America has long been one of the world's worst polluters per capita and one of the slowest to enact laws to check climate change, a position the current administration has promised to change. One of the administration's leaders on climate change is Lisa Jackson, a chemical engineer and the head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA recently finalized its finding that carbon dioxide is a dangerous pollutant that can be regulated. Jackson is emphasizing this and other measures in Copenhagen to try to convince other nations that the United States is on their side. She told the conference, "[The United States has] been fighting to make up for lost time. In less than 11 months since taking office we have done more to promote clean energy and prevent climate change than happened in the last eight years." Making that case is crucial for Jackson and the United States because many nations say they are waiting for the United States to act before they commit. 

One party at the conference that has particular reason to be concerned is the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS). Climate change will produce sea level rise that will threaten or in some cases possibly obliterate these islands. AOSIS' representative at the conference is Dessima Williams, Grenada's ambassador to the United Nations. Before taking a diplomatic role she was a sociologist at Brandeis University. In remarks at the conference she has called for a legally binding agreement. Although most say that is very unlikely, it is not surprising that countries with so much at stake are among those pushing for the most decisive action.

Host nation Denmark's Minister for the Conference is Connie Hedegaard, a career politician who has played a large role in Danish energy and environmental policy. Previously she was the Minister for Climate and Energy and Minister for the Environment. She is acting as the president and chairwoman of the talks, and it will be her job to forge a resolution. That she is a strident conservative may seem strange to some but she sees no contradiction: "In my view, there is nothing as core to conservative beliefs -- that what you inherit you should pass on to the next generation," she told The New York Times.

Working through disagreements and finding consensus is what these diplomats are good at, but not all of them have much experience studying climate change. A program called C-ROADS could help them understand what the impacts of their decisions might be. It was developed by a group from the Sustainability Institute (a think tank), software maker Ventana Systems and MIT to model climate change as it could play out under various plans proposed at the conference. Beth Sawin, a biologist, is representing that group in Copenhagen and showing off the program. She told Nature that, though she thinks the talks have flaws, she emphasizes to her kids that this is "a time when people are trying to make common decisions about how to protect our common planet."

While most of the Conference focuses on the future there have been opportunities to look back. One was the recognition of Wangari Maathai's work in Africa. In 2004 Maathai became the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, and in Copenhagen she will receive the U.N. Messenger For Peace Award for her work on the environment and women's rights. Maathai was born in Kenya and studied biology and zoology in America and Kenya. She founded the Green Belt Movement, which pays women to plant trees. In accepting the award she called for "an ambitious deal," and though she urged her audience to temper their expectations she said she was optimistic: "I don't believe that so many presidents will come to Copenhagen for fun. Keep your hopes high and we shall prevail."

I hope she's right.

Who do you think are the most influential women at the Copenhagen talks? Do you think the meeting will produce meaningful and lasting results? Share your thoughts in the comments section below or share your personal story in the Your Stories section of the site.

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Chelsea December 16, 2009 69.86.91.196	I'm adding Franny Armstrong, director of The Age of Stupid documentary film and the daily online live Stupid Show: http://www.ageofstupid.net/stupid-show.

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