“Alternative, non-official physical spaces were needed for civil society to gather together and work at this COP”, thus areas were prepared, such as the Climate Change Village, the Climate Forum, Vía Campesina and Espacio Mexicano, for that effect. For participation of civil society is being seek, Cancun makes the difference in the search for a dialogue with this sector, said the Director General for Civil Society Organizations of Mexico, Miguel Díaz Reynoso, this morning at a press conference in the Sol room of the Moon Palace venue for the 16th Conference of the Parties (COP16).

Chancellor Patricia Espinosa Cantellano, Secretary of Foreign Affairs of Mexico and President of COP16/CMP6, convened an informal meeting prior to high-level meeting to inform the delegates about the progress delivered by the AWG-LCA and AWG-KP.

In the presence of Mexican and foreign legislators, civil society representatives and delegates of the conference on Climate Change,  the Cities’ and Parliaments’ Initiative meeting was held in the Mar Conference Room of the Moon Palace building, an official venue of the COP16 in Cancun, as a part of the World Mayors Climate Summit.

In his speech at the high-level meeting of COP16/CMP6, the Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources of Mexico, Juan Rafael Elvira Quesada, said that "the political will must be translated into concrete proposals" so that the impacts associated by the influence of climate are less.

Mexican forestry officials on Wednesday presented a national vision for the REDD+ program, a global strategy spearheaded by Norway and France that provides financial compensation to around 60 countries for efforts to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions caused by deforestation and forest degradation.

The PEMEX Climate Action Plan was presented during the forum Green Solutions @COP16. With it, we seek to create value for the company and at the same time achieve a sustainable development schema, stated Carlos Murrieta Cummings, Operations Director of PEMEX.

Hybrid cars made their presentation in the COP16/CMP6 Go Karts circuit located next to the Climate Change Village. This event aimed to demonstrate that renewable energy vehicles are a good option for the future.

Green Solutions @ COP16 closed its activities with an international panel in which participants presented their findings and gave their comments on the relevance of a forum that unites the business community. In the forum there were 44 panels, eight private meetings, five informal sessions, a roundtable on Nationally-Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAS), a breakfast with ministers and a Mexico-Korea bilateral meeting. There were more than 1,080 meetings among international companies, closing businesses for over 50 million dollars. In total, more than 4,000 people participated in the four-day event.

If agreements to confront climate change are not reached, there will be an increasing number of displaced persons and, as a result, more violent conflicts, said Sir Nicholas Stern, Director of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment of the London School of Economics.

In an earlier press conference that day, President Calderón Hinojosa announced that Rubenius, an energy services company based in the United Arab Emirates, would invest $4 billion (dollar) in Mexico to build the world’s largest battery bank. The storage facility would house energy generated by solar, wind and geothermal plants across Mexico to be consumed at home and in the United States.

The Executive Director of Greenpeace International, Kumi Naidoo spoke of the need to understand Climate Change as a human problem that affects everyone: “it is the fight for human rights", stressed the head of Greenpeace during the event to which he was a guest today, held at the Climate Change Village.