Last week, I heard presentations from the chief climate person at the World Bank on the outlook for international agreement in Cancun, a Harvard economist on the national outlook under the new Congress, and an MIT systems dynamicist on an online model of climate change anybody can play, C-LEARN http://forio.com/...
Andrew Steer from the World Bank said that Cancun was not likely to make much progress (though not in so many words) but that there were already a lot of national and regional programs in motion. Climate change is part of most of the projects the Bank is now considering.
The economist, Robert Stavins, said the next Congress is likely to do nothing, at best, on climate change (though not in so many words). He also said that there were already a lot of municipal, state, and regional programs in motion.
John Sterman, the business and management professor, demonstrated the C-LEARN and the C-ROADS http://climateinteractive.org/... simulations. C-LEARN is designed for the general public and C-ROADS for negotiators. He said that even a majority of MIT engineering students don't understand the dynamics of the climate system but that playing the simulations could be a powerful learning tool.
If neither international agreement nor national policy are forthcoming, we have to build a climate policy ourselves. DIY climate policy. Ain't nobody else. Yes, keep lobbying the Congresscritters and write those LtEs (go, Warren!!!) but we need to organize energy fairs, weatherization and solar barnraisings http://www.heetma.com , simple solar PSAs on youtube, Appropedia ( http://www.appropedia.org/ ) and Global Swadeshi http://globalswadeshi.ning.com/ open source global experiments in sustainable living and climate reclamation......
Plus everything else we can do. And, as the song goes, we got to do it for ourselves.