File:Russia, Japan and FF expanders score Fossil of the Day at COP22 Nov 17 (31062299205).jpg

From the CAN media release: The first Fossil of the Day award goes to...take a deep breath...Turkey, Russia, Australia, New Zealand, France, Japan and Indonesia for duplicity at the UN climate negotiations. While representatives from climate vulnerable countries, cities, business, and civil society are fighting to keep dirty fossil fuels in the ground, as well as preventing the expansion of polluting airports (hat-tip to France), these countries are doing their best to increase their domestic fossil fuel extraction. By doing so, they are quite literally drilling under and undermining everyone’s efforts to keep global warming below the critical threshold of 1.5C degrees. These countries helped forge the Paris Agreement which is now in force, committing them to halt climate change, so they really need to get the left hand and the right hand talking to each other. Big words at the UN don't mean much when you've got big fossil fuel plans back home!

The second Fossil of the Day award goes to...Japan for its dodgy stance on coal. Japan has a crazy number of new coal power projects in the pipeline (48!) and is funding a massive 10GW worth of new coal in Indonesia. On a near-daily basis Indonesian locals have been protesting against proposed coal operations in the Cirebon region, concerned about the impact on public health and water supplies. Unfortunately, the Japanese government and the Japan Bank for International Cooperation has been blind to these protests, and apparently the attempts of the international community to tackle air pollution. Time to shape up, Japan!

The third Fossil of the Day award goes to...Russia for promoting nuclear power as a feasible solution to climate change. We all know that this outdated and risky technology is too slow and expensive to contribute to climate efforts - and if deployed it will steal away resources needed to develop renewables. Not to mention the fact that nuclear is not even a zero-emissions technology - it produces massive amounts of greenhouse gases during the uranium enrichment. Then, of course, there is the question of safety. The Russian government really need to take a look at the long-term, widespread consequences of the Fukushima and Chernobyl, for a start.