Climate Change

Addressing Climate Change for Sustainable and Profitable Business

February 27 - February 29, 2008
Denver, Colorado

The rules of business are changing. Climate change is at the height of media attention and has become an important part of current business trends. The 2008 Sustainable Opportunities Summit will explore how companies can financially benefit from becoming more engaged in addressing climate change.

As evidence mounts that human activity is contributing to global warming, many leading businesses are taking meaningful steps to address the climate challenge. In the process, they are realizing significant opportunities by creating new sought-after products, realigning the way they operate, and reducing their energy costs. Companies are finding that managing the risk of climate change and lowering their impact on the environment allows them to gain investor confidence, reduce their exposure to non-compliance, and increase their profits.

In a carbon-constrained world, the political, economic and legal rules governing commerce are certain to change. Colorado’s Governor Ritter has made a commitment to establish a New Energy Economy. Policy, legislative and regulatory shifts are all being considered at the state and national levels.

The 2008 Sustainable Opportunities Summit brings together corporate leaders, entrepreneurs, and venture capitalists from across Colorado and the nation in a unique forum to assess the growing opportunities created by climate change.

THIS WEEK in Eugene, Oregon and the surrounding areas, there has been a lot of talk about the weather. But not in a mundane fashion, such as when you are having your gas pumped (remember that 'round here, you cannot pump your own gas, it is all full serve!) and offhandedly offer the station worker an observation about the local and eternal wintry curtain of rain.

No, the talk has been more along the lines of "what is going on with this weather?" Because the past couple of winters have brought an atypical amount of snow to this city west of the Cascade Mountains. In fact, 2008 has seen the most snowfall to hit Eugene, Oregon, since 1996.

Here's your faithful Street Team 08 Oregon rep with a short visual presentation of the latest strange winter to visit us.

Yesterday's climate-change debate between current Senator Kerry and former Speaker Gingrich seems to have earned a big raise for all concerned.

It raised awareness of the urgent need to deal with the science of global climate change in a responsible manner.

It raised questions of why smart people from both sides of the issues can't work together more often to find mutually-acceptable solutions to common problems.

It raised the bar for reasonable, rational, respectful discourse between persons from different partisan political parties.

It raised eyebrows on the part of pundits who had been predicting a 'smackdown' but got a hug fest instead.

It raised the hopes of those who believe progressive politics is finally on the rebound in America.

And it raised the hackles of arch-conservatives who bitterly accused their erstwhile standard-bearer of selling out to those terrible tree-hugging leftists.

(I especially like that last aspect of it -- let the über-right wingnuts go choke on their own vile bile. Sorry, you whackjobs, Gingrich's goin' green. Deal with it.)

John Kerry and Newt Gingrich are debating the government's role in dealing with global climate change this morning at 10 am EDT, and enviromentally-minded netizens will be blogging about it in real time.

The debate, hosted by New York University’s John Brademas Center for the Study of Congress, will take place in the Russell Senate Office Building and will be broadcast live by C-Span and simultaneously webcast at http://c-span.org.

As TheHill.com notes, this event ought to be a thinking-man's matchup well worth watching:

Kerry, who bowed out of the 2008 presidential race earlier this year, has been dubbed an “environmental champion” by the non-partisan League of Conservation Voters. His website touts a long record of fighting for the environment. He and his wife Teresa Heinz Kerry also recently wrote This Moment on Earth, which addresses climate change and preserving the environment.

"Newt’s a guy who has spent a lot of time wrestling with climate change and the environment. He reads about it, he teaches about it, he writes about it,” Kerry said Thursday. “We don’t see eye to eye about everything, obviously, but that’s what makes for a good debate.

“As a father, when someone tells me that within the next decade, if we don't deal with global warming, our children and grandchildren may deal with global catastrophe, that tells me I damn well better do whatever I can to help make Washington deal with this responsibly,” Kerry added. “We need these good old-fashioned debates and forums and discussions to get everyone thinking creatively on both sides of the aisle.”

John Kerry and Newt Gingrich are debating the government's role in dealing with global climate change this morning at 10 am EDT, and enviromentally-minded netizens will be blogging about it in real time.

The debate, hosted by New York University’s John Brademas Center for the Study of Congress, will take place in the Russell Senate Office Building and will be broadcast live by C-Span and simultaneously webcast at http://c-span.org.

As TheHill.com notes, this event ought to be a thinking-man's matchup well worth watching:

Kerry, who bowed out of the 2008 presidential race earlier this year, has been dubbed an “environmental champion” by the non-partisan League of Conservation Voters. His website touts a long record of fighting for the environment. He and his wife Teresa Heinz Kerry also recently wrote This Moment on Earth, which addresses climate change and preserving the environment.

"Newt’s a guy who has spent a lot of time wrestling with climate change and the environment. He reads about it, he teaches about it, he writes about it,” Kerry said Thursday. “We don’t see eye to eye about everything, obviously, but that’s what makes for a good debate.

