Measured Insights
The latest blog posts from our research projects.
Undergraduates Present MOU to lead U.S. and China negotiators at UN Climate Summit in Cancun
In the hectic hallway traffic of the Moon Palace Resort, where the UN climate negotiations have been underway since last week, Washington University in St. Louis undergraduates Jiakun Zhao and John Delurey met with lead Chinese negotiator Su Wei. And by a stroke of luck, Jonathan Pershing, a senior U.S. negotiator, happened to walk by in a fortuitous moment reflective of the U.S. and China’s softer and more conciliatory tone in the talks.
CPR (Climate Public Relations): China’s attempt to resuscitate its image in Cancun
“China is still very hurt from last year’s Copenhagen talks,” the lead of the Chinese youth delegation, Lina Li, told me yesterday on one of the many buses shuttling this year’s participants at the UN Climate Summit in Cancun. Her statement was in reaction to what she felt were unfair media accounts placing blame on China, which – as a developing country – she and many Chinese feel have already shouldered more than its share of the global burden to address climate change.
Google’s Earth Engine Officially Launched at COP-16 in Cancun
While climate negotiators were busy discussing the role of forests in the Cancun climate negotiations, Google was launching its Earth Engine - a practical tool to help countries obtain information about their forests, which are critical carbon sinks, easily and...
Sectoral Approaches in the Chinese cement sector featured in China Environment Forum, vol. 11
Our piece, “Commentary: Sector-based Approaches to Measuring and Managing Greenhouse Gas Emissions: China’s Cement Industry,” by Angel Hsu, Neelam Singh, and Ranping Song was finally published in Vol. 11 of the China Environment Forum, which features a plethora of articles related to clean energy and climate change in China.
Students from the U.S. and China Collaborate on MOU to be Presented at COP-16
Walking away from last year’s Copenhagen negotiations disillusioned, youth from China and the United States decided to not let last year’s disappointing talks and an unreleased joint statement be the last the world heard (or didn’t) of them. Instead, they decided that if they expected their respective governments to cooperate on climate change, dialogue needed to happen first amongst themselves.
Another ‘What to Expect from Cancun’ post
While expectations for the upcoming United Nations climate talks in Cancun have been intentionally kept low, China is doing the opposite – raising the bar for developing countries that have no obligation under current international regimes such as the Kyoto Protocol to address climate change, while urging developed countries to step up to the plate.
Preview of COP-16 in Cancun at the GSLF
Today I was asked last minute to fill in for someone on a panel that discussed global cooperation for the UN climate summit in Cancun, Mexico for the Global Sustainable Leaders Forum. According to the GSLF's website, the purpose of the forum is to "develop future...
Account of the Tianjin Climate Talks
Coming away from this past week of negotiations at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change meeting in Tianjin, the sense is certainly that time is not on our side. While delegates from more than 150 countries were charged the task of whittling down options on the table to prepare for heads of state and ministers in Cancun, the talks concluded with dishearteningly little progress, a widening divide between developed and developing countries, and resurfacing tensions between the U.S. and China on climate change.
Of Pigs and Mirrors – The breakdown of the US-China dialogue in Tianjin
The UNFCCC intersessional talks in Tianjin concluded with somewhat disheartening headlines of little progress, a widening divide between developed and developing countries and credibility slowly seeping from the multilateral process. One theme that dominated media in the waning days of the negotiations, however, centred on friction between the United States and China, whose differences led to the Chinese lead negotiator calling the US a “pig preening itself in a mirror”.
Tweeting from Tianjin, courtesy of the NY Times
Angel Hsu scaled the Great Firewall of China to report on U.S. Deputy Climate Envoy Jonathan Pershing’s dim sum outing.
“Went to have dinner at Ding Tai Fung in #Tianjin. Guess who was there? US lead negotiator Jonathan Pershing. Can’t get away from that guy!” Hsu, who tweets by the handle @ecoangelhsu, told her 352 followers.
