The British presidency of COP26, the UN climate change conference that seeks to conclude the regulation of the Paris Agreement, published this Wednesday morning (10) a new text proposal for diplomatic negotiations. The discussions are scheduled to end next Friