We’ll be traveling for the next 24 hours or so, so blogging will likely be light or nonexistent. Sporadic blogging will resume once Maggie and I return to EnviroKnow world headquarters later on Tuesday, and will be back to a normal pace on Monday the 4th.

In the meantime, check out Josh Lynch’s top 10 list of youth climate moments over at IGHIH:

• December 2009 - Youth sit-in, refuse to leave while reading 11 million voices for a strong climate deal in Copenhagen
• October 2009 – 15,000 school kids march for climate in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in One of over 5000 climate demonstrations in 181 countries
• March 2009 – 2,500 Protest Capitol Coal Plant after historic Power Shift Conference
• December 2008 – Youth climate journalist breaks story of Tennessee Coal Ash spill 100 times bigger than Exxon Valdez
• April 2007 – 1350 “Step It Up” Demonstrations put 80% by 2050 carbon target on the map
• December 2005 – International Youth launch popular climate blog ItsGettingHotinHere.org at Montreal Climate Talks
• June 2004 – Youth leaders from more than 20 organizations in U.S. and Canada form the Energy Action Coalition
• November 2003 – Students at 65 colleges and universities organize the first National Day of Action for Clean Energy
• April 2001 – Seven-Day Student Sit-in for “Kyoto Now!” Wins Cornell University Climate Commitment
• December 2000 – Over 200 students pressure governments at UN Climate Talks in The Hague

Julianna Williams has the hot news:

Fifty young Americans took over a climate denier conference hosted by a prominent conservative organization this evening in Copenhagen, rushing the stage and telling the live TV audience that a clean energy future is the real road to prosperity in America. The young people, merely a fraction of the more than 350 US youth in Denmark for the UN climate negotiations, entered a session of the Americans for Prosperity “Hot Air Tour” speakers series and were able to drop two banners and gain access to the conference’s stage. The live event was webcast to over forty climate denier rallies in cities across the United States.

The students entered the event in small groups, joining a paltry audience of five conference attendees, who had come to hear climate denier Lord Christopher Monckton speak about the Copenhagen climate negotiations. After the first five minutes of the event, student representatives from SustainUS, the Sierra Student Coalition, the Cascade Climate Network, and other American youth NGOs displayed banners reading “Climate Disaster Ahead” and “Clean Energy Now.” After security agents at the event took the banners, the young attendees began a chant of “Real Americans for Prosperity are Americans for Clean Energy.” The chant lasted five minutes, as the youth took the stage and displayed their message for the live video feed being sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, despite evasive action on the camera crew’s part. As they left the stage, Lord Monckton repeatedly called the activists “Hitler Youth” and “nazis.”

Here is the must watch video:

TP’s Zaid Jilani caught one of AFP’s speakers — Lord Monckton — calling the youth protesters ‘Hitler Youth’ and ‘Nazis.’ Americans for Prosperity Policy Director Eric Kerpen tried to distance himself from his Monckton’s remarks, but the AFP blog piled on, calling the youth activists ‘eco hypocrites’ and ‘radical protesters.’

Here are the guidelines, in five languages (including English on page four):

VelkommentilDanmark –

Hundreds of Chinese Flying Lanterns Will Light Up Ellipse as Activists Urge Obama to Attend Copenhagen

Who: Climate activists with the Avaaz DC Climate Action Factory
What: Candlelight vigil, glow-in-the-dark balloon banner, and hundreds of flying Chinese paper lanterns
Where: Southern end of the Ellipse, south of the White House near 15th St. and Constitution Ave., NW
When: 6:30 PM, Tuesday, November 17th

Washington, DC — Tuesday evening, as President Obama continues his visit with Chinese President Hu Jintao in Beijing, youth climate activists will light and release hundreds of Chinese flying lanterns into the air around the White House. The activists are making an urgent call for Obama to stop delaying a global climate treaty and for the US to stop lagging behind while other countries—including China—take action on climate change.

PHOTO OP: Hundreds of lanterns flying into the night sky with White House and Washington Monument as a backdrop; glow-in-the-dark banner held up by helium balloons.

Action Factory DC:

This morning climate activists greeted German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s motorcade at the White House as she arrived to meet with President Obama. The giant heads of each leader had a speech bubble reading “No, you go first” in both English and German in front of a banner reading “Climate Finance”.

The activists, part of the Action Factory, say President Obama and Angela Merkel are the two leaders with the most power to lead the world to a global climate treaty. A major hurdle to a climate treaty in Copenhagen is the inability of rich nations to fund climate adaptation that would help vulnerable countries deal with increased climate threats.

“Obama and Merkel need to lead together. They keep complaining about a lack of leadership, but when they meet face-to-face, they had better get past that and commit to business,” says Morgan Goodwin, 25, an activist with the Action Factory.

This should be good. Here is a sneak preview:

Morgan Goodwin:

As part of a national day of action to stop mountaintop removal coal mining, 14 activists have staged a sit in at 11:30 the EPA. Dozens others are also holding a rally in front. They are asking the EPA to take immediate action to stop the mountaintop removal blasting that began this week on Coal River Mountain, WV, the site of a proposed wind farm.

While President Obama spent the week trumpeting his administration’s support for clean energy, Massey Energy began dynamiting Coal River Mountain in West Virginia, which is the site of the proposed 328-megawatt wind farm. Coal River Mountain gained national notoriety after a study showed that its peaks and ridges have enough wind potential to provide 70,000 households with electricity, support 700 long-term green jobs and give back $1.7 million in annual county taxes. Massey Energy began dynamiting those peaks this week in preparation for a massive mountaintop removal project.

