Students to COP-15
The AGS and the World Student Community for Sustainable Development sponsored students to join the COP15 in Copenhagen. These students from diverse backgrounds and countries have shared their opinions and experiences of the Climate Summit here and in the blogs of the WSC-SD and the AGS universities.
Read about their huge store of impressions and encounters, emotions swinging from inspiration to despair and frustration, impromptu encounters with delegates, experts, and indigenous people. Hoping for a FAB- a Fair, Ambitious and legally Binding – climate treaty. Organising workshops and getting together to generate momentum for the ideas of the young generation on how to achieve the low carbon society.
AGS students at the first COP-15 week:
The University of Tokyo (Todai)
-
Akira HIRAISHI“I will keep an eye on the political significance of any “Post-Kyoto Decision” and conflicts of interests between major countries over the new framework. Also I have the aspiration to make the “IR3S joint workshop” and its student session successful.”Akira Hiraishi is a masters student of the Graduate School of Public Policy at the University of Tokyo. His current research is focused on the evaluation of policy through an economic approach. -
Yasuaki KAMBE“At the COP15, I’m interested in watching the relation between science knowledge and negotiation/discussion matters. My biggest question is how we can overcome the gaps in our scientific knowledge and negotiation/political knowledge between scientists and politicians.”Yasuaki Kambe is a PhD student of the Graduate School of Engineering, Dept. of Chemical System Engineering, at the University of Tokyo. His study is aero-chemistry, mainly the detection of air polluted species and developing detection systems. -
Takako OGIMOTO“I’m now feeling very lucky to be the witness of a historical turning point of the global movement to tackle climate change. And also very eager to see how each country exerts its political influence in the negotiations.”Takako OGIMOTO is majoring in international conflict resolution process and the negotiation. She is interested in the political science of conflict resolution processes in ethnic conflict and other cases. -
Makoto TAMUGI“First, I planned to research only about the topic of technology transfer. However, I realised that technology transfer could not be included within the CDM, but it was a theme involved in various aspects of the negotiations. So I am going to follow all topics about technology.”Makoto TAMUGI is a student in the Masters of the Graduate school of Frontier Sciences of The University of Tokyo. His major is International Studies. -
Fang-Ting CHENG“For me, the reason to participate in the COP15 is to witness the political determination of concerning Parties as well as to observe the process in negotiating futures agreement. What will be the key factors of making progress? I would like to hear your opinions and the purposes bring you here.”Fang-Ting CHENG comes from Taiwan and she is a PhD student of Graduate School of Law and Politics in The University of Tokyo, majoring international politics on global environmental issues. -
Marcos Makoto IKEGAME“The reason I am participating in COP is that I would like to see how politics shape policy making and how policy making, in turn, spur the creation of new industries.”Marcos Makoto IKEGAME is a PhD student at The Univesrity of Tokyo. He is studying the promotion (i.e. policy making) and economic impacts of bio-energy and bio-fuels in the Department of Advanced Interdisciplinary studies of the Graduate School of Engineering. -
Takara TERANISHI“I will attend COP privately to focus on my research. I would like to draw the picture; what is the best scenario and mechanism for many countries for both developed and developing countries. This is a very difficult question.”Takara TERANISHI is a part-time student, who is working at JBIC (Japan Bank for International Cooperation). She is seconded to JFC (Japan Carbon Finance) to purchase CER from the project.
Chalmers University of Technology
-
Johan TORÉN“The large scale problems facing our global community, be it climate change or the broader trials facing us as we stride for a sustainable future, cannot be solved without strong international cooperation at all levels in society. The COP15 meeting in Copenhagen presents a great platform to connect with individuals and organisations determined to work for a better tomorrow in the large and in the small.”Johan TORÉN is a MSc student in Industrial Ecology. He is combining thesis work and research at the division of Physical Resource Theory, focusing on industrial energy use and green house gas emissions in a carbon constrained world. He is also developing methodologies for biomass potential assessment as part of an EU wide initiative. -
Linus HELMING“In order to meet the needs of future generations, sustain natural resources and mitigate climate change, my personal view is that all people in the society has a responsibility to take action, debate these issues and participate in the negotiations of climate change and thus COP15.”Linus HELMING has a MSc in Chemical Engineering from Chalmers and works in the Chalmers Physical Resource Theory group on an EU project on alternative fuels and alternative more efficient automotive technologies. He is an active member of Chalmers Students for Sustainability and the WSC-SD. -
Marcus HÖGBERG“We are all part of the global system – which makes us sensitive to changes in our living environment on the planet. However, at the same time we are all individuals and can decide about our own consumption, way of transportation and way we are living in general.”Marcus HÖGBERG has an MSc in Chemical engineering from Chalmers and works as a process engineer at Akzo Nobel. He is an active member of Chalmers Students for Sustainability – vice chairman 2008 and advisory board member 2009. -
