Everywhere you look and every event you attend, COP participants are bombarded with facts and statistics most of which mean absolutely BA to me. However every so often a fact hits home (even if it is just quirky). Some people work best with numbers so for you, on this post I will continually post Top Cop facts. (I’ll try and post the source where I can but repeat my mantra of “cant do shorthand so duff reporter”).
- 10,000 people migrate to Mumbai every day (speech by Ruchi, Youth Representative)
- 45% of Panama is forest. 34% of these forests are within indigenous areas (event by conservation.org)
- 1.3% of the Earth’s land can be found in Indonesia, a lot of this land is forest. This forest accounts for 11% of the Earth’s plant life and 10 % of animal life. Indonesia suffers the 2nd highest rate of deforestation in the world (second only to Brazil) and accounts for 80% of the countries emissions.
- The key to understanding Algae is the strands. There are 35,000. You have to pick the right one. (Carbon Trust speech)
- Airlines are currently making a $4 billion loss. Telepresence companies are making a $39 billion profit. (Carbon Disclosure speech)
- Cities are responsible for 75% of the world’s emissions and account for 50% of the world’s population (Opening Speech to the COP by Ritt Bjerregaard, Major of Copenhagen)
- The average Life Expectancy of Cuba is the same as that of the United States. The average American income is 9 times that of the average Cuban. (Talk by Tim Jackson at the Klimaforum)
- 80% of the lifetime carbon emissions of computers and mobile phones is produced before we even take them out of the box (The Bellona Centre)
- Despite 15 years of climate negotiations, growth in emissions in the 00s has grown 33% faster than in the 1990s
- 1 in every £4 spent in the UK is spent in Tescos. (UK event on the Low Carbon Economy)
You're right Lucy - there is a constant stream of conflicting facts, figures and statistics being roared at us this week (not only in the Bella Centre, not only at Klimaforum, but also on the public transport systems, on street signs and on endless pamphlets and flyers in the streets in Copenhagen).
ReplyDeleteTo highlight how contentious a lot of these facts really are: yesterday, I was given no less than 3 different CO2 emissions figures for the building sector in less than 24 hours. At the Danish Architecture Centre I heard the contribution was 14% of the global total, at an Urban Tranportation seminar in the BC it was down to 8%, whereas 'Architecture and Daylight' magazine upped the figure again to a whopping 40%.