Intense and important meetings start at State Department

For those of us who are prognosticating on the likelihood of a Copenhagen deal, the place to be is C Street in DC (that is where the State Department is). If the major emitters can hash something out, there is still hope for a deal. If this group can not produce something tangible by the end of next week, when the G20 meetings are held in Pittsburgh, then he likelihood of a Copenhagen deal goes down to extremely tiny.

Jake's blog on US position on international provisions

Jake Schmidt is again covering items important, quickly, and succinctly. In today's blog (hyperlink in title to grist.org), Jake shows how the lead US negotiator, Todd Stern, spoke in front of a House committee on the importance of the international provisions in the Waxman-Markey bill, including REDD.

Indonesia's REDD rules some years away

This story is quite important. Everyone realizes the importance of engaging the private sector, but rules for REDD projects will be needed at the national level. As this story and example show, REDD rules (particularly around carbon rights and benefit sharing) will take some time to develop. In the meantime, investors continue to be frustrated. This large new class of assets is likely to come on-line in both US and UNFCCC legislation. But without clear guidance on how private monies can be leveraged for conservation, it is likely that there will be continued enthusiasm, but little skin-in-the-game for private-financed REDD emission reductions. It should be noted that most other developing countries with substantial rates of deforestation are not as far along the process as Indonesia. Some countries essentially prohibited pre-compliant REDD projects from taking off.

Good Grist.org article on Copenhagen (100 things...)

This article has lots of good tidbits for anyone planning to go to Copenhagen or just following the talks.

In the article you'll find some good policy links (to good critical coverage of the politics behind the scenes) and absurdities (it is OK for women to swim topless in pools in Copenhagen, there is no plan yet to deal with a swine flu outbreak at the talks). Perhaps most frightening....? #19 according to the list says there will only be about one hour of sunlight per day during the talks.

TFG will be sending a COP15 delegation of about 25 people, mostly volunteer scientists and policy advocates. At latest count, our team will be coming from 8 countries, speaking probably 15 languages.

Nigerian illegal logging task force gets serious

This is one of the most interesting tropical forest stories of our times. Cross River State is finally getting very (some say, too) serious about stopping illegal logging. The Tropical Forest Group is working with local organizations to bring more stable international support to their heroic efforts to curtail illegal logging in one of Africa's most important forests.

Radio sparring on tropical forest carbon credits

I had a fun but tough radio interview with Green Patriot Radio about the concept of can and trade legislation as well as the particulars of REDD credits. The link is in the title and the interview is about 2/3 the way through the program.

Brazilian researcher calls global deforestation "grossly overestimated"

Solid numbers for tropical deforestation are notoriously hard to come by. The director of Brazil's National Institute for Space Research in the article (hyperlinked in title) speaks of deforestation rates (and thus carbon emissions) much lower than prevailing estimates. While he may be right, deforestation numbers may be lower, there is usually more to statements from Brazil on deforestation than meet they eye. This could be part of a strategy by Brazil to frame the debate on REDD in Copenhagen. One should also remember that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the authoritative international body on climate change science, believes that approximately 17.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions come from land use change in the tropics. So for a leading Brazilian researcher to be quoted as saying,

"I'm not in favor of conspiracy theories," Camara (the Director of the Institute) told Reuters in a telephone interview on Friday. "But I should only state that the two people who like these figures are developed nations, who would like to overstress the contribution of developing nations to global carbon, and of course environmentalists."

...is probably a good reason to be skeptical.