“As a father, when someone tells me that within the next decade, if we don't deal with global warming, our children and grandchildren may deal with global catastrophe, that tells me I damn well better do whatever I can to help make Washington deal with this responsibly,” Kerry added. “We need these good old-fashioned debates and forums and discussions to get everyone thinking creatively on both sides of the aisle.”

I have discussed the craziness and duplicity of the denial lobby before (e.g. here). And I have been just beginning to discuss the need to move on, to evolve the discussion, from a supposed "debate" over whether global warming is happening (it is!) to a discussion of solutions. Personally, I do hope to help evolve the discussion. But sadly, the denial lobby continues its supid, suicidal crusade against science.

The latest salvo of the denial lobby was in England, though I am starting to hear eager references to it here in the US from our own denial lobbyists. On Thursday the 8th, the London TV Channel 4 aired a program titled "The Great Global Warming Swindle". This program turns out to be largely devoid of integrity and intelligence and, to quote two climatologists commenting on Real Climate, "it just repeated the usual specious claims we hear all the time." This program is just one more pack of denial lobby lies.

Real Climate has a detailed refutation and discussion of the Great Channel 4 Swindle. But what is even more interesting, is that one of the scientists used by Channel 4 in their program to supposedly counter global warming claims, Carl Wunsch, has written into Real Climate expressing his feeling of being swindled by Channel 4. He feels completely misrepresented by Channel 4. Here are excerpts from his response:

For most Americans, hearing about global warming involves a fair amount of taking things on faith. When Rush Limbaugh blatantly lied and claimed that the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide was due to the Mt. Pinatubo eruption, how would most people know he was telling a lie based on a something like 10-fold overestimate in the amount of carbon Pinatubo was ejecting and on a conflation of two different kinds of carbon: carbon dioxide and particulates.

When Al Gore tells us what's up, most people would consider it just as reliable as Rush Limbaugh's lies. But I am lucky. First of all, I do keep up on the scientific literature, including climate research to some extent. But my ability to understand the details is limited because I am a biologist.

But my wife is a climatologist. So when I hear Al Gore, either live, as I was lucky to do some years back, or watching An Inconvenient Truth right now on Showtime, I am watching it with my wife and her friends, who all know the science behind it backwards and forwards. They know this material the same way you and I might know addition and subtraction. They know the facts Al Gore is talking about.

Both times I have heard Al Gore's presentation on Global Warming, I have one or more fact checkers right next to me. My fact checkers pretty much approve Al Gore's message in its entirety.

Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth is not controversial. That is what we have to realize. It is not based on controversial data. It is based on solid science.

Democratic Assemblywoman Linda Stender has a great invitation for anyone who wants to go from New Jersey to Washington, D.C. to rally in front of the United States Capitol for action on Global Warming. Here's her invitation:

Please join me on Tuesday, March 20th as I bring New Jersey's effort to combat Global Warming to Washington!

I invite you to ride along with me on a bus to Washington, DC where I will be joining the thousands of concerned citizens from around the nation for a rally at the United States Capitol. Your voice will add strength to our message-Global Warming is Real and the Time to Act is Now!

I am proud to be the leader of New Jersey's effort to combat Global Warming by sponsoring "The Global Warming Response Act." This legislation will make New Jersey one of the first states in the nation to establish mandatory reductions on green house gas emissions. I am equally proud to have the opportunity to address the crowd in Washington to tell them about our efforts.

After the rally, you will be provided with a unique opportunity to meet with your Representative in Congress. This is our chance to make sure reversing climate change with a responsible energy agenda is at the top of their To-Do list.

New Jersey has set an example for the nation to follow. Please join me on the 20th and lend your support to this most important cause.

WHEN: March 20, 2007, the bus to Washington will be leaving from the Short Hills Mall at 6 am. The rally begins at 11 am and ends at 1 pm. You will then have the opportunity to meet with your Congressman and then depart from DC around 4 pm.

The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), a national nonprofit organization established in 1967, has helped forge a cross-sector alliance between corporate and environmental leaders, with the intent to achieve economically viable reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.

The group, the United States Climate Action Partnership (USCAP), is thus far composed of 10 dominant corporations and 6 leading environmental groups, including such big names as Alcoa, General Electric, and DuPont, as well as EDF and the National Resources Defense Council.

The alliance's proposal, "A Call For Action" [pdf], requests immediate federal government limits on greenhouse gas emissions and the creation of market-based incentives to achieve those limits. There is a clear need for such cap-and-trade requirements to be mandatory, so that early adopters will be rewarded by being able to stay competitive in relevant markets.

USCAP motivates its incentives with the NAS survey result:

In June 2005, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences joined with the scientific academies of ten other countries in stating that "the scientific understanding of climate change is now sufficiently clear to justify nations taking prompt actions."