Author Archives: Justin Catanoso

About Justin Catanoso

Regular contributor to Mongabay since 2015. Professor of Journalism, Wake Forest University since 2011 MA in Liberal Studies, Wake Forest University, 1993 BA in Journalism, Penn State University, 1982

Mongabay: COP25 — Self-serving G20 spites youth, humanity, world at climate talks

Two empty chairs on the set of a COP25 broadcast outlet seemed to symbolize the failing ambition and lack of integrity on display at the Madrid summit.

That’s not what hope looks like, is it? But those empty chairs, as soon as I saw them outside the main plenary hall at #COP25 in Madrid, I recognized a metaphor for this disturbing and deeply disappointing climate summit (story linked here).

Listen to Mohamed Adow, director of Power Shift Africa, whom I interviewed after a panel discussion in which he participated:

“In the last 10 years following the climate talks, none have never been as bleak and disappointing as this conference. The science is staring us in the face and school children are taking to the streets in their millions, and yet at the global climate summit countries are blocking progress and watering down climate action. It’s disgraceful and politicians are simply not doing their job of protecting the planet.

“We need to see countries committing to new and improved climate plans next year. That regular review and ratchet mechanism was what made the Paris agreement an effective tool for reducing emissions, but countries are dragging their feet and they are putting us all in danger.”

My final story from my sixth climate summit details what happened and didn’t happen, and in the final section, explains why. It all comes down to leadership. And until the U.S. reengages in this process in a positive, not destructive way, hopes for the Paris Agreement coming close to achieving its climate mitigation goals will be remote.

*Seen here on a TV monitor in the media center, Ugandan activist Hilda Flavia Nakabuye pleads angrily with COP25 delegates: “Please listen: if you don’t know how to fix it, stop breaking it.”*

Mongabay: COP25 — EU officials say biomass burning policy to come under critical review

A forest industry pine plantation in the U.S. Southeast. Not only is biomass for energy not carbon neutral, it also transforms biodiversity-rich native forests into tree farms, which are close to being biodiversity deserts. Photo courtesy of the Dogwood Alliance.

This story linked here came about a bit on a lark. My new friends in the Italian press corps told me they were attending a late-afternoon press conference with leaders of the European Union and parliament. I decided to go, sat near the front, and tuned out the obligatory chatter about progress near the end of the summit (there was none). Instead, I had just one question and made sure the moderator called on me.

When he did, I mentioned that the top priority of the EU is about accuracy in carbon accounting, and yet it allows, as a matter of policy, for biomass (wood pellets) to be burned instead of called and being considered carbon neutral. As a result, biomass emissions, which studies have concluded pollute more than coal, are not counted by the nation burning them. So much for a commitment to accurate carbon accounting.

The two ministers paused before answering my question. More than 100 foreign journalists crowded the room. I thought they might ignore it. But they didn’t. And their answers surprised me enough, and the NGOs I ran it by, that I realized I had credible story to write on one of the high-profile issues I will continue to cover in this climate emergency saga.

My new Italian journalist friend Andrea Borolini of Milan took this photo of the closed-circuit TV in the Media Center as I asked my one question during the EU press conference on December 12, 2019 in Madrid, Spain. Just right of me is Italian journalist and friend Emi Barbiriglio, who urged me to join her at this press conference.

Mongabay: COP25: Wood pellet CEO claims biomass carbon neutrality, despite science

Thousands of trees stacked like cordwood wait to be turned into wood pellets for overseas shipment, mostly to the UK and EU, at one of three pellet-making plants in North Carolina. Photo courtesy of the Dogwood Alliance.

This story here is not one I thought I would have the opportunity to write. After 20 months of focusing much of my climate and climate policy reporting on burning wood pellets for energy, I wandered into a side event at the 25th United Nations climate summit featuring the CEO of Drax, the United Kingdom’s largest weed-pellet-burning power plant.

