Archbishop Desmond Tutu Offers Hope During Suspended Climate Conference

As the Hopenhagen Ambassador, I'm supposed to be spreading and collecting messages of hope. But to be honest, it isn't easy being hopeful right now.

According to a recent post by Andy Revkin of the New York Times, the pledges that countries are making right now likely corresponds to almost four degrees Celsius of warming by the end of the century. The IPCC says that four degrees of warming would reduce crop yields around the world and result in the extinction of perhaps more than forty percent of all plants and animals. Sea level would likely rise by more than three feet, forcing hundreds of millions of people to abandon their homes. Almost all countries agree that we should keep warming under 2 degrees, yet the current pledges don't line up with this goal.

Nobel Peace Prize winning Archbishop Desmond Tutu spoke at a rally today during "Hopenhagen Live." I attended the rally, where Desmond talked about the injustice of climate change. To give you a sense of the event, below is the first 28 seconds of the speech where Desmond greets the audience.

During the press conference that afternoon, reporters asked Desmond questions such as "What would you say to Obama in an elevator?" or "Do you think everyone in the rally yesterday was on your side?" I asked Desmond, "What gives you hope that we can solve climate change?" Watch below to see where Desmond puts his faith.

Tomorrow I'll interview some of the leaders of the movement Desmond describes.

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Comments

[econ1]

If nothing is done about population growth....this is going to be either impossible or very, very hard.

[KatK]

Absolutely correct. The exponential population growth is at the root of every environmental problem. Now, with so many of our resources destroyed to make houses or grow crops and so many mouths to feed, our standard of living is plummeting. Our children and grandchildren will be too busy fighting over food and water to worry about a standard of living. If care at all about future generations and animals on the earth, controlling our population should be our number one priority right now,

[994runner]

Isn't it funny that the hero of Obama's science czar John Holdren is Harrison Brown - the same man who called for the doubling CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere to spur plant growth only around 50 years ago.
People need to stop believing the hype and stop getting their information from bureaucratic agencies pretending to have true scientific merit such as the EPA, UNEP and the UN's IPCC and begin to look a little further into why we are being misled.
So the villain in all of this is CO2 - the same “rare gas” of which all life depends. That’s right; there’s only one source of carbon for all life, CO2 in the atmosphere. If CO2 is truly a “pollutant” then why do we use it in industry, manufacturing, medicine and agriculture and in our everyday lives such as in beverages, dry ice, CO2 extinguishers, pneumatic tools and the list goes on.
Are people really this naive to believe this garbage? Everyone, don't exhale!!!!

[PWM]

Global Warming

"Yet, Arctic sea ice continues to dwindle —as do glaciers across the globe; average temperatures have increased by 0.7 degree Celsius in the past century and the last decade is the warmest in the instrumental record ; spring has sprung forward , affecting everything from flower blossoms to animal migrations; and the concentrations of atmospheric greenhouse gases continue to rise, reaching 387 parts per million in 2009, a rise of 30 percent since 1750.

"Nor has the fundamental physics of the greenhouse effect changed: CO2 in the atmosphere continues to trap heat that would otherwise slip into space, as was established by Irish scientist John Tyndall in 1859 . "There is a natural greenhouse effect, that's what keeps the planet livable," noted climate modeler Gavin Schmidt of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) during a Friday conference call with reporters organized by the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank. "Without it, we'd be 33 degrees Celsius colder than we are. That's been known for hundreds of years."

Source Scientific American http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=scientists-respond-to-climategate-controversy

"The British Antarctic Survey fully supports the major conclusions of the IPCC 2007 Fourth Assessment Report (AR4)...Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in human-induced greenhouse gas concentrations.

Source British Antarctic Survey http://www.antarctica.ac.uk/bas_research/science/climate/position-statement.php

[994runner]

As I said in my previous post any information referenced to beureaucratic agencies isn't worth the paper it's written on.
Since east anglia and many other disgraced so-called scientists were fixing recent data to help push an agenda this data is now worthless.

You want to see real data - do a google search for "vostok ice core" and enlighten yourself.

I won't offer you misleading quotes, I'll only point you in the right direction and the rest is up to you.

[larry278]

Archbishop Tutu probably is the sole voice of sanity re: climate change who isn't beholden to the so called powers that be on earth. It's to be hoped that Archbishop Tutu's proposals for controlling the disaster of global warming becomes a guide & all the earth's nations adopt Archbishop Tutu's proposals & suggestions to control global warming to prevent the catestrophic(sic?) flooding of the earths low country.

[994runner]

So, by your reasoning tutu is an expert on global warming, sorry, climate change as al gore is?

[PWM]

Global Warming

"Yet, Arctic sea ice continues to dwindle —as do glaciers across the globe; average temperatures have increased by 0.7 degree Celsius in the past century and the last decade is the warmest in the instrumental record ; spring has sprung forward , affecting everything from flower blossoms to animal migrations; and the concentrations of atmospheric greenhouse gases continue to rise, reaching 387 parts per million in 2009, a rise of 30 percent since 1750.

"Nor has the fundamental physics of the greenhouse effect changed: CO2 in the atmosphere continues to trap heat that would otherwise slip into space, as was established by Irish scientist John Tyndall in 1859 . "There is a natural greenhouse effect, that's what keeps the planet livable," noted climate modeler Gavin Schmidt of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) during a Friday conference call with reporters organized by the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank. "Without it, we'd be 33 degrees Celsius colder than we are. That's been known for hundreds of years."

Source Scientific American http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=scientists-respond-to-climategate-controversy

"The British Antarctic Survey fully supports the major conclusions of the IPCC 2007 Fourth Assessment Report (AR4)...Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in human-induced greenhouse gas concentrations.

Source British Antarctic Survey http://www.antarctica.ac.uk/bas_research/science/climate/position-statement.php

[AJ39]

I know there are more important things at stake; nonetheless I must say that I was put-off by your calling Desmond Tutu by his first name. Are you on a first name basis with him?

[hankelvis]

"On June 15, 2006, President George W. Bush, pursuant to his authority under the Antiquities Act of 1906, issued Proclamation 8031 and created the largest marine conservation area in the world. The Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine National Monument encompasses 139,793 square miles and just surpasses Australia’s 128,960-square-mile Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. The Antiquities Act authorizes presidents “to declare by public proclamation historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest that are situated upon the lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United States to be national monuments.” (16 U.S.C. § 431). The area was originally slated for designation as a national marine sanctuary, but President Bush, apparently inspired by Voyage to Kure, Jean-Michel Cousteau’s stunning documentary on the beauty of the Islands and the perils facing them, wanted to act more quickly."

http://nsgl.gso.uri.edu/masgc/masgcg06006.pdf
http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2009/01/20090106-9.html

[Middle Blue]

Why do they want cash?

[BCALM]

"Solve Climate Change"?

[ElectricFuture]

Climate change is nothing new... it's been happening on planet Earth for the last 4 billion years.

[SPQR1775]

WE WILL ALL "BE THE CHANGE WE WANT TO SEE IN THE WORLD" PRESIDENT OBAMA, 2008, YES WE CAN AND WE WILL!

[deBeer]

Desmond Tutu said the people were standing not in warm weather? Opsseeeee