IISD VIDEO: Philippines delegate Naderev Saño COP19 Warsaw from IISD Reporting Services on Vimeo.

The full transcript is here.

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I thought it was important to share these 15 minutes with you now as the UN climate talks start tomorrow, even though I recorded this interview for the next (18 Nov) show. This is Asad Rehman, head of the climate and energy programme at Friends of the Earth, speaking before he left for Warsaw. Here’s a transcript with some links:

This is such a good summary of the upcoming UN climate talks in Warsaw (11-22 November 2013) that I just had to post it. After the failure of COP15 (Copenhagen, 2009) it seemed like the UN climate talks were dead on their feet. But the latest IPCC report has given a renewed urgency to finding a global solution to this global problem. To do that we need to listen to the voice of civil society in the majority world (“Global South”) and move beyond the failed paradigms pushed by the rich world. This is their perspective in a press release from Climate Justice Info dated 4 November 2013.

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In this month’s show we continue to look at solutions, but with renewed urgency in the light of the latest IPCC report.

• Colin Hines, founder of the Green New Deal Group explains how we can finance the transition to a Zero Carbon Britain
• Natalie Bennett, leader of the Green Party outlines her programme for government
• Cat Hobbs, founder of the We Own It campaign tells us why the railways would be better under public ownership and
• Louise Hazan, campaigner for the Fossil Free UK campaign tells us how a new divestment campaign has the power to cut the dirty energy companies down to size.

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Can we power the UK and the world using renewable energy and wise energy use? Yes we can! is the answer given by the latest iteration of Zero Carbon Britain and the newly produced Two Energy Futures report. We explore these alternative energy scenarios in detail in interviews with Alice Hooker-Stroud, research co-ordinator for ZCB at the Centre for Alternative Technology and Danny Chivers, a lead author on TEF.

We’re standing at a crossroads. It’s time for humanity to make a choice. Do we sit back and allow fossil fuel companies and oil-friendly governments to dig, drill and frack us into a dark and dirty future? Or do we stand together with communities around the world to stop these extreme energy projects, and head down a different path into a safer, fairer energy future? – Two Energy Futures

The latest version of Zero Carbon Britain features two new pieces of research. The first addresses the variability of supply and demand and what we need to do to keep the lights on in a 100% renewable energy scenario. The second is about how we feed ourselves well, using the land available to us in the UK.

Two Energy Futures takes the Zero Carbon Britain blueprint as its starting point along with mainstream figures for the amount of harvestable renewable energy that is available globally. It contrasts this cleaner, fairer energy future with the best scenario that governments and corporations are currently offering us – a world full of extreme energy and catastrophic climate change.

Utopias aren’t chimeras, they are the most noble dreams that people have. Dreams that through struggle can and must be turned into reality. – Juan Manuel Sanchez Gordillo, Mayor of Marinaleda, (quoted in The Village Against the World by Dan Hancox)

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Third of three programmes produced during the Reclaim the Power camp in support of the Balcombe blockade against fracking. Contents:

• Our new ten-year old star presenter Freddy takes us on a tour of the Reclaim the Power camp
• Collette from Balcombe village talks about the Solidarity Sunday march
• An arrestee from the community support camp returns to the camp
• Andi from Disabled People Against Cuts explains why DPAC are supporting RTP
• Jordi reads a statement by UNANIMA International presented to the United Nations Human Rights Commission on the threat that fracking poses to the human right to safe clean water and sanitation
• Samba band; thoughts on the night before the day of action; RTP ceilidh band
• Report from the day of action – includes an interview with Caroline Lucas MP sitting down as part of the blockade prior to her arrest; three offsite actions at Cuadrilla HQ, fracking PR company Bell Pottinger’s office and Francis Maude MP’s constituency office; sit downs, lock-ons, diamond arm-lock formation; rousing chants; violent police reaction to peaceful blockade even in the presence of vulnerable people and an MP; fall out and final thoughts from Ali and Andi; bagpipe player.

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Second of three programmes produced during the Reclaim the Power camp in support of the Balcombe blockade against fracking. Contents:

• Balcombe villagers speak out – we’re fighting not just for this village but for the whole of the country; fracking will not bring down energy bills; sometimes we feel we’re better informed than government ministers; what Cuadrilla will be doing during the test drill; what will happen with the waste water; the US experience; why we support the blockaders; fracking and local democracy; are recent water discolouration incidents in Balcombe connected with fracking?; we’ve exhausted all democractic means – all we have left is direct action; find out what’s happening in your area
• Freddy finds out what the kids at RTP think
• Jamie Kelsey-Fry from the media team on how RTP, fracking and the dash for gas is joining the dots between different issues
• Reclaim the Power camp second plenary – update from the action fairies; international solidarity message from Ghana; Tina from RAFF on network of anti-fracking campaigns and cross-country solidarity; anti-fracking campaigns in Algeria and the importance of global solidarity; the impacts of high gas prices on fuel poverty; why pensioners support the campaign against fracking and the dash for gas; and scientist Simon Lewis on climate change

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First of three programmes produced during the Reclaim the Power camp in support of the Balcombe blockade against fracking. Contents:

• Intro
• Voices from the community support camp
• Reclaim the Power camp opening plenary with No Dash for Gas and Vanessa Vine from Frack Free Sussex amongst others – why we occupied West Burton gas-fired power station; why we moved RTP to Balcombe; why direct action?

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Very happy to be able to share this keynote speech with you from Arts Admin’s recent Imagining the Great Transition event.

In the wake of his recent book Cancel the Apocalypse, New Economics Foundation fellow Andrew Simms plays Fantasy Economics and imagines what a country might look like if it was run in the public interest rather than in the interest of the corporations and bankers. Bold, visionary and studded with real world examples that are happening now, Simms’ erudite and witty attack the doctrine of “There is No Alternative” bristles with a barely concealed venom. Recorded by Climate Radio for Arts Admin on Saturday 22 June 2013.

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It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World. European consumption patterns are already responsible for over a third of of global deforestation which is bad news for the climate, biodiversity and forest-dependent communities. And yet the UK and Europe have now decided to burn trees to create electricity. Why are policy makers ignoring the advice of their own scientists which says this will be worse for climate change than burning coal? Where might millions upon millions of tonnes of trees come from and what implications might this have for exacerbating land grabs and land conflicts?

Featuring:

• Harry Huyton, Head of climate and energy policy, RSPB
• Rachel Smolker, Biofuelwatch US, Energy Justice Network
• Almuth Ernsting, Biofuelwatch UK
• Giuseppe Nastasi, legal advisor at Client Earth