It was a surprising day in Copenhagen as the climate change conference dissolved into protests and arguing. But the work goes on as heads of state started arriving.  Here are highlights from December 16th.   The podcast includes some of the more interesting talks given by various people there, including Bill McKibben.

COP15 – Highlights from Day 10

A compromise proposal to be presented by the Danish presidency Wednesday was held up as the negotiating process, according to UN climate chief Yvo de Boer, was subject to an “unexpected stop”. Significant amounts of money have been pledged. Some targets have been tabled, some targets have been increased. The Kyoto protocol group indicated optimism on their work also.

The president of the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen, Connie Hedegaard, unexpectedly resigned this morning. She is to be replaced by the Danish premier.

“With so many heads of state and government having arrived it’s appropriate that the prime minister of Denmark presides,” Hedegaard told the 192-nation meeting. “However, the prime minister has appointed me as his special representative and I will thus continue to negotiate the … outcome with my colleagues,” she said.

Copenhagen summit veering towards farce, warns Ed Miliband

Climate talks at least 18 hours behind schedule as world leaders set to arrive in Copenhagen.

The climate change summit in Copenhagen was in jeopardy tonight with the complex negotiations falling far behind schedule as the climate secretary, Ed Miliband, warned of a “farce”.

With just two days remaining, the inability to overcome disagreements about the shape of a deal to combat global warming led to hours of inaction today , while outside the negotiations police clashed with protesters who broke through a security cordon but failed in an attempt to storm the conference centre.

“We have made no progress” said a source close to the talks. “What people don’t realise is that we are now not really ready for the leaders. These talks are now 18 hours late.”  More than 115 world leaders arrive tomorrow and on Friday.    Read more here

De Boer: “Unexpected stop” in negotiations

The negotiating process at the UN climate conference in Copenhagen was subject to an “unexpected stop” on Wednesday, according to Yvo de Boer, the UN’s top climate official. Read more

IPCC forecasts 9m sea-level rise if temperatures meet 2C threshold

Hundreds of millions of people around the world would be affected as low low-lying coastal areas became inundated, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report warns.

Global sea levels could rise by up to 9m in the next few hundred years, even if the world manages to stabilise average temperatures to 2C above pre-industrial levels, according to a new study.

In this scenario, hundreds of millions of people around the world would be affected as low low-lying coastal areas became inundated. New Orleans would be lost to the sea, much of southern Florida and Bangladesh and most of the Netherlands.

<p style="padding-left: [...]