Guoguo LIU“Faced with the increasingly serious climate problem, COP15 is a great opportunity for all environment advocates to exchange ideas and network on the climate issue. I will get to know the political attitudes of different countries, but also learn more about how other organisation contribute and plan for the future. Global cooperation is the only solution.”Guoguo LIU is an active environment activist and member of WSC-SD. She has a master degree in Civil Engineering, Industrial Ecology and Management of Science and Technology. She intends to do her master thesis in Waste Technology and Management Direction at Chalmers. - Carl Justin Kamp, PhD student at Chalmers, WSC-SD co-president
- Christopher Hedvall, research assistant at Chalmers, CSS and WSC-SD
- Rasmus Einarsson, PhD student at Chalmers, CSS and WSC-SD
- Christian Stöhr, PhD student at Chalmers
- Kristina Sahleström, architecture student at Chalmers, CSS and WSC-SD
- Susetyo Priyojati, student at Chalmers, CSS
ETH Zurich
-
Markus HUBER“Climate change represents an enforced opportunity for collaboration between policy, science and economics. The tools to cope with the issues of climate change have already been derived in these fields. Let’s hope that they are being implemented in Copenhagen.”Markus HUBER studied physics at ETH Zurich and is currently writing his PhD thesis in climate physics. He co-founded the student club ETH Model United Nations and an interdisciplinary Climate Change PhD lunch to foster interdisciplinary discussions at ETH Zurich. -
Tim SCHLOENDORN“Climate change is the greatest danger for mankind since the Cuba missile crisis. This time the critical decision will not be taken by a handful of actors, but will be in the sum of uncountable individual decentralised actions.”Tim SCHLOENDORN is currently writing his masters thesis in Environmental Sciences in the research group Environmental Policy and Economics at the ETH Institute for Environmental Decisions.
Second week of the COP-15 negotiations
ETH Zurich
-
Franziska AEMISEGGER“The climate change debate is a new opportunity of historical importance to face frighteningly old problems linked to power, equity, as well as social, economical and technical development.”Franziska AEMISEGGER has a master degree in Environmental Engineering. She is now writing her PhD in the Atmospheric Dynamics research group of the ETH Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science. -
Katja HALBRITTER“Yes, we can!…. But do we do?”Katja HALBRITTER holds a Master of Science in Chemistry from the University of Cologne. She is currently working on her MSc thesis in Management, Technology, and Economics at the ETH Institute for Environmental Decisions.
MIT
- Kat Potter, PhD student and co-president of Sustainability@MIT
-
Aaron THOM“I’m greatly interested in the relationship between science and policy, especially on an international scale. The negotiators will (likely) be non-technical people talking about data which they themselves did not compute. Of course, they have multiple other values to conider that the scientists did not, including social and econimic impacts of their decisions. How do they manage these various factors? Will our WSC_SD group have a different perspective or insights? What can we learn about how we can become more effective ourselves?”Aaron THOM is president of Sustainability@MIT – he helped set up the first annual MIT Sustainability Summit and many other events. He is working for his Bachelor of Science in Environmental Engineering with minors in Economics and Political Science at MIT. His interests focus on the relationship between science and policy, with an emphasis on environmental management.
Chalmers University of Technology
-
Emil LEEB-LUNDBERG“I feel very lucky to be witness to this historical event. Personally, I am interested in seeing the application of efficient solutions to replace outdated and unsustainable methods of society.”Emil LEEB-LUNDBERG is a student in Chemical Engineering with Engineering Physics at Chalmers. - Robert Rochowiak, Alexander Poestra, Nordic Engineers for Sustainable Development (NORESD) at Chalmers
Other students in the World Student Community for Sustainable Development
- Christopher Baan, WSC-SD Executive board member, Morgen – the Dutch national student network for SD, The Netherlands
- Sina Birkholz, WSC-SD Co-president, Augsburg, Germany
- Tamilla Khalilova, WSC-SD Executive board member, Tashkent, Uzbekistan
- Mohammed Rizwan Shamim, WSC-SD student, BRAC University, Bangladesh
- Annisa Utami, WSC-SD student, Gadjah Mada University, Indonesia
- Lindsey Cray, WSC-SD student, The State University of New York
- Juan Diego Venezuela, WSC-SD member, NGO, Venezuela
- Pieter Ploeg, WSC-SD member
- Urias Goll, WSC-SD member
LINKS TO RELATED BLOGS:
- WSC-SD blog: http://cop15.wscsd.org
The WSC-SD is a global community of students motivated to take action for sustainable development. A team from all over the world and from 6 universities blogged every day. - ETH Klimablog (german only): http://blogs.ethz.ch/klimablog/
Der ETH-Klimablog will die aktuelle Debatte zum Klimawandel aufnehmen und einer breiten Öffentlichkeit vermitteln. Die Blogger sind sowohl Professoren und Studenten der ETH Zurich als auch Gast-blogger aus Politik, Wirtschaft, Kultur und Gesellschaft der Schweiz. - Chalmers and Göteborg Universities blog: http://forskarbloggcop15.wordpress.com/
- AGS-University of Tokyo students blog: http://todai-cop15.blogspot.com/
