by Dr. Donna Charlevoix, GPO Climate Research Campaign Coordinator
Greetings from Denmark! I am here in Copenhagen for the Conference of Parties-15, more commonly known as COP-15. We wrote about this conference in an earlier blog. The two-week conference starts Monday 7 December. I am here representing GLOBE at the U.S. Center in the Bella Conference Center where the meetings will be held. I will try to update you on what is occurring at the conference during the short time that I am here.
My travel from Colorado in the United States to Copenhagen took just over 12 hours so I am rather tired. I met someone from New Zealand and she said that it took her 38 hours of travel to arrive here! Clearly people from all over the world see this meeting as a very important place to be and to contribute to.
Copenhagen, Denmark Airport
This photo I took from my airplane as we were waiting to deplane into the Copenhagen airport. While the official language of Denmark is Danish, most everyone speaks English. Official meetings at the conference will be available in other languages and everything will be available in English as well; sometimes English is considered the “language of science.”
From the airport they provided a free shuttle bus directly to the Bella Center where the conference is held. I got on the bus – with all my luggage – and
Waiting in line to get through security so we can get our badges
arrived at the Bella Center to find a very long line! We waited to go through security. Here you can see the photo taken from just inside the door. The line was equally long outside the door.
After we were cleared through the security, we had to stand in line to get our official badges. The badge allows us access into the conference. Eight weeks ago I had to submit my name to the U.S. State Department to get clearance to attend the conference. Everyone else had to do the same thing from their home country. The badge has our photo on it, our name and a bar code.
Waiting to get paperwork that allows us to get photos taken for the entry badges.
When we want to enter the conference area they just scan the bar code on the badge. It took 1.5 hours to get all registered for the conference. The numbers I heard today were that they were expecting 20,000 people from around the world to attend over the 2-week period.
After I got my badge, I then set out to find my hotel where I am writing to you now. Tomorrow the conference begins. I’m headed off to get some sleep so I can fill you in on tomorrow’s events! “Godnat!”
