Google has announced it has partnered with the Danish government to launch an online platform focused on climate change. The move comes ahead of the UN Climate Change Conference 2009 (COP15) in December hosted by the Danish government. The goal of the platform is to increase global engagement in climate change. Users will be able to upload videos to YouTube's "Raise your voice" COP15 channel sharing their thoughts and opinions on climate change. The channel will also allow users to watch videos that go behind the scenes of the conference. During COP15, videos will be shown to the leaders at the conference who will be able to record their opinions from the venue.
The most popular video submissions will be aired globally during the COP15 CNN YouTube debate on December 15, and the top two submissions will win a trip to Copenhagen. Working with data from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Google has created climate change scenarios on Google Maps and Google Earth. Users will be able to view visualizations of greenhouse gas emissions by region, the likely consequences of climate change, as well as narrated virtual tours.
