All About COP26

The 26^th Conference of Parties to the UNFCCC will take place from the 31^st of October to 12^th of November in the city of Glasgow in Scotland under the presidency of the UK and Italy. The venue will be the Scottish Events Campus. The conference of parties is an annual gathering of parties to the UN Climate Change and is held to discuss and map the way forward in regards to climate change. This year’s COP is particularly more significant for various reasons. 

COP26 - image courtesy

One is that it was supposed to take place in 2020 but was pushed to 2021 because of the pandemic.

Two is because it is the second time that NDCs are deposited and so they will be evaluated to see if the principle of ratcheting up ambition, a major part of climate action is being followed. Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) are the centerpiece of the Paris Agreement whose aim is to drastically lower greenhouse gas emissions so as to stop climate change, which is of grave importance in today’s world.

The climate meet is one of the biggest conferences under the auspices of the United Nations agencies and will involve an estimated 30000 participants gathering in the Scottish city.

The preparatory PreCOP meetings and the Youth4Climate event were both held in Milan Italy in the months of September and October. Italy hosted the G2O leadership earlier in the year and will do so again in October.

New or updated NDCs are submitted after every five years by the signatories of the Paris Agreement. Since the inaugural ones 2015, this will be their next submission. Nationally Determined Contributions are documents prepared by each individual entity and show the sum total of a country’s greenhouse gas emissions per sector as well as the measures and intention put in place to cut and drastically lower carbon pollution. This is known as ambition. Under the Paris agreement, NDCs should be ambitious, progressive and ratcheted up. That is, they should show increasingly greater levels of emission cuts in relation to each country’s emission levels.

One issue still lacking consensus and which needs a definitive conclusion at this COP is common time frames for implementing individual NDCs, whether a timeframe covers a 5 year period or a 10 year one. The decision should be common and so apply to all parties irrespective.

Collectively, these NDCs will show the global capacity to cut greenhouse gas emissions and whether put together, we will attain the first and second aim of the Paris Agreement which is; to limit warming this century to 1.5 degrees above preindustrial levels and keep it below 2 degrees above the same.

As of end of July 2021, 113 parties had issued 86 new or updated NDCs which the UNFCCC used to issue a combined report. The 86 are 59% of the signatories and represent a 49% share of all emissions. Going only by this number, there is going to be a 12% decrease of emissions in 2030 compared by 2010. However as per the IPCC physical science report, the 1.5 degrees goal needs a 45% cut of carbon dioxide by 2030 and emissions need to be halved by 2030 so to be net zero by 2050. For the 2 degrees goal, there needs to be a 25 % decrease in emissions by the end of this decade.

According to the UNFCCC synthesis report, 70 of the 113 parties indicate achieving net zero by 2050 which also means a 26% cut of emissions by end of this decade contrasted with 2010.

As per the 191 NDCs deposited at UN Climate change whether new or old, there will be a 16% spike in emissions by 2030 as compared to 2010 and this will result to a rise of 2.7 degree this century.

NDCs by developing countries are, not surprisingly, progressive and ambitious but are pegged on climate finance which is necessary for both adaptation and mitigation, which ushers in the next issue at COP26 which is climate finance.

A paper backed by major groups of developing countries asks that developed countries, responsible for most of climate change take responsibility and honor their promise to remit 100 billion dollars yearly to developing countries, particularly from now to 2024 and then more from 2025 going on. This promise which has never been fully honored was made at COP15 in 2009.

Developing countries have also asked that finance be structured in the form of grants rather than loans, which are punitive and do not serve to really promote climate action.

According to the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) developed countries mobilized 79.6$ in 2019, which was just 2% above 2018. G20 countries contribute three quarters or 75% of all emissions but do not pull their weight in a similar manner when it comes to reducing emissions. The United States however has pledged to give 11.4 dollars per year by 2024 which is four times its contribution from 2013 to 2015. The UK, Australia, Canada, Japan, and Italy have been asked to give 4 billion per year given that they are some of the major polluters.

Adaptation is another key element to be discussed at the meet whereby rules and guidelines are to be put in place to govern the principle. Adaptation is crucial because the planet has warmed and will continue to do so because of the emissions already in the atmosphere. Participants will endeavor to give a more certain and clear definition on the Global Goal on Adaptation (GGA). The global goal on adaptation is meant to clearly delineate and support creating resilience, decreasing vulnerability and upping adaptive capacity. Adaptation guidelines should either be included in a stand-alone report by the IPCC or in the 7^th Assessment Report meant to be released in 2021 to 2022.

Likewise, half of all climate finance should go to adaptation. Currently, it stands at 25%. A couple of countries: Denmark, Holland, the United Kingdom and Sweden have recently committed to give 50% of their contributions to adaptation.

Loss and damage is another aspect of climate change to be discussed at the negotiations. It occurs in case of serious and unavoidable consequences of climate change such as floods or droughts which hit an area and cause serious destruction. This particular matter has been a major point of emphasis for developing countries and especially small and island states which are under the very real threat of sea level rise and typhoons. However, there is hesitation on the part of developed countries to convincingly be part.

So, the talks will aim at concretizing loss and damage by implementing the Warsaw Implementation Mechanism of COP19 and bringing the Santiago Network on loss and damage (COP25) under the charge of the conference of parties and the Paris Agreement. Loss and damage also requires technical and financial assistance which needs to be operationalized.

Another issue is the Paris rule book. The Paris Agreement needs guidelines and basic rules of operation, something which six years to its inception has not been agreed upon. The agreement is fine, but the rules to play by are yet to be decided. An example of this is formulation of transparency guidelines.

Clean energy is another major point at the climate meet. For the first time, solar and wind power are lower-priced than coal and oil. China, at the 76^th UNGA in New York, indicated a total stop to building new international coal projects. Japan, Korea, France and Germany have pledged No to new coal.

Global stocktake is a process that is initially meant to start in 2023, and every five years thereafter. The ways and methods to do so are yet to be decided upon. Global stocktaking is meant to help the world collectively evaluate where we are in terms of progress in view to fulfilling the Paris agreement and what needs to be accelerated.

Nature based solutions to climate change are likely to be raised at the negotiations. Forests, oceans, soils are all natural ways to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Ecosystem based adaptation is the concept of strengthening natural ecosystems to better shield and absorb the impacts of climate change.

Carbon markets is another prickly issue yet to be concluded. As Article 6, it helps parties offset their unavoidable emissions by buying certified reductions from other parties. Discordance exists here because of several questions: making sure they’re not taken advantage of to lessen individual national ambition to mitigate; ensuring that such projects safeguard the integrity of the environment; ensuring they contribute to actual financial support so certifying additionality.

The UK’s COP26 president Alok Sharma has a five point objective at the meet which is to bring attention to adaptation and resilience, promoting an energy shift to renewables, emphasizing the protection of nature, mobilizing climate finance and promoting zero carbon transport.

COP 26 is an important milestone in the climate fight and all eyes will be watching to see if nations will do the right thing and deliver progress that ensures the safety and wellbeing of the planet and people.