Journalist and film maker Alison Cahn spent 11 days at the Climate Fringe at COP26, hearing stories from those already facing climate breakdown and learning how people on the ground are showing leadership.

The man from Tuvalu, voice breaking, talks about watching the bones of his ancestors floating out to sea as his island cemetery is submerged. He speaks of homes engulfed, crops destroyed, soil salinated, hope disappearing.

His was one of many stories from people who are already being impacted by climate change that I heard. Of how the seasons are changing and crops failing. How people are moving because of flood, fire, forest clearance, drought, pollution and more. How those who have done least to cause climate change are suffering first and most.

These voices were present when I went to COP26 in Paris six years ago, but this year they were everywhere and climate justice was a major focus – at least at the climate fringe, where I spent most of my time. It was shocking, guilt making, moving, and deeply depressing – but also inspiring as people spoke of what they were doing to adapt and mitigate.

1.5 degrees and no more

Another change from Paris was the focus on 1.5 degrees warming as the absolute top limit of what we can risk without unpredictable, irreversible, catastrophic consequences - the science has moved on. That was hard to hear too, as we are currently on course to go well beyond this limit.

I came to COP26 to listen and learn, and to decide how to focus my own activities. I didn’t have a pass for the Blue Zone, where the negotiations and the lobbying went on. I went a couple of times to the Green Zone – the official government space for the public. The real learning and action for me was in the fringe, with its own huge programme of events, debates, panels, films, exhibitions, activities, protests. It felt like a different world.

Occasionally the two worlds met. The second night we went to a lecture called ‘Outrage and optimism in the face of the climate crisis’ by Christiana Figueres, who led the climate talks for the UN in Paris. She was joined by Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, and three extraordinarily thoughtful and articulate young climate activists from Belgium and Chile.

Having five women on a panel, also chaired by a woman, gave it a thoughtful and honest feel with little posturing – of which there was lots in Glasgow.

Ms Figueres predicted the outcome of the talks pretty accurately – some important wins, progress, but not nearly enough to keep warming below 1.5 degrees. She emphasised the importance of ensuring nations had to return with new commitments every year, instead of every 5 years as agreed in Paris – the pressure to deliver needs to be constant and increasing she said. This was what she would be fighting for behind the scenes in the Blue Zone, she told us, and this, at least, was delivered. We have to keep pushing, we have to be optimistic, she said.

Optimism appeared again in a session featuring the groups of people who had walked, cycled, sailed and rolled (in a metal cylinder) to Glasgow – compèred by a man wearing a ”stubborn optimist” t-shirt. I met up again with a group of 20 cyclists who had stayed at Halton Mill, which I run, on their journey north. They were cycling in support of the campaigning group Not1more and had been joined by a young Cambodian activist. They asked for the camera to be switched off when she took the stage – environmental activists have been murdered in Cambodia, as in other parts of the world.

What difference does a march make?

Then on Friday and Saturday I joined the two big marches. I volunteered as a steward on the big Saturday march and ended up at the back with a group of people campaigning for Scottish independence – lots of blue flags but hardly a mention of climate. Just a bizarre conversation between a young man from Hong Kong, to whom independence meant re-joining the UK, and a Scottish Nationalist, who was campaigning for the opposite. A lesson in how the same concepts mean very different things across the world.

Looking at the BBC early evening news that night was a low point – more than 100,000 people marched in Glasgow, and millions more around the world, but it was only the fourth item on the news. Tory ‘sleaze’ and death at a US festival might be big stories, but are they really more important that the collapse of our ecosystem? What is the point of protesting, I raged to my son, who rang me to ask how I was finding COP. You’re wrong, he said, governments do take notice of public protests, especially autocratic governments. He should know, the impact of protest on governments in Africa was part of his PhD research.

But I was in need of more than wise words from my offspring. I wanted to hear some solutions. Don’t get me wrong, there were plenty of people offering them. I had a fascinating conversation with the business development director from Wrights Coaches about the potential of hydrogen. I went to a brilliant session by the Architects Climate Action Network about how to reduce the carbon emitted by our built environment – one Scottish architecture practice had a group of questions they asked potential clients, the first of which was: ‘Do you really need to build a new building?’ That’s the kind of shift in thinking we need, and which governments aren’t offering. And Dr Jannik Giesekam from the University of Strathclyde talked about his work on the policy and practices required to deliver net zero carbon buildings.

The Birdman of Pollock

In search of inspiration, I went to see a film called The Birdman of Pollock, about Colin MacLeod, who inspired the first school strikes back in the 1990s. He was protesting against the felling of 5,000 trees for the construction of the M77 motorway passing through Pollock Park – recreation space for a deprived area of Glasgow where he lived. He spent 9 days up a tree, and declared the Free State of Pollock, attracting large numbers of people to camp out in the park.

MacLeod didn’t stop the motorway, but he did start a movement, despite dying tragically of a heart attack at 39. He founded GalGael Trust a centre for cultural renewal in inner-City Glasgow, with boat building and other traditional crafts as a central focus.

After the film MacLeod’s widow Gehan spoke of how it’s always worth fighting for the environment and for justice, that the impact of what you do will ripple out and continue. Rosie Kane McGarvey, who also spoke, proved the point. A working-class Pollock woman, she had never taken any notice of politics or the environment before MacLeod started his tree protest: she ended up being a member of the Scottish Parliament.

GalGael became a hub for climate fringe activities during COP26. I spent my last evening in Glasgow there, watching a bronze casting demonstration, and seeing what MacLeod had started off.

Reflections

What did I take away from COP26? The sense that activists and experts from all walks of life and parts of the globe are the ones showing leadership, and that politicians are lagging behind. The feeling that opinions and actions are shifting, among politicians, businesses and the general public, but that we need much more, much faster. And determination, that however overwhelming it seems, we have to keep trying. I’m still thinking what my role is – writing about the work of the Lancaster Environment Centre is part of it, as are the films I make and the way I live. I’m sure there’s more.

Author biography

Alison Cahn is a BAFTA winning journalist and film maker, who writes stories for the Lancaster Environment Centre website. She is a partner in Forgebank Films, lives in the award-winning Lancaster Cohousing Community, and runs Halton Mill, a low carbon work and event space.

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