_ The Zero Emissions Strategy Conference

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Welcome to the Virtual Conference

This Welcome Page is intended to serve first time visitors to the virtual conference. But before we go any further, it may be useful to point out to you that this site is most comfortably viewed with versions 3.0 (or better) of InternetExplorer or Netscape. Of course the faster your modem and the better your monitor, the easier and more productive the experience. But those of you who need it will get the necessary further background on all this shortly.

Access and Participation in the Conference

This is of course a "virtual" or entirely electronic conference. The actual physical 'conference hall' is in fact spread out over three distant locations, in Paris (where most of the planning and work is done), in Vienna Virginia (where the main database and processing unit (including this page) are hosted by PrimeHost, and at the Hamline University Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota (which is where the critical CyberForum component is housed and managed). For the user, though, the entire conference is taking place on your desk top via its various electronic linkages to and through our three working sites. For the present, it makes not different at all where our team happens to be or even (with few exceptions) when we do our work. (An excellent chronology of the accomplishments, setbacks and attempted resolutions of the first weeks of the conference will be found in the Archives section. If you have an interest in virtual conferencing, what we can do with it, and where it might be going, it is a recommended read.)

The first step of the conference was to test a stripped down version of the technology and operations package in a limited pilot run. Its specific target was to see if, with very little advance notice and only a portion of the funding actually needed, it could over the month of August be used to provide a first round of expert counsel, inputs and various forms of feedback and links re the Zero Emissions debate, specifically to support some planning activities in this area by the Institute of Advanced Studies of the United Nations University in Tokyo. But this collaborative venture has in fact a much greater range of objectives and intended uses in view as well, and thus far has managed to gain the support of a small (and we hope growing) ad hoc consortium of groups and institutions with some rather different interests and competencies in the several areas involved. (You will find more on this in the section on the initial sponsor group that follows immediately below.)

But the conference is also, and perhaps this is the most important of all, seen as an important learning opportunity for all involved (including for the conference's organizers and its various sponsors). Because of its somewhat unusual nature, we are going to ask you to take a bit more time at first with the various 'rooms' and tools that together make up the conference site, than many of you are perhaps accustomed to when you sit down to your computer for your other daily work purposes. You may find that using your computer in this way is quite different and at times quite exasperating. With that annoyance clearly in our sights, we have worked hard to make this an 'efficient' process to the extent possible, in particular for the non-expert Web user. The core of our push for efficiency will be found in the site map which as you will shortly see is the central navigational tool of the conference.

That said, all this like anything else that is experimental in nature (because it is in itself very much a research process if you learn and use it to its fullest) it requires a level of curiosity and patience which stretches well beyond the practices of many busy administrators or bureaucrats, and indeed of many mature scientists. Thus if you wish to get full benefit of the considerable resources which are set out in these pages and beyond via their linked extensions, you are going to have to play with it a bit at first. This means inevitably that you will find yourself going up the occasional blind ally and that you may get lost from time to time. However, with discipline, imagination, a willingness to learn, and a good dose of patience with yourself, this is going to be a powerful tool indeed.

Finally, we would ask you to bear in mind that this is a conference, that it is a good one, and that when you go to a conference it takes you quite an investment of time and energy. Now of course a lot of that time is wasted in airports, finding your room, etc. Our conference will save you a great deal of that, but for you to benefit you are going to have to give it your time and attention as well. And perhaps, before you go any further, you might do well to take a side trip to the Participant's Contribution, and then come on back here to move ahead with the rest in good order.

And does this mean that we will never meet again, that there is no need for bringing together large floating crowds of scientists, administrators and diverse others to meet, lecture, glare and schmooz in some lovely corner of the world? Well, we have an answer to that, but why don't we first spend this month or so together and THEN talk about it.

Sponsors Others Contributing to Support the Conference

As is perhaps fitting for a project as innovative as this, its sponsorship is every bit as varied and resourceful as the technology and operations arrangements it sets out here for your consultation and use. Backing for the first stages of the project have been pieced together by the organizers from various sources, some of whom have come in with a portion of the funds required to bring the project this far along, and others with technical help and support. The bulk of the input to date has been 'risk financed' by EcoPlan (against hopefully future compensation). A quick summary of the initial sponsor group follows, together with links to their own WWW sites so that you can learn more about them and the reasons for their interests in these matters.

And what are the sponsors getting for their time and money and support? And what might you get from it if you decide to join the group?

Well, that's a rather interesting question, and we guess the answer is what you get is, appropriately, a sort of 'virtual report'. As we move ahead with the project in its various stages, we listen carefully to what these various sponsors expect and would like to get from it, and to the extent possible we try to take this into account as we design, fine tune and administer the conference. There is, however, no written final report, nor in most cases even a specific timetable which announces the beginning and end of 'their' project. The raw materials for whatever they might wish to get out of it are what they themselves obtain as they look into, review, ponder and eventually make use of the conference and its many parts.

All this of course does considerable violence to the usual research contract approach, but perhaps what is most innovative (and for some surely most disturbing) of all, is that virtually all of what goes on and can be deduced from this activity is available to anyone with an interest in the subject. Not only available, but free! So... the 'power of information' has changed altogether with this new age. It is no longer important to 'have it' (and maybe to hide it); the power is when you decide to make use of it. QED.

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Our Special Audience: The New Media and Why They Are Needed

Our conference, virtual as it is, is aggressively making use of 'the new media' in an attempt to prompt and support a series of electronic exchanges which are intended to permit all-comers, no matter who or where they are, to access and contribute to a shared international "forum" of ideas, views, reactions, reports, materials and proposals to improve their understanding of the topics under discussion. The discussions and exchanges are taking place via not just one but several technologies and paths, depending on the time, preferences, and facilities available to the participant.

We are well aware that these communications aspects may be somewhat troubling for some participants. Indeed, experience and observation have shown us that here, once again, there is a sort of uncomfortable inverse squared relationship that can be observed: thus, more often than not, the more knowledgeable and senior the scientist or administrator, the less able or willing they are to take the time needed to learn and begin to make effective use of these new media. And yet these are the very people who are best placed both to understand and to influence policy in the important areas that are the concern of this meeting. Our problem emerges, however, when one considers that it is probably most unlikely that they will be able to make the much needed breakthroughs in the policy sphere (as opposed to the ivory tower of research) unless they begin to equip themselves with some of these new tools. What to do in the face of this? If the challenges of sustainability were not so very pressing, we could simply wait for the next generation of fully computer literate scientists and leaders to come along. But time is pressing, and the price of such a leisurely generational conversion is simply too high. It would be grossly irresponsible just to wait.

This then is the second major challenge of our meeting -- not only to address our important substantive issues that bring us here together (and yes indeed, we are very much here!), but also to do this via a fast-emerging new set of tools being deployed in an actual working situation that is basically recognizable to all involved. Learning by doing (and, incidentally, in the process providing valuable feedback to all concerned so that in next rounds of such trials and encounters an improved set of tools and routines will be available). We are making a major effort both through this site and materials available on request via email to bridge this gap, and in the process hope to turn what otherwise might be seen as a trying and unpleasant chore to as close as we can to a convivial and instructive activity. So, get comfortable, take a good look at the site map, check to see if your computer and communications setup are up to standard , get ready to be very patient with yourself (because if anything goes wrong here, the most likely source of your problems is probably not the Net), and get ready to spend just a bit of time to explore what is, after all, a most exciting and useful world through a new set of lenses.

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__ The Registration Desk

Of course there is nothing that keeps you from having a look around and even visiting and using portions of the conference regularly without letting us know about it. First time visitors may find it useful to begin by visiting the Site Map and Conference Guide which hopefully will be a big help in getting around the conference and all its various parts. But, while lurkers are welcome, if you wish to be able to access all parts of the conference you will need to take a minute to 'register'. Fortunately it is a very simple procedure. (It's also free.) So, once you have had your inspection tour and satisfied yourself that you are in the right place, it will be time to ...

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