Already, it's clear we won't get an agreement comprehensive enough to force the deep cuts scientists say are necessary to slow down climate change.
Yet the Copenhagen meeting is a promising and worthy successor to the Kyoto Protocols it is meant to succeed.
That's becuase it brings all the major carbon emitting countries into one room, and one treaty.
The inclusion and participation of the U.S., China and Indonesia (the three largest carbon sources) even in a draft agreement is a good start.
And we know that a low-carbon future is going to take more than legislation: it will require a cultural change in the way we live and work.
This means more mass transit and less private car ownership in the west; it means energy growth in India and China fuelled more by renewables than by fossil fuels. India's decision to invest in a decntralized network of solar energy, 15,000 MW per year for the next 30 years, will significantly raise the standard of living in rural areas, villages and towns without adding to carbon emissions.
What will be drafted at Copenhagen, can actually be signed and sealed in the summer of 2010, when the leaders of the G20 group of major world economies gather in Toronto.
By that time, Canada should develop and enact a comprehensive plan to provide its own leadership on climate change.
In Green Oil, I propose a dedicated energy tax -- the Natural Resources Severance Tax -- to pay for and build a green future we can share with the world.
Even at a $60 oil price, a modest application of this tax to the Alberta oil sands, the world's largest hydrocarbon deposit, will hield more than $6 million a day to pay for the reserach, the ingenuity, the technology and even the investment needed to develop greener alternatives from the proceeds of our hydrocarbon wealth.
I am delighted to note that the Green Oil group now has attracted member from beyond Canada. We need all of you, all of your voices, all of your wisdom and experience, to shape the green future.
A cultural shift may look overwhelming, but creative and influential people like you can make a huge difference if you lead the way. Green Oil is the owner's manual you need, to develop your own ideas and propositions for building a greener future from sustainable and responsible development of the oil wealth of Canada, the only energy superpower in the democratic world.
Whether you live in Canada or beyond, all of us in democracies know that we need to give our politicians the courage of our convictions.
What Gandhi taught us so many years ago still rings true: please be the change you want to see in the world.
Do follow Copenhagen, and add your voice and your thoughts to the quest to secure the future of our planet.
-Satya Das
