Green Labor Journal - Working for a Substainable Future

Labor's Notable Progress in Copenhagen

AFL-CIO Now Blogs from Copenhagen Climate Change Conference, December 7-18, 2009, by Roger Toussaint, Bob Baugh, Barbara Byrd and Dick Iannuzzi

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Editor’s Note: The following AFL-CIO Now Blogs were filed by union delegates Roger Toussaint, Bob Baugh, Barbara Byrd and Dick Iannuzzi from  the U.N. Climate Change Conference that met in Copenhagen, Denmark, on December 7-18, 2009. Please see Archives, December 2009.

Copenhagen’s Legacy: Future in the Balance
Roger Toussaint, international vice president and director of strategic planning of the Transport Workers Union (TWU), sent us a final report from the climate change talks in Copenhagen, Denmark, where 40 U.S. union members were part of a 400-member global union movement delegation led by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).

The success or failure of climate change negotiations in Copenhagen is being weighed by the world based on the final outcome of the talks that ended Dec. 18. We hoped for a signed treaty with emission targets, a timetable, a commitment from both developing and developed countries to take action to curb their greenhouse gas, as well as ways to measure each country’s progress.

Fig 1 - Impacts of 4 Degree Temperature Increase

Rather than a firm agreement with these elements, the legacy of Copenhagen will be a pathway to getting us there in 2010 in Mexico City, if not before. However, our success should not be measured by this alone. While negotiations did not result in a next-generation climate treaty, the process included some notable steps forward.

In particular, the global labor movement leaves Copenhagen having made remarkable progress in advancing our concerns and influencing the climate crisis discussion.  For one, labor’s participation in climate negotiations is unprecedented. We were clearly and visibly at the table with 400 labor delegates from around the world converging in Copenhagen. The 40 U.S. union leaders and other representatives came from such unions as TWU, ATU, AFT, CWA, Utility Workers, IBEW, Mine Workers and Boilermakers.  Compare this with a total of 80 delegates who participated in climate negotiations in Bali in 2007.

There is no doubt our presence resulted in the delegation’s successful introduction of “just transition” language in the preamble of the draft treaty to ensure there is a “just transition of the workforce that creates decent work and quality jobs.”

This level of participation also clearly signals U.S. labor’s recognition of the importance of the climate crisis on its membership, regardless of industrial sector, and its desire to engage and ensure that a new low-carbon economy will both benefit and protect working people. The emergency is at our doorstep, and it has become an issue we, as a movement, can no longer afford to ignore—whether we represent members in the transportation sector, service sector, building trades or energy-intensive industries.

We clearly need full protections for workers who are negatively affected by climate policies in accordance with the principle of just transition. Who is better positioned than the labor movement to advocate such protections on behalf of working men and women in the United States and around the world?

What we also need are science-based carbon dioxide emission targets that can generate a massive increase of green jobs in public mass transit, renewable energy, green manufacturing, energy-efficient construction and building retrofits. Only ambitious targets will generate the necessary massive infusion of public financing to generate green jobs and provide training for members displaced by climate change policies, as well as a strong political signal to private investors who are sitting on the sidelines waiting to invest in an economy at the beginning of its lifespan.

Our future is in the balance. This re-engineering of the economy will occur with or without labor’s willing participation.  How decisively we move in this direction will determine our ability to effectively compete with our global competitors already traveling down this path, in particular China. Asia is already outspending the United States by 3-1 in clean-tech investments. In the short term, the best we can hope for is that taking ambitious action now will enable us to catch up.

U.S. Voices Support for Just Transition to Green Economy
Bob Baugh, executive director of the AFL-CIO Industrial Union Council and co-chair of the AFL-CIO Energy Task Force, sends us this report from the second day at the climate change talks in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Today, union delegates to the climate change talks received good news. For the first time since we arrived in Copenhagen, a U.S. negotiator said publicly that the Obama administration will propose language to support a “just transition” to a new green economy. Under a just transition program, workers have the right to a voice at their workplace, the right to form a union and bargain collectively and the right to have access to training on the latest technology.

At the morning meeting of the working group on a shared vision, U.S. negotiators for the first time spoke out in favor of just transition. One of AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka’s first official letters following his election was to Special Envoy Todd Stern in support of the having just translation language in a climate agreement.

The news that the United States supports the concept of just transition and wants to suggest language for it got everyone’s attention. But there still are procedural and other questions to be answered before it is a done deal. Specifically, what was the language the U.S. government wants to add or change?

The U.S. labor delegation met with Trigg Talley, the lead U.S. negotiator on this section of the agreement. He told us the United States is “concerned about the long preamble of the shared vision statement, but they liked the positive ideas that our just transition language conveyed.” He said he wanted to make sure the concept was preserved as the document was shortened and to submit some language.

