The Minister’s speaking points
Check against delivery 

  • Your Majesty, Chairman, conference participants, it is not every day I have the pleasure of introducing the winner of an Academy Award (Oscar).  
  • Of course, most of all I would like to congratulate former Vice-President Al Gore, not only on winning an Oscar — which is in itself a great achievement — but on an even greater achievement: how through his book An Inconvenient Truth and the film based on it, he so convincingly has explained to us what will happen to the global climate - unless we immediately change our way of life.  
  • Primarily I therefore wish to pay him tribute for his dedication to the environment, as a role model, as a champion of the cause, and as a communicator. And for sharing his message with us. 
  • And he has, tirelessly, worked to put this issue on the world’s agendas — the media’s agenda, decision-makers’ agendas, in Washington D.C., in Brussels, in Berlin, in Oslo. 
  • The persuasive, clear language Mr Gore uses as the narrator of the film is very effective. An example: “Humanity is sitting on a ticking time bomb. If the vast majority of the world's scientists are right, we have just ten years to avert a major catastrophe...” 
  • Mr Gore’s message does not consist of idle words or scaremongering. Both the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) latest report, and the review produced by Sir Nicholas Stern, the former World Bank Chief Economist, which was commissioned by Tony Blair, point in the same direction: 
  • IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report removes all doubt as to whether anthropogenic climate change is taking place. Two of the main findings:
  • Global average temperature is increasing. Eleven of the last 12 years rank among the 12 warmest years in the record of global surface temperature (i.e. since 1850).
  • Average Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the second half of the 20th century were very likely higher than during any other 50-year period in the last 500 years. 
  • The Stern review considers the social costs resulting from anthropogenic climate change, the costs of reducing climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and the costs of adapting to climate change. Three conclusions:
  • There is still time to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, if we take strong action - now.
  • It will cost a lot less to reduce greenhouse gas emissions during the next few years than to do very little or nothing, because the cost resulting from climate change will be so high in the future.
  • But strong action is required. It will cost 1–2% of global GDP to reduce emissions now in order to prevent part of the climate change. On the other hand, if we do nothing, climate change could cost as much as 20% of global GDP by 2100. 
  • A third report looks particularly at the melting ice and climate change that is taking place in the north. This is the ACIA report (Arctic Climate Impact Assessment), published a few years ago, which states that:
  • Climate change is happening at a faster rate in the Arctic than in the rest of the world. Moreover, changes in the Arctic will affect the climate all over the world. 
  • So, what can we do about this?  
  • National and international measures. Greenhouse gas emissions are a global problem. It can only be resolved through international cooperation. 
  • An issue of governance, cooperation and responsibility.  
  • As a rich country and a major producer of oil and gas, Norway has a particular responsibility for developing environmental technology and providing emission control technology to poor countries.  
  • We must also facilitate a shift towards more environmentally friendly energy production and use in Norway as well. 
  • New licences for gas-fired power plants will require CO2 capture and storage. Last year we initiated an ambitious research, development and demonstration project at Mongstad. The goal is to build the world’s first full-scale CO2 capture and storage facility. It will be operative in 2014. The Prime Minister has called it “Norway’s moon landing”.  
  • But our vision goes beyond this – and now to the core issue discussed at this conference: We believe that the Mongstad project will encourage international technological cooperation.  
  • This is essential if we are to achieve coordinated, broad-based action to deal with climate change. International cooperation will make it possible to share the risks as well as the rewards and technology.  
  • It is necessary to implement market-based mechanisms to internalise the costs of greenhouse gas emissions. These include a number of measures - like taxation of international air traffic.
  • By the way, this is of course about us conference delegates as well. It is about big and small measures, about details, which however small, are not insignificant: they are the contributions we all can make at the individual level:
  • The budget for this conference includes funds that will be used to offset each invited participant’s greenhouse gas emissions. We have commissioned the verification of the figures and an assessment of a proposed project that these funds could be used for. In the invitations and on our website we have encouraged the participants to offset the emissions from their travel to and from Oslo. This should be seen in connection with the Government’s decision to compensate the emissions resulting from government employees’ travel abroad.  
  • This is in line with Al Gore’s message: we can all do something. But now, I have the pleasure of introducing the Honorable Al Gore.