Report to the Canadian Business Community on the Copenhagen Climate Change Negotiations

Controversy continues to swirl around the Copenhagen climate change meetings held December 7-18, 2009. Logistical chaos and a breakdown in the traditional pattern of all Party consensus-driven decision making resulted in few useful formal decisions by the Conference of the Parties to the Framework Convention on Climate Change or by that body acting as the Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol. But a new agreement appeared on the stage, miraculously and at the last minute, that being the Copenhagen Accord (CA). Whether the CA represents a bold new initiative that can rescue climate change decision-making, a short term diversion from the tried and true method of negotiating international climate change policy or even the beginning of the end for international efforts to deal with climate change, the CA deserves a closer look by Canadians as do the events of Copenhagen itself. Gray Taylor and Radha Curpen from Bennett Jones and Skip Willis, Principal of Willis Climate Group, present informed and insightful commentary on the Copenhagen process; the decisions made in Copenhagen; the Copenhagen Accord; winners and losers from the process; Canada's role in Copenhagen; and where Canada and the world go from here on climate change. Recorded video and presentation materials from the live webcast are available.