Payroll skeptics!

The Climate Action Network Europe (CAN-E), a network of NGOs, has issued a report accusing major European companies of donating funds disproportionately to candidates in the US Senate election who are known for their denial of climate change.

Among the donors are chemical manufacturers Bayer and BASF, oil company BP, energy provider GDF/Suez and steelmaker ArcelorMittal.

According to publicly available figures, the eight companies examined by CAN gave a total of $306,100 (219,400 euros) to Senate candidates, of which 78 percent went either to known climate change deniers or to senators who voted against the Obama administration's cap-and-trade legislation, seen by activists as a major contribution to the fight against climate change.

This is the news from Climate Action Network (the quotation is from the website of Deutsche Welle.

I can respect people who can be skeptic to science and want to try the scientific statements in a search for truth. That is the method of all good science. Hypothesis are right until they are proven wrong. But to keep a point of view with reasons that is more about what we want the world to be are not especially smart or honest. It would of course be much more convenient if you just could go on with business as usual but this not make the lie a truth.

Now it is even worse when you get paid to be skeptic when you have influences on the political decision making. This seem to be the case and that those who kept USA from taking steps to a more progressive climate policy and to take steps forward in the international climate policy discussion where getting the big bucks from big industry. It is a shame. And it seems like the elections i USA coming weeks will slow down the climate process in one of the most important countries of the world. And it will be done with money from the business world. Why cant they see that the future needs another way of thinking!

But we have to trust the word; The truth shall set you free.

Not to brilliant, mr President!

(Reuters) - Climate change is not a threat and the consequences of global warming will not be catastrophic, the President of the Czech Republic said on Tuesday.

Vaclav Klaus is a vocal sceptic on the topic of global warming. He published a book in 2007 in which he said global warming had turned into a new religion, an ideology that threatens to undermine freedom and the world's economic and social order.

"Global warming in the last 150 years was modest and future warming and its consequences will not be dangerous or catastrophic. It doesn't look like a threat we should respond to," he told a lecture in London on Tuesday.

Now, this is not so clever Mr President! You act more or less like the good prophets of the time of the old testament. They said everything is fine. Don´t change anything. But those prophets were never remembered. They were just there to make the world easier and smooth for those with power.

No mr President this is not a new religion, but you seems to keep up with the old religion that have devastated the planet for the last centuries; the cult of mammon. I think you better come to your senses and understand that climate-research of today gives us information that we have to respond to. And then we need to get "religious" in that sense that we have to act for the most vulnerable. Just as the old testament prophets said in the old testament.

EU takes one step forward - and a bit closer to were they been!

Good news are not so frequent when it comes to climate change negotiations. But today we have one.
EU was very proactive in 2007 during the UNFCCC negotiations at Bali but one year later they were very defensive and withdraw their ambitions.
Today the good news is that EU is going to Cancun for the COP16 negotiations with the ambitions to prolong the Kyoto protocol.
In these days after the breakdown i Copenhagen this is good news.
The problem is that the world need to do much more than what was in the Kyoto protocol. And that has been known since the Kyoto protocol was formulated in the nineties.
But in these days we have to celebrate everything that is not a step backwards. Even a step back to original ambitions is a good step.
Now, let´s hope that EU raises their bid in Cancun and go for a 30% cut of emissions to 2020 to challenge the other nations in Cancun.

Climate change in the arctic - a risk for geopolitical conflicts

Climate change is not only about environment. It is about food, water, equity and lifestyles. All issues that I have tried to address on this blog.
But the implications of climate change is also about peace.
Due to change in the climatic systems we will probably see a diminishing ice shed of the Arctic. This is highlighted in an article in the Guardian today. That will lead to possibilities to get natural resources that has not been in reach for the different states before. So the tensions between Russia, USA Canada Norway and others will be a new problem that we already can see some signs on.
So if you want to create peace - save the climate and let the natural resources, especially the oil, be untouched for some more years. Go for renewable energy and act for peace.

101010 - a mustard grain

Yesterday the 101010 campaign took place. A global work party for action to lower the emissions of greenhouse gases.
Many churches around the world joined the party and thousands and thousands events around the world occurred.
This is great! And even if this was not a headline on the news in northern Europe it was at least a great step for all those that participated. Even if the decision-makers of the world did not act in Copenhagen and seems very sleepy for the Cancun meeting later this year things like 101010 raise the awareness in the context were it happens.
If Jesus referred to the mustard grain as a picture for how the good things grow. From small things big things come.
I hope that 101010 is a mustard grain that, together with other actions will grow and we will create another world, a sustainable and just world. And we will do it together. One humanity and one world.