Morgan is liveblogging at It’s Getting Hot in Here.

Scott Parkin is offering updates on Twitter.

Here is the letter two West Virginia residents tried to deliver to EPA administrator Lisa Jackson today:

Press release via email from Greenpeace.

PITTSBURGH—Greenpeace activists are in the process of rappelling off of some of Pittsburgh’s iconic bridges with massive banners displaying their message to G20 leaders gathering for tomorrow’s summit. The banners, one nearly 80-feet by 30-feet in size, take the form of stylized “road signs” that warn of the political maneuvering and delay that have put a international climate treaty in jeopardy as the world enters the final stretch on the road to Copenhagen.

The message comes on the heels of a major address by President Barack Obama on climate change at the UN, where he warned of the tremendous danger the world faces from global warming but failed to commit his country to the science-based action necessary to stop it.

Key to the meeting here is a commitment by wealthy nations to invest at least US$140 billion annually by 2020 in order to help the developing world adjust to unavoidable climate impacts, build a clean energy economy, and preserve tropical forests. In July, President Obama and other leaders tasked G20 finance ministers to work on climate finance and report back on progress at the G20 summit.

“It is imperative that developed world leaders do not fail again in Pittsburgh. They must put money on the table to support developing countries” said Damon Moglen, Greenpeace USA’s global warming campaign director.  “It is also critical for G20 leaders agree to kick-start economic recovery through clean energy investment. Both of these elements are vital to achieve a good deal in Copenhagen and avert catastrophic climate change.

Economic recovery is dependent on tackling climate change. If leaders fail to take the actions urgently needed this year, climate impacts will likely cost over 20 percent of global output—more than the Great Depression and both World Wars combined— in addition to the human deaths and species’ extinction, according to Lord Nicholas Stern, former World Bank chief economist.

Tackling climate change and investing in energy would be a fraction of this cost, just one or two percent of global GDP. A recent report from Greenpeace and the European Renewable Energy Council shows the renewable power industry could support 8 million jobs by 2030, if governments switched from carbon intensive energy to renewables.

The G20 leaders of developing countries must demonstrate leadership in Pittsburgh, the final time they will meet ahead of the Copenhagen climate summit, and break the deadlock plaguing climate talks by:

• President Obama, Chancellor Merkel, President Sarkozy and other industrialized country leaders must take responsibility and send a strong signal that they will put money on the table – at least US$140 billion annually by 2020 – to support clean energy and other mitigation activities, forest protection and adaptation in developing countries.

Rainforest Action Network’s Understory blog has an excellent story explaining the rationale for this action:

Before dawn this morning, a small team of climate activists is rapelling from the US observation deck at Niagara Falls. Dangling hundreds of feet above the ground, they’re sending a special welcome message to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper ahead of his first official visit to the White House.

…

So here’s our welcome to you, Prime Minister Harper. Now, please, go home.

And take your dirty tar sands with you.

Here are a few photos from the action:

More photos at the RAN website.

Media Advisory from Avaaz.org via email.

Climate Leadership in Question at Harper-Obama Meeting
‘Carbon Bigfoot’ Harper and President Obama to Sip from Dirty Oil Sands Milkshake

Washington DC — During their meeting this Wednesday, President Obama, and ‘Carbon Bigfoot’ Harper will be sipping from a larger-than-life dirty oil sands milkshake. Harper will appear as a hairy and foolish Bigfoot character who has no qualms about his enormous carbon footprint.

The leaders plan to discuss commitments to climate change solutions ahead of the G20 Summit later this month. However, Harper’s climate policies make Canada one of the countries most impeding progress on the global climate treaty that countries will supposedly agree on this December. Carbon Bigfoot Harper is also a strong supporter of dirty oil sands, which contribute to global warming pollution and cause major local damage on indigenous lands in the borreal forest of Canada, where they are extracted. The US imports dirty oil sands from Canada, and recently approved the Alberta-Minnesota Clipper pipeline, which will promote more destruction and pollution in both the US and Canada.

On Wednesday, Harper, the climate offender, and his enormous carbon footprint will be exposed, making it clear that Canada is right now weak and irresponsible when it comes to international leadership on climate change.

EXCELLENT PHOTO OP: Climate Activists posing as ‘Carbon Bigfoot’ Harper and President Obama with Larger-than-Life Oil Sands Milkshake and calling for a fair, ambitious, and binding global climate treaty in Copenhagen this December

WHERE: Outside the White House northwest gate

WHEN: Wednesday, September 16th, 2009, during Obama and Harper’s meeting


WHO: Youth Climate Activists working with Avaaz.org to secure a fair, ambitious and binding global climate treaty this year

Jerry Cope at Huffington Post:

For the past week a drama has played out in Pettry Bottom, West Virginia as tensions in the area continue to threaten violence in what is now ground zero in the battle to preserve a stable climate and protect the environment. The long struggle against Mountain Top Removal Mining has drawn national attention this summer after numerous arrests including those of pre-imminent climate scientist James Hansen, actor Daryl Hannah, and ex- secretary of state Ken Hechler. As the battlelines are drawn between King Coal represented by Massey energy and opposition the threat of violence from Massey and it’s employees is very real and authorities at the federal, state, and local level appear content to stand behind big energy and wait for bloodshed. It would not be the first time.