We suggested he include language about quality jobs and decent work. As this blog is written, nothing is a done deal and we still do not know the end of the story but the beginning has certainly been encouraging.

Learning and Doing in Copenhagen
Barbara Byrd, secretary-treasurer of the Oregon AFL-CIO and co-chair of the Oregon Apollo Alliance, is taking part in climate change talks in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Labor delegates from around the world are taking full advantage of opportunities to negotiate, educate, persuade and build bridges here in Copenhagen.

Most of us spend time at the World of Work pavilion, located at the Danish Confederation of Trade Unions. The events here provide labor delegates and others with chances to share information and strategies for labor’s involvement in lowering carbon emissions globally. These education sessions have been the most helpful to me in drawing lessons for the Oregon union movement in dealing with climate issues.

For example, the international labor group Public Services International led a discussion on “Public Services: Key to Getting Us Out of the Climate Crisis.” We heard from public sector union leaders from Australia, South Africa and the United Kingdom about the important role public workers can play in reducing the carbon footprints of their departments and agencies and stimulating change in other sectors of the economy.

David Arnold of UNISON, one of the United Kingdom’s largest public employee unions, said: Public services came about to address market failures. Climate change is itself an example of a disastrous market failure.

Our own members in AFSCME, the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) and other public unions play a similar role in Oregon, drawing attention to the need to “green” their own workplaces while helping the state meet its energy efficiency and renewable energy targets. As testament to the Oregon unions’ interest in this issue, Jon Hunt, president of ATU’s Portland local, is here in Copenhagen for the talks.  
 
Near the end of the workshop, delegates from Uruguay and the Philippines told us how the climate crisis has created huge problems with their public water supplies. These countries suffer the double whammy of the climate crisis and poverty, stalling their efforts to deal with flooding and water resource depletion. Uruguay’s public service unions also are fighting privatization of the public water supply, just as Oregon’s public sector unions have fought privatization of public services.

It was a stark reminder of what we have in common with our union brothers and sisters in the global south. And it contained an implicit call for increased financial assistance from wealthy industrialized nations. While we argue with our bosses about using recycled paper, union members in these countries lose their livelihoods ─ and sometimes their lives-to the climate crisis.

Union Members Keep Focused on a Just Transition to Green Economy
AFT Vice President Dick Iannuzzi writes about the importance of a just transition to a green economy.

The importance of a “just transition” to a clean energy economy has been evident in labor’s approach to every aspect of participation in the climate change talks. In an attempt to influence the kind of global climate agreement that would meaningfully address global warming, we have emphasized making aggressive investments in energy intensive industries to modernize and develop capacity for new technologies.

A just transition speaks to training and retaining workers, education and assistance for workers negatively impacted by climate policies. It also requires support for the research and development needed to address climate change in ways that can enhance the economy.

A meeting of the U.S. labor delegation with Energy Secretary Steven Chu returned over and over to these points. Representatives from Utility Workers (UWUA), AFT, United Steelworkers (USW), Communications Workers of America (CWA), SEIU, Laborers and other unions all demonstrated their support for the Obama administration’s overall energy/climate plan. Yet they stressed the value their industries are capable of adding to the agenda and the importance of a just transition.

Chu was pressed on resources for higher education—especially community colleges—to provide the support to educate and train (or retrain) employees for new and green technologies. He was reminded that these jobs in education are also part of the green jobs picture.

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack addressed delegates on the impact of climate change in rural communities, especially on farmers, dairy farmers in particular. Noting that farmers create half as much carbon dioxide as they did in the 1970s, Vilsack outlined new industries that will further reduce carbon emissions going forward. He stressed the direct link between climate change and agriculture, and providing food for a growing population’s food supply nationally and internationally.

Again, the discussion needs to weigh the impact on local communities, industries that currently meet farmers’ needs and the workers in those industries. AFT members emphasized that empowering these rural agricultural businesses creates strong local communities to support local public schools. Again, much education and training will be required, if a just transition is to be achieved.

These talks are about climate change and how to achieve meaningful agreements. For U.S. labor, it means going back home to achieve the necessary legislation. That legislation—if created properly—can be good for the planet, good for its inhabitants and good for workers provided that there’s a just transition.

Jeff Rickert is Director of the AFL-CIO Center for Green Jobs, see http://www.workingamerica.org.  Figure 1 graphic from James A. Cusumano, Ph.D., “Part II, Climate Change & Global Sustainability,” Prague Leaders Magazine, March, 2008, www.leadersmagazine.cz.