Climate Corrections

Brighter Green colleague Brazilian Simone Lima, told me about an interesting misstatement, made yesterday at the Bella Center that might contain a grain of truth. Speaking to delegates, Dilma Roussef, Brazil’s minister for development and possibly the country’s next president, said: “The environment is, without a doubt, a threat to sustainable development. And this means it endangers the future of our planet and our countries.” Of course she meant to say global warming. But, as Simone observes, it’s an “interesting slip nevertheless by someone who is always countering environmentalists’ concerns” about her (Roussef’s) development proposals. Another correction: turns out that the food at the Klimaforum, the people’s climate summit, isn’t all-organic and vegan; only one café, a tent, really, set up by NGOs, is.

When not the site of the Klimaforum, the venue in Copenhagen is a community sports center, with its own concession stands. They’re operating, and the menu definitely favors omnivores. It even includes two beef-based main dishes (and no soy milk)’pretty bizarre given the enormous carbon, methane and nitrous oxide footprints of beef. The concession manager agreed that all the food served at the Klimaforum would be organic, one of the organizers told me. But climate-cooling vegetarian or vegan? The answer was “No.” I managed a 4 p.m. lunch today with some colleagues, a sort of Klimaforum special: a cold vegan bean burger with lettuce on a thick bun. People’s vegan? Perhaps.