Thursday, 13 December, 8:00 p.m. — The 1,000 seat room where Al Gore was going to speak started to fill almost an hour and half ago. There were many NGOs, but there was a large contingent of delegates and other dignitaries, including Bianca Jagger. A climate skeptic-NGO handed out leaflets to the effect that Gore had been proven wrong in a number of instances.

Then Gore entered to thunderous applause. After starting to speak, about old times at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro and Kyoto, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri joined the room and the two Nobel Prize winners embraced on the podium.

In a passionate address, Gore told the absolutely quiet audience why it had taken so many so long to understand that climate change was happening and that it was a real problem. "There is the illusion that it will affect others. Not us." And he said we have been given four separate opinions — the latest IPCC report being the fourth, and they all confirmed the previous opinions. "When you get four opinions and they all say the same thing, you act."

But Gore's main message was that, more than anything else, there is a moral imperative to act on climate change. "We are one people on one planet with one destiny." He urged the audience not to wait until 2009 to complete a new treaty. "We can't afford to wait another five years. We may have less than 10."

Thursday, 13 December, 5:30 p.m. — If you think it is getting hotter wherever you are, it is. The last 10 years have been the warmest on record, according to data released by the World Meteorological Organization. And even though 2007 still has some 18 days left in it, WMO head Michel Jarraud said that he could say that with confidence and that seven years of the new century are among the eight warmest on record. This has happened even with a La Nina effect in place, which often has a cooling influence. The year 2007 was also spectacular, he says, for the dramatic melting of Arctic Ice which has led to the first recorded opening of the Northwest Passage in Canada.

Thursday, 13 December, 4:30 p.m. — Everyone says they are being constructive and flexible but listening to the various countries and groupings, it sounds like consensus is still far away with less than 24 hours left for negotiating. But Emil Salim, the head negotiator for Indonesia, looks calmly at the possibly chaotic hours ahead. "In negotiations like this, everyone holds their cards close to their chest," he says. But he thinks the discussions will go on well into the night, or morning, and agreement will eventually be reached. He thought it unwise for delegation to look to get everything they want at this point in the process."

Thursday, 13 December, 1:30 p.m. — This is the time when people are starting to get nervous. The object of the Bali meeting seems simple enough. Yvo de Boer, the head of the Climate Change Convention, says the goal is to formally launch negotiations on a post 2012 climate change deal, to set an agenda for the negotiations and to agree on a time to end the negotiations. But as the talks wind down, the only area where there is broad agreement is that the talks, whatever form they may take, should conclude in 2009.

Some of the disagreements are over technical and legal issues such as how the new negotiations should take place and what form the final decisions should take. Some disagreements are substantive, such as discussions over technology transfer and talks over reducing emissions from deforestation. Delegates sounded a note of exasperation that talks on the transfer of technology completely collapsed over whether to call a new initiative a "facility" or a "fund."

"I'm very concerned with the pace of things," de Boer said. The talks have taken an all or nothing quality to them, and he says the "whole house of cards could fall."

Thursday, 13 December, 10:30 a.m. — All sorts of species are in trouble because of climate change. Many plant and animal species have been moving away from the equator, moving to higher heights, changing their reproductive behaviour, and, in some cases, developing new physical traits. Some species will make it, others won't. The latest IPCC reports say that almost a third of all species could become extinct because of climate change.

To help species adapt to climate change, the Convention on Biodiversity has launched a new website. The new website will serve as a repository of knowledge of case studies and practices that could help promote biodiversity. Ahmed Djoghlaf, who heads the Biodiversity Convention, says the new website could play a major role in illustrating the link between biodiversity and climate change.