The entrance to the conference. Photo by Maria Cordeiro.

Bali, Indonesia

World leaders from 191 countries have convened in Bali, Indonesia for the United Nations Climate Change Conference, a two week event aimed at setting the agenda for a plan to combat global warming. In a move illustrating that global warming is increasingly recognized as an economic issue, not just a fringe environmental cause, the host country, Indonesia, invited the world’s trade and finance ministers as well as the environment ministers, the usual cast of characters at such a conference.

Around 10,000 people from a wide range of backgrounds – business groups, civil society, academia, etc. – have also flocked to the small island, participating in a variety of side events on topics like technology and governance and their link to fighting global warming.

The spotlight for Bali includes an agreement to launch negotiations for updating and extending the Kyoto Protocol, set to expire in 2012. Expectations are running high. Will the United States take a new stance now that the US Congress is shaping climate change legislation? Will the sudden political shakeup in Australia, a country now preparing to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, increase the pressure on the US to do so too? Will developing countries, including China, one of the largest contributors to global warming, agree to cut back their emissions? And above all, will there be a new treaty to provide a long term response to climate change?

Stay tuned: for the next week I will be in Bali, attending side events and talking with experts as I report the latest developments at the COP here on TheCityFix.

For more information on what’s going on at Bali, check out Joe Romm’s post at Climate Progress.

Maria Cordeiro

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Maria Cordeiro joined EMBARQ, the WRI Center for Sustainable Transport in 2004 and has since been involved in the management of the environment and global tools programs, and of various transport and environment projects in Latin America. Maria leads multicultural teams and conducts research on topics such as the calculation of greenhouse gas and criteria pollutant emissions from transport projects and cost-effectiveness analysis of emissions mitigation measures. Maria is particularly interested in the monitoring of the air quality, health and climate change impacts of transport and on the political, management and technical measures to mitigate these impacts. Prior to joining EMBARQ, Maria worked for Climate Action Network Europe, ECOTEC Research and Consulting Ltd, and About Net, where she advised government, private sector and civil society clients and partners on climate, energy and environmental policy. Maria has research experience with the British Geologic Survey and with the Research Center Julish in Germany on the impact of soil contamination on the health of local communities, and on the development of bio-sensors for application in waste water treatment plants. Maria holds a Masters degree in environmental management from the Nottingham Trent University and a Bachelors degree in Energy and Environment Technology from the University of Glamorgan, in the United Kingdom.

Other posts by Maria

• New Publication Seeks to ‘Measure the Invisible’
• Covering the UN’s Climate Change Conference