"UN climate chief quits, leaves talks hanging"

[GreenPartyVoter]

AMSTERDAM – The sharp-tongued U.N. official who shepherded troubled climate talks for nearly four years announced his resignation Thursday, leaving an uncertain path to a new treaty on global warming.

Exhausted and frustrated by unrelenting bickering between rich and poor countries, Yvo de Boer said he will step down July 1 to work in business and academia.

With no obvious successor in sight, fears were voiced that whoever follows will be far less forceful than the skilled former civil servant from the Netherlands.

His departure takes effect five months before 193 nations reconvene in Cancun, Mexico, for another attempt to reach a worldwide legal agreement on controlling greenhouse gas emissions, blamed for the gradual heating of the Earth that scientists predict will worsen weather-related disasters.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100218/ap_on_sc/climate_de_boer_quits

[OKIsItJustMe]

1. Yvo de Boer steps down as UN climate chief to work for accountants KPMG

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/18/yvo-de-boer-climate-change

Yvo de Boer steps down as UN climate chief to work for accountants KPMG

UN official who oversaw four years of climate talks claims disappointing Copenhagen outcome was unrelated to decision

John Vidal
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 18 February 2010 17.33 GMT

Yvo de Boer, head of the UN's climate change body for the last four years, has unexpectedly resigned in a move which could further set back global negotiations.

In a telephone interview given to Associated Press, the veteran UN diplomat said he was announcing his retirement to allow the UN secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, to find a successor well before November, when 192 countries meet in Mexico to conclude fraught climate talks. He will leave officially in July.

De Boer said that he was not quitting the key UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) post because the Copenhagen climate talks in December were widely seen as a failure. "We were about an inch away from a formal agreement. It was basically in our grasp, but it didn't happen. So that was a pity," he said.

But he was known to have been frustrated by the outcome, and doubtful whether anyone could steer through a major global agreement between wildly diverging rich and poor countries. Today he said that the talks were "on track", but that he was uncertain that a full treaty could be finalised this year.

...

[hatrack]

6. "Talks were on track" . . . if that means headed in the direction they were heading, well, yes.

Inertia applies to moving and non-moving objects, I suppose.

[GliderGuider]

2. That job would be like spending your whole life in a E/E nuclear vs. renewables thread... nt

[phantom power]

3. +oo

[GreenPartyVoter]

5. The stress and high blood pressure would kill me before the first day was over.

[jdlh8894]

7. Why?

If the science is settled,why would you have"stree" and HBP?:evilgrin:

[GreenPartyVoter]

8. LOL Well, I am already feeling "streeed" and I already have HBP. Adding

that job to the mix is just asking for trouble, settled science or no. (Just arguing with the deniers will be enough to do me in.) :P

[jdlh8894]

11. Glad you enjoyed the

:evilgrin:

[amborin]

9. dealing with the deniers........

[OKIsItJustMe]

14. Dealing with people who are obstinately, defiantly ignorant

I don't mind dealing with ignorant people. Ignorant people can be informed.

I find that dealing with people who revel in their ignorance, wearing it as a badge of honor, refusing to acknowledge science, is incredibly stressful.

http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2006/10/20061012-4.html

...

And we've got an aggressive effort to research new raw materials to be used in ethanol. I was down in Alabama -- I'm going to tell you an interesting story when I was down there the other day. But I talked to a fellow from Auburn, he's a Ph.D. -- just reminded me the difference between a Ph.D. and a C student; the C student is the President, and the Ph.D. is the advisor. ...

(He just loved using that gag...)

However, just imagine the stress associated with trying to save someone's life, and having them criticize and mock you in return...

[tom_paine]

15. Sounds fun.

:silly: :crazy:

[OKIsItJustMe]

4. Yvo de Boer's resignation compounds sense of gathering climate crisis

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/18/yvo-de-boer-resignation-un-climate-change-body

Yvo de Boer's resignation compounds sense of gathering climate crisis

Despite his steady hands at the helm of climate talks, de Boer was losing his touch and navigated into rancorous territory

Mark Lynas
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 18 February 2010 15.05 GMT

How can everything have gone so wrong so quickly? A year ago, the prospects for successful climate change regulation were bright: a new US president promised positive re-engagement with the international community on the issue, civil society everywhere was enthusiastically mobilising to demand that world leaders "seal the deal" at Copenhagen, and the climate denial crowd had been reduced to an embarrassing rump lurking in the darker corners of the internet.

Now there seems to have been a complete reversal. Obama is held hostage by a deadlocked Senate, which will agree to neither domestic climate legislation nor US participation in a new legally binding treaty. Copenhagen was a disaster from start to finish, and even the face-saving Copenhagen accord is winning at best lukewarm support even from the countries that helped draw it up. To add to the sense of crisis, the climate denial lobby is suddenly resurgent, and the conspiracy theories that underlie the hacked climate emails controversy are in danger of becoming popular received wisdom.

These are dark times. And the resignation of Yvo de Boer as executive secretary of the UN climate change secretariat today only compounds the sense of gathering crisis. De Boer has been a steady pair of hands guiding the international negotiations through some very rocky periods — not least the dramatic episode in Bali two years ago where he himself burst into tears on the plenary stage — and his trustworthy, solid presence will be sorely missed. Despite the official denials, there can be little doubt that this resignation indicates his frustration at the general unravelling of the process that was so depressingly evident at Copenhagen.

Whether de Boer himself should shoulder any of the blame for the Copenhagen debacle is arguable. Most of the responsibility for the conduct of the negotiations, which were marked by poor organisation, suspicion, bitterness and almost absurd levels of chaos on the final night, rests with the hosts Denmark. But the secretariat also appeared powerless to navigate past procedural blocking tactics employed by Sudan and other retrogressive developing nations, suggesting a creeping lack of confidence on the part of the UN. De Boer seemed to be losing his touch.

...

[Dead_Parrot]

10. Man in charge of saving planet says "Fuck it, it's not worth the hassle".

Film at 11.

Does anyone know what Bruce Willis is doing at the moment?

[Nihil]

16. Isn't that the truth though ...

I guess the poor sod woke up one morning and realised that he was
burning himself out by trying to fight the "unrelenting bickering"
from well-sponsored & deliberately obstructive parties and had a
"Pilate moment":

Don't let me stop your great self-destruction,
Die if you want to, you misguided martyr(s),
I wash my hands of your demolition,
Die if you want to, you fuckwitted puppets!

(OK, slight variation in the last line but hey ...)

:-(

[Spoonman]

12. Time to find a new

revenue stream, now that the GW one is going dry!


A sweater can be made from a single strand of yard, and can disappear with one little tug.

[Name removed]

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