Having ploughed my way through the 200 page Revised Negotiating Text some months back, I look forward to reading any document from a politician under 20 pages. The 13 pages of Danish Text, a 'secret text' that almost everyone had heard about, but until yesterday few had actually seen, only proves the old adage that dynamite may well come in small packages. 

Within the pages are articles which may undermine any emerging, fragile consensus on a final agreement here and even worse, put developing countries on the back-foot, seriously disadvantaging them. 

Fortunately, the paper has no status in the formal UN process as the Danes were not mandated to draw up such a paper. Phew! However, in a strongly worded press statement, the President of the Sudan, speaking on behalf of the G77 and China, lambasted the writers of the text on several sound points. Still, the old hands at the negotiations seem nonplussed.  This to-and-fro is just part of the game, they say, so let’s not be too worried about these developments for now.

Protests against Canada’s tar sands

Canada's recalcitrance on the issue of mitigation targets can be explained in part by its tar sands, which are said to hold more than 170 billion barrels of recoverable oil, second only to Saudi Arabia's reserves. 

According to Greenpeace Canada's website, "buried below the Boreal Forest of northern Alberta is a source of oil known as the tar sands. Deposits of tar sands are spread out over 138 000 sq. km of land. Until recently, it was too expensive and complicated to extract the tar sands to produce oil, but over the past few years increases in oil prices and technological changes have made it possible, and profitable." 

Obviously environmentalists are very unhappy with this idea and the Canadian Youth Delegation (CYD) have brought their protest to Copenhagen. The CYD demo is available on youtube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asubKAt1JQI&feature=youtube_gdata.

Pacific survival stories

Another youth group a world apart -- on my way around the exhibits I came across these young people telling personal stories of what it is like to live on a small island. They’re from the group Project Survival Pacific - http://youthprojectsurvival.org/ - and each person told a personal story of how Climate Change is affecting their day-to-day existence on their islands. Stirring stuff, reminding one that islands aren't just for sunny holidays for those of us from the North...

Kim Coetzee for Green Energy Republic