Press Conference on ‘CO₂ Cubes – Visualize a Tonne of Change’

The project “CO₂ CUBES –- Visualize a Tonne of Change”, to be launched at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen on 7 December, was introduced today at a United Nations Headquarters press conference.

The CO₂ Cube is a giant multimedia arts installation that helps visualize what one metric tonne of carbon dioxide (CO₂) stored at standard atmospheric pressure looks like.

Participants in today’s press conference, moderated by Eric Falt, Director, Outreach Division, Department of Public Information (DPI), were:  Kiyo Akasaka, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public Information; Mia Hanak, Executive Director, Millennium ART, which creates unique platforms for public engagement on themes tied to the Millennium Development Goals; Travis Threkel, Chief Creative Director, Obscura Digital; and Ramya Raghavan, Non-profit and Activism Manager of YouTube.  The press conference was opened with music composed and played by violinist Ken G. Williams.

Opening the press conference, Mr. Akasaka said that CO₂ CUBES would be unveiled on 7 December, the first day of “Copenhagen 15”, the fifteenth meeting of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which would last until 18 December.  The last two days of the meeting would consist of a Summit of Heads of States and Government, in which United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon would also participate.  United States President Barack Obama would also attend the Conference.  The Conference was of critical importance, he said, as was the expected agreement.

In order to make the Conference a success, the Department of Public Information had been working hard with many partners, including from civil society and the world of business, art and academia, he said.  The CO₂ CUBES project was an excellent example of the collaboration between the United Nations and the arts world.  As 32 billion tonnes of CO₂ was released in the atmosphere yearly, the Cube –- the size of a three-story building -- would help visualize the seriousness of global warming and climate change.  The communication platform would send a powerful message to stakeholders and the public and would, he hoped, contribute to reaching an agreement.

Ms. Hanak added that the project was about bringing together the “open minds” of artists, architects and scientists through the universal language of art.  The cube of 27 x 27 x 27 feet (8.2m x 8.2m x 8.2m) visualized 1 metric tonne of invisible gas.  She hoped that piece of art would illustrate the impact of the fact that the average person in the industrialized world is responsible for one tonne of CO₂ emissions each month and in the United States, every two weeks

Through innovative digital technologies, the cube would be used as a platform for projections that would show the emissions’ impact and would give a real time stream of events.  The cube was an “architectural feat” designed by Alfio Bonanno, a pioneer of site-specific nature installation, and architect Christophe Cornubert, recipient of the Rietveld Architecture Prize.  The cube consisted of stacked containers that would be floating on the water of the St. Jørgens Lake near the Tycho Planetarium in Copenhagen.  YouTube would provide a real-time portal to show stories from around the world through the “Raise Your Voice” campaign.  It was a carbon-neutral project that would be unveiled at 5:30 p.m. on 7 December and would stay live throughout the Conference.

Explaining the “Raise your Voice” campaign, Ms. Raghavan said that thousands of voices had been raised through the campaign, in which people all over the world could send in their take on Copenhagen through a YouTube channel, would raise the level of discourse.  Two thousand videos had already been received.  The videos would be projected on the cube, bringing citizens’ voices from all over the world.  On 15 December, there would be a town hall event, where leaders on climate change issues would answer questions raised by the campaign.  The event would be covered by CNN and uploaded on YouTube.  She applauded the United Nations on its “forward thinking” in using new media technologies in the intersection with art.

Mr. Threkel said the CO₂ Cube was a massive, three-dimensional video sculpture that delivered context, story and visualization.  Custom technology had been developed to fuse data sets and personal videos coming through YouTube, streamed on arrival.  It was a blend of data, technology and art.  In the three-dimensional space different websites and real time streams could be viewed on arrival.  The project had been taken a step farther by going to a “hypercube”, a fourth-dimensional cube also called a tesseract.  It was another symbolic aspect of looking at the environment from a different dimension or perspective.  He then showed some of the test-clips produced from a small-scale cube.

Answering a correspondent’s question, Mr. Threkel said a hypercube was a three-dimensional representation of the fourth dimension.  Although the fourth dimension was a mathematical concept that could not be comprehended by humans living in the third dimension, shadows of the fourth dimension could be seen in the third dimension.  It was much like suggesting three dimensions on a two-dimensional platform by adding perspective.  Those shadows of the fourth dimension looked very much like abstract deformations.

Asked how art could clarify the message to the stakeholders, Mr. Akasaka said that every negotiator was aware of the expectations.  As a negotiator during the Kyoto conference on Climate Change himself, he was conscious of the messages from non-governmental organizations and the media.  The work of artists could help in making the negotiators and governments feel the expectations of the people of the world.  As the Conference would be attended by some 90 Heads of State or Government, he hoped that the CO₂ Cube would be translated into pressure on the negotiations.

Answering another question, Mr. Akasaka said that on-line engagement with civil society was not new to the Department.  The Department had worked with YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and MySpace, among others, during the September Summit of the General Assembly and the International Day of Peace.  It was a creative way of using new technologies to reach the widest possible audience.

Ms. Hanak added that the CO₂ Cube could help non-governmental organizations communicate their message.  It was a way to build a “global community”.  Partners in the project had worked on a tight budget, with most contributions in the form of in-kind services.  The total budget was around $250,000.  (Mr. Falt noted that the United Nations had not contributed financially.)  She said that there were ongoing discussions about a United States tour after Copenhagen, and about participation in the 2010 Shanghai World Expo.   Copenhagen could be used as the launch for a year-long outreach campaign.

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For information media • not an official record