Not coincidentally, the moderator of the event told the audience packed into the UK pavilion that there would not be time for questions — before the program started, and even though it wrapped up five minutes early. In other words, he didn’t want to make any of his guests uncomfortable by having to take difficult questions about the scientific reality of burning wood instead of coal to generate electricity.

But as soon as the program ended, I walked over to the riser as the Drax CEO was preparing to leave, introduced myself and asked him if he had a few moments for questions. He did. He was candid, slightly defensive, and clearly proud of his company. I also was able to balance the CEO’s opinions and remarks with the knowledge and insight of one of the world’s top climate scientists on the issue of wood pellets and energy.

The result is one of the most compelling and dramatic stories I’ve written from the six UN climate summits I’ve covered since Lima, Peru, in 2014.

*Will Gardiner CEO of Drax, the United Kingdom’s largest biomass plant, speaking at COP25 at the UK pavilion in Madrid, Spain.*

Mongabay@COP25: Indonesian dam raises questions about UN hydropower carbon loophole

Tapanuli Orangutans (Pongo tapanuliensis): Adult male on left, and adult female on right. Batang Toru Forest, North Sumatra, Indonesia. Image by Tim Laman under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license.

This story here, my third of ultimately five stories from COP25 in Madrid, Spain, was truly a team effort. It also illustrates the challenge and thrill of journalism — learning a new topic from scratch, finding just the right sources you’ve never met before, working with an editor in Indonesia and one in Vermont to put together a complex and nuanced environmental story about an ecologically sensitive part of the world (North Sumatra) with an rare and endangered great ape (Tapanuli orangutan).

Thanks to Isabel Esterman, Mongabay’s Indonesian editor, and Glenn Scherer, my editor at Mongabay, for putting me on to the story, then assisting prodigiously in putting all the pieces together about an Indonesian hydroelectric company, a dam-in-the-jungle project, the Tapanulis’ habitat and a serious question over carbon emissions.

Indonesia’s pavilion at the UN climate summit in Madrid.

WUNC-The State of Things: Greta Thunberg Wields Her Power At Climate Conference In Madrid

Greta Thunberg addresses nations in attendance to the United Nations conference. — Greta Thunberg, named Time magazine’s Person of the Year during the UN climate summit, is shown here excoriating international delegates for this abysmal and willful failure to rise to the challenge of our time — combating climate change, not simply talking about it.

For the fifth consecutive year, The State of Things, WUNC-91.5 FM, has hosted me live from whichever United Nations climate summit I was covering. Here’s a link to my discussion with SOT host Frank Stasio,recorded live on December 13, 2019.

Mongabay @ COP25: Hopes dim as UN climate delegates dicker over Article 6 and world burns: critics

*Delegates have set a low bar at the COP25 climate summit, putting the world’s future at risk, according to critics.*

After arriving at the cavernous venue on the outskirts of Madrid, Spain, on Friday, December 6 (happy birthday, Dad) for my first day at the 25th UN Climate Summit, I wondered around in a jet lag haze until I received my credentials, got my bearings, and figured out the venue’s layout. Then I contacted a reliable source and said, “I’m ready to get started.” And he was ready to brief me and put me in touch with the exact sources I needed — including one (Bill Moomaw of Tufts) who I’ve been eager to talk with for nearly two years.

The story, linked here, is a follow up to my pre-COP25 story of a week ago, only this one is far more detailed, and in many ways far more accurate and realistic. It simply doesn’t seem to matter to the delegates and leaders of the world’s largest economies that they alone hold the fate of the planet in their hands. And they are utterly failing.

*Bill Moomaw, a leading expert on international climate policy and a former author of United Nations climate change reports.*

Mongabay: COP25 — Laura Vargas inspires with power of faith in defense of forests

Laura Vargas has been a social justice and environmental activist in Peru for more than 50 years. This photo was taken in Madrid, Spain, during the UN climate summit.

When we were making our coverage plan for COP25 in Madrid, my longtime editor at Mongabay, Glenn Scherer, made an unusual request: “Try to find at least one upbeat story. The site is filled so such much gloomy news about the environment, we could use it.”

I had written about the Interfaith Rainforest Initiative in September 2019 and knew representatives from the group would be at the UN climate summit. Over breakfast with IRI’s program director in Peru, Laura Vargas, the idea slowly emerged as we spoke that she was exactly the story Glenn was requesting. Here’s the story. What a remarkable woman.

“IRI has given me a goal of defending life and nature on a global scale, and a deeper sense of purpose.”

Mongabay: COP25 may put climate at greater risk by failing to address forests

COP25, the 25th UN climate summit, was set for Santiago, Chile, from Dec. 2-13, 2019 until civil unrest forced the Chileans to cancel. Madrid, Spain stepped up quickly to offer to host the global event and its 30,000 participants on the same dates. Remarkable.

In the run up to covering my sixth UN climate summit, my fifth for Mongabay, my editor Glenn Scherer and I decided on a tighter focus for the stories I’d pursue in Madrid — forests, forest policies and related issues like impacts on indigenous peoples.

My pre-COP story linked here focuses on the highest priority of this meeting — unfinished rule-writing business from COP24 in Katowice, Poland. Already controversy is brewing, expectations are low and the stakes are just as high as ever. Stay tuned.

Mongabay: Vatican calls landmark meeting to conserve Amazon, protect indigenous peoples

In January 2018, Pope Francis visited Puerto Maldonado in the Peruvian Amazon, a city and region I know well. There, he saw firsthand the destructive nature of deforestation from illegal gold mining and the oppression of indigenous peoples who live in the jungles.
Photo by Luis Fernandez, CINCIA

For the fourth time in his papacy, Pope Francis has convened bishops in Rome for a synod, or special meeting. The one he called for Oct. 6-27, 2019, is the first one ever to focus on an ecological region — Amazonia. As my story for Mongabay details, Francis appears eager to reclaim the mantle of environmental leadership he staked out for himself in 2015 with the historic teaching document Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home.

This story in some ways connects to my last story — can religious leaders use their moral authority, and the strength of billions of followers, to pressure governments in places critical to the health of the planet to more urgently and forcefully protect the environment? So far, little has moved the leaders of the industrialized world to rise to the existential threat to human existence posed by the global warming already causing such damage with just 1.8 degrees F of warming. What happens when we get to the predicted 5 or 6 degrees F in the next 50 years?

Mongabay: Interfaith leaders step up to protect the world’s ‘sacred’ rainforests

Seventy percent of the world’s remaining rain forests are in five countries: Brazil, Democratic Republic of Congo, Peru, Indonesia and Colombia. Photo by Rhett Butler of mongabay.com

At the close of the UN Climate Summit in December 2018 in Poland, United General Secretary Antonio Guterres was so discouraged by the lackluster outcome that he told world leaders that he would admonish them to increase their urgency and ambition for climate mitigation during Climate Week in New York City (Sept. 23-27, 2019).

Guterres is not alone. Swedish teen Greta Thunberg, in her inimitable way, has inspired millions of school-age children around the world to organize and rally to demand that world leaders treat global warming at the existential crisis that more and more scientists are finding it is.

Add to that an emerging group of faith leaders — the Interfaith Rainforest Iniative (IRI) — that aims to use its moral clout and power in numbers to pressure national leaders to enact policies to slow, reverse and stop deforestation in five tropical countries, as my latest Mongabay story describes.

This kind of religious political lobbying comes with challenges and obstacles, as I explain. But here’s the goal:

“This isn’t about churches planting trees,” said Joe Corcoran, IRI program manager with UNEP, the United Nations Environment Programme. “We want to say clearly and definitively to world leaders: religious leaders take this issue of forests and climate very seriously, and they are going to be holding public officials accountable to make sure these issues are addressed.”