April 2, 2020: A great many planned face-to-face meetings are being replaced by webinars or teleconferences because of the pandemic. I guess folks are scared of catching the virus, so they plan other ways to accomplish what they need to do. So I was a little taken aback when I read today that United Nations officials have postponed COP26 (the international climate talks scheduled for November in Glasgow, Scotland) as a result of the ongoing coronavirus crisis.
I do understand the caution. But what I do not understand is why COP26 was not restructured as a web-conference. Seems like an ideal justification for the climate change scientists and proponents to practice what they preach rather than fly people all over the world to conferences. Embrace the technology and hold the meetings remotely; who knows, you might save not only yourselves from getting COVID-19, but also the rest of us from totally unnecessary GHGs.
