Why what happens — or doesn’t happen — at the COP26 climate summit matters to Maine
Maine Public reports on Ania Wright ’20, several College of the Atlantic students, and other COA alumnx joining climate activists from around the world and international leaders in Glasgow, Scotland for the 26th Conference of the Parties, which has been billed as the most consequential United Nations climate summit in years.
By Kevin Miller | Maine Public
For activists, students and other observers from Maine, COP26 — short for the 26th Conference of Parties — is a potentially historic event with major implications globally and locally. It’s important enough for some to make the trip across the Atlantic to help pressure leaders for meaningful commitments. Many others will closely monitor developments from here in Maine.
Among the thousands of activists and climate organizations from around the world that will be in Glasgow is a group of students and at least one alumnus from College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor.
This will be the third COP for 2020 graduate Ania Wright ’20, who now works as a grassroots climate action organizer for the Sierra Club in Maine. But Wright acknowledges she wasn’t sure she wanted to go this time.
“It’s a really difficult space to be a part of,” Wright said.
Wright says the hope and optimism that she felt at the start of COP24 in Poland dissipated as she watched key players – and particularly the Trump administration – stymie negotiations and block progress. The following year’s COP in Madrid wasn’t much better.
“There’s a lot of I guess just frustrating politics that come out at the COP and I think it’s partly of why I personally got really interested in working in Maine, because you see the level of inaction that is happening at the international level,” Wright said.
But Wright says there were also inspiring moments.
In Poland, she helped arrange interviews and media appearances for a certain Swedish teenager, Greta Thunberg, whose reprimand of global leaders at the summit would make her a hero among youth climate activists worldwide. And at COP25, Wright was overcome by the sights and sensations of being part of half-million strong crowd that marched through the streets of Madrid.
In deciding to travel to Glasgow, Wright says activists have an obligation to “show up” to keep pressure on those who will make the decisions.
“I think you have to have hope that these negotiations will be different than the last ones,” Wright said. “After all, it an international space where people are coming together to try to solve things — so definitely necessary to be there, even though it’s not always fun.”