Is Business Finally Getting It?

 

 

Six months before the crucial climate summit in Copenhagen in December 2009, this major meeting of business leaders was intended to build momentum to ensure that vested interests do not sabotage the chance of a tough and effective treaty to replace Kyoto.

For any conference the key is casting. But for this one, it was doubly important, not only to make the event itself feel like a success, but to establish the evidence that business was effectively on board for the Copenhagen process: to be able to give the politicians in December the comfort that the corporations would back them if they took a brave step towards a low-carbon world. Of course ‘low-carbon but with growth’ has to be the mantra or else, conventional thinking has it, both the corporations and the consumers will quickly desert.

So the first bit of casting was spot on – they bagged the Secretary General of the United Nations. He gave his standard climate change speech, but did include a sharp rebuke to those companies paying millions to lobbyists to derail effective legislation proposed by President Obama – currently the Waxman-Markey bill which would cut US emissions by 17% by 2020.

 

 

 

Representing the politicians was the eco-star, Al Gore. He made a speech which inspired many, though others felt it didn’t focus enough on the latest and most relevant issues for the business community. He used the notion of future generations looking back on our failure (or success) in saving our planet as a litmus test for the policies we adopt.

 

 

 

Among a very few regional politicians was Jane Davidson, Environment Minister in the Welsh Assembly. She is in the process of consulting the people of Wales towards a target of fully sustainable energy supplies within 20 years. But, she says, the real challenge will be making transport sustainable.

 

 

 

The conference organisers had invited some leading scientists. We spoke to Dr. Pachauri, Director of TERI and Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, who claimed to have changed his mind about one important aspect of the road to success in Copenhagen.

 

 

 

Among the business leaders there was, as was often said during the three days, a lot of worthy green rhetoric. But at one point Adam Werbach from Saatchi & Saatchi challenged Sir Martin Sorrell of WPP as to just how sincere these fine words were when it came to actions on investment.

 

 

 

Jose Manuel Barroso, President of European Commission shared his conviction that the cynics were wrong and that Copenhagen will be a success.

 

This was not an NGO occasion, but Jeremy Hobbs, Executive Director of Oxfam International, was there making a very strong case for not neglecting the need for serious levels of funding to support developing countries adapt to the impacts of climate change that they are already suffering. OneClimate spoke to him after a lively working group meeting on adaptation.

 

Indeed just these kinds of poorer communities were represented on the square outside the Town Hall - though not invited into the reception inside.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nor were the climate deniers allowed in.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Celeb endorsement is also an important casting consideration, but in this case Cate Blanchett provided a seriousness and a welcome breath of candour. Her son's angle on the Hobbit took us back to a moral dimension about our consumerist society that no business person was going to mention.

 

 

 

But the last bit of casting was the strangest of all – OneWorld. Why on earth were we included when WWF, FOE and all the most eligible NGOs were not. Because we were safe? Because our name sounds so global? Or, hopefully, because we have attempted over 15 years to span these different worlds and reflect their best insights to a wider world. OneWorld’s UK Director and Founder of OneClimate, Anuradha Vittachi, took a moment to pay tribute to the great storyteller, Copenhagen’s own Hans Christian Andersen. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A lot of skeletons came out of cupboards on the final morning, when facilitator Nick Gowing pressed a powerful group of business actors and analysts to come clean about what business really thought, why some were paying for negative lobbying and what could be done going forward. Finally some of the gloves were off, and the audience got a sense of the reality of what climate change means – and doesn’t mean – to the business community. What were some of the chambers of commerce up to?

 

 

 

Taking part are: 

James Rogers, Duke Energy

Samuel DiPiazza, PWC

Anders Eldrup, Dong Energy

Shai Agassi, Better Place

David Blood, Generation Investment Management

Sir Cripson Tickell, James Martin Institute, Oxford

The official report on the whole event is here.