CLaSP Students Part of U-M Delegation to United Nations Climate Conference
Climate & Space students are part of a larger U-M delegation to the annual Conference of Parties (aka COP 23) happening through November 17 on Bonn, Germany. The two-week conference is the 23rd annual conference to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which was adopted in 1992 and signed by U.S. President George H.W. Bush and other world leaders.
Doctoral student Samantha Basile was interviewed by Weather Underground Category 6 blogger Bob Henson for an article about the conference. Basile is a member of Climate Blue, a U-M group which grew out of the COP 15 delegation. Climate Blue is reponsible for sending the ten member delegation from across the university to the conference. In addition to the team, a U-M faculty member will stay on for the full two weeks of the conference, and the delegation will rotate 5 students to the gathering each week.
From the article:
"Representatives from virtually every nation on Earth gathered in Bonn, Germany, on Monday to push ahead with implementing a landmark global climate agreement, in spite of U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision in June to withdraw the United States from it. The top goal of the Bonn meeting is to develop a “rule book” for tracking and facilitating each nation’s progress in reducing global greenhouse-gas emissions under the Paris Agreement, which was crafted in 2015. Every country in the world has signed the agreement except for Syria. Update: Syria announced its intention on Tuesday to sign the agreement, which makes the United States the only country on Earth planning to opt out.
"For the time being, the U.S. remains part of the Paris deal, because the agreement’s rules stipulate that no nation can finalize a withdrawal sooner than November 2020. As in past U.N. climate meetings, the U.S. is sending a delegation with experienced negotiators to Bonn. What’s unclear is how much of a say they’ll have in the outcomes—especially in arguing for U.S.-favorable provisions, given the announced departure from the agreement."
...and:
"I think the bottom line is that [U.S.] federal representation is reduced, and any public statements they have will likely be limited,” said Samantha Basile, a doctoral student in climate science at the University of Michigan (UM). Basile is in Bonn this week as a part of a UM delegation of ten students (each attending for one of the two weeks) and one faculty member."
Read the full article here.