In preparing for my trip to the international climate negotiations in Bali I
packed suits and a briefcase stuffed with science papers and a laptop.
After today I feel like I should have just brought a bull horn and some
spray paint. Maybe its not too late to find them...

This evening Canada had the dubious honor of receiving the Fossil Award of
the Day for a leaked memo that was even more outrageous than Harpers
comments in the press the day before. In the memo Canadian delegates are
instructed to agree to nothing short of binding targets for all countries.
The memo goes on to propose that Canada push for a "special circumstances "
addendum. These positions are designed to derail the negotiations in Bali.
The Harper government knows full well China will never agree to this and
these positions leave Canada with a very convenient excuse to do nothing.
It is abundantly clear that the elephant in the room is the tar sands.
Canada is doing everything it can to protect the rapid and highly
destructive development of the largest fossil fuel project in the world.

So lets review. Two thirds of Canadians support strong action on climate
change and our government is busy becoming a vociferous eco-pariah at Bali.
One can only hope that the international condemnation raining down on the
Harper government will embarrass them enough to back away from these
positions and start to build some constructive dialogue towards solutions.
But its not looking good.

On a another issue ForestEthics released a great report today on the carbon
stored in British Columbia's forests and the importance of including forest
conversation in the provinces climate strategy. Check it out on our site.

Tomorrow we'll be doing a press conference and panel discussion on Canada's
forests here at Bali. There is a lot of discussion here about tropical
forests but few people know that Canada's forests store more carbon than any
other terrestrial ecosystem or that our logging contributes as much
greenhouse gas emissions as all the cars on the road. Hopefully we can
spark some discussion on the changes needed to the forest rules so that we
can ensure that forests in the north and the south are conserved for both
climate mitigation and adaptation. It just seems so crazy that all the
science presented here points towards the importance of protecting ecosysten
services, biodiversity and primary forests yet as a country we've protected
less than ten percent. Here's to hoping we can spark a conversation to
change that.

But just in case the Canadian delegation isn't listening perhaps I should go
look for that bullhorn and spray paint...