While the bureaucrats and ministers slug it out on text insertions and
deletions at the UN conference, the UNFCCC President Mr. Rachmat
Witoelar took a break from the proceedings earlier today to to visit the
Rainbow Warrior docked in Benoa Harbour of Bali to launch Greenpeace
Southeast Asia's 'Energy Efficient Bali' programme.

Witoelar was as excited about the 'Switch off, Unplug, Enjoy' initiative
as he was about visiting our flagship, that has been for last two months
taking direct action to expose and stop climate crimes happening in his
country. Like Gerd Leipold our international executive director pointed
out to him, Greenpeace is not all about direct actions or stopping
crimes, we also promote solutions and Energy Efficient Bali is one such
initiative, the Minister agreed and encouraged all stake holders of Bali's
hospitality industry to participate enthusiastically in the Greenpeace
programme.

The programme incidentally is being run in partnership with Bali Hotels
Association and Bali Tourism Development Sector and will include regular
skill-shares to provide information on cost-effective energy efficiency
measures and modern renewable energy technologies that the hospitality
industry can deploy at their properties; Regular training on energy
conservation, water conservation and waste management for hotel staff;
and of course some Greenpeace style lobbying of the Indonesian
government to provide incentives and subsidies to allow hotels to invest
in renewable energy and energy efficiency measures.

Witoelar was happy that he could get away from the meeting, but we used
the opportunity to impress upon him that we expected that under his
leadership the UNFCCC and all parties at the conference will take brave
decisions to ensure that the outcome of the Bali meeting will meet the
aspirations of the millions of people around the world.