On December 7 and December 8, 2011, in Princeton and Grand Rapids, Minnesota, the Will Steger Foundation, the Lutheran Coalition for Public Policy in Minnesota, and Fresh Energy joined together to present public forums on Clean Air, Climate, and Health, with keynote speaker Will Steger.

Today, we stopped by Senator Klobuchar's office to deliver 1,145 postcards signed by young people across the state urging her to protect the Clean Air Act. Young people in Minnesota need Sen. Klobuchar to stand up for our future and be a champion for clean air safeguards. Any delays or compromises will jeopardize our health and the environment we are inheriting.

This year’s UN climate conference – the longest to date – concluded in Durban at 6am Sunday morning after a second all night session of negotiating.

Perspectives from a Youth Climate Leader and the U.S. Lead Negotiator, Todd Stern

Abigail Borah, Middlebury College student delivered (unauthorized) remarks to the plenary on behalf of the American people just before Todd Stern, representing the U.S. State Department:

"I am speaking on behalf of the United States of America because my negotiators cannot. The obstructionist Congress has shackled justice and delayed ambition for too long. I am scared for my future. 2020 is too late to wait. We need an urgent path to a fair, ambitious, and legally binding treaty. You must take responsibility to act now, or you will threaten the lives of youth and the world's most vulnerable. You must set aside partisan politics and let science dictate decisions. You must pledge ambitious targets to lower emissions, not expectations. Citizens across the world are being held hostage by stillborn negotiations. We need leaders who will commit to real change, not empty rhetoric. Keep your promises. Keep our hope alive. 2020 is too late to wait."

As of 10:45pm on Saturday Dec. 10, 2011, the only big decision of the COP process was a recommendation by a working group that the next Kyoto commitment would be 8 years. They also suggested that the commitment would allow for a range of 20-40% reductions from 1990 levels by the major industrialized nations. Many of the developing countries were not satisfied by this level of “ambition” and therefore wanted a 5 year commitment so they could ratchet up the standard for the next one. Parties additionally wanted to change language of the proposal, and probably could have fought over the exact wording forever. At the end of the day, the chairman of the working group decided that the 8 year, semi-weak reductions were better than nothing, and forced it through. He made a quick motion, no one objected in a half-second (literally), and down went the gavel signaling the close of this particular session until COP 18.