Sunday, 2 December, 9 p.m. — There were no questions asked about the science of climate change at one of the first press briefings here in Bali by the head of Climate Change Convention secretariat, Yvo de Boer. There were no questions doubting whether climate change was really happening or whether it was caused by human activities.

What there was, instead, was a volley of questions going straight to the heart of how Bali might shape the future agreement — the nuts and bolts that Bali will have to deliver on in order to properly frame a workable solution to climate change.

It's not just that the type of questions being asked on climate change have changed, it is that there are so many more press outlets that are interested in this year's Climate Change Conference, a conference that is often dominated by rather technical discussions. More than 1,200 members of the press have registered for the conference, compared to just over 600 at last year's conference in Nairobi.

Sunday, 2 December, 6 p.m. — Bali looks ready. All along the main road from the airport to the conference center are signs welcoming delegates. Its not the high season for tourism right now in Bali, as my taxi driver tells me that December is usually rainy. And today the air is hot and heavy and the sky looks like rain.

But the taxi drivers, hotel managers and restaurant owners say the outlook for the next two weeks is quite sunny. More than 10,000 people have checked in at the conference center and those numbers could swell as we move closer to the high level talks that will start during the second week. There are, of course, the delegates from individual countries. The difference in Bali, I'm told, is that country delegations are much bigger than usual. And there are NGOs, academics, science people and a strong business contingent. In this group, interest seems to be running high within the carbon market trading among carbon traders, whose fortunes are very much linked to the process that emerges from Bali.