FOCUS
CLIMATE CHANGE ARCHIVES
Conference of the Parties (COP)
On November 13. Finally, though a day late and a dollar short a Glasgow Climate Pact was signed with mixed results. There was acknowledgement that fossil fuels are the main drivers of climate change. There was at least formal recognition of a 45% reduction of global greenhouse gases by 2030. There was an agreement to accelerate reduction of emissions. There was agreement that rules were needed to manage a global carbon market. Reports on progress toward net zero would be due in one year rather than five. There was talk of doubling funding for adaptions by developing countries by 2025.
The good news at COP27 was the establishment of a fund to protect vulnerable countries after disasters.The bad news was that nations were reluctant to adopt a more ambitious climate plan. COP 27 left the planet on a dangerous path.COP27 made it clear that letting go of the current energy system is not something that is going to happen anytime soon. Rob Jackson, a climate scientist at Stanford University, said about the progress made at COP 27 it is inevitable that a safe warming threshold will be surpassed by a reluctance to give up fossil fuels.
COP28 is distinguished from previous COPs by the conclusion of the First Stocktake. The Paris Agreement’s Global Stocktake process, designed to assess the global response to the climate crisis, is conducted every five years. It is intended to evaluate progress on climate action at the global level — not the national level — and to identify overall gaps to achieve the Paris Agreement as well as opportunities to bridge them. This First Stocktake is slated to conclude during COP28 in December. It will evaluate the world's progress on slashing greenhouse gas emissions, building resilience to climate impacts, and the success in securing finance and support to address the climate crisis.
The United Nations’ Conference of the Parties (COP 29) to be held in Baku, Azerbaijan will take place from November 11 to November 22. The agenda will include a focus on relationships between war and climate as well as the hope for a more permanent cooperative structure to explore roads to peace given climate change. The slogan, and the hope, for the 29th cop is reflected in the slogan “ In Solidarity for a Green World.” However some project that there will be fewer attendees compared to the previous COP28. For one thing there is the distraction of widening wars with no end in sight. It is also likely that the progress made in the previous cops has been inadequate and relatedly commitments by powerful interests have not been kept. The bottom line is that there is no means to effectively assign some accountability.
COP 15, held 7-19 Decembe 7-19 2022 in Montreal, Canada, represented governments from around the world. Leaders came together to agree on a new set of goals to guide global action through 2030 to halt and reverse nature loss.
The Conference of the Parties (COP16), is happening in Cali, Columbia from October 21 to November 1. The theme is “Make Peace with Nature”. Around 200 nations are participating in 2024.
The biodiversity COPs have been meeting every two years since 1995. The purpose is to find ways to save nature given the rapid rate of habitat destruction and climate change.
The previous COP15, held in Montreal, fell far short of the hoped for goal of $200 billion to develop national biodiversity plans and the COPs have yet to develop a plan for developing countries that does not drive them into debt.
Two items for consideration on the COP16 agenda are a proposed creation of a permanent body on indigenous issues and the establishment of a global multilateral system for sharing genetic information from plants, animals, and microbes.
The WEFs held at DAVOS Switzerland, are the place where capital is king. On the other hand, it is a place where climate change economics are more debated compared to, for instance, the Conference of the Parties, (COPS). DAVOs 24 differed in several ways from DAVOS 23. The existential threat of climate change was delayed or put on a back burner compared to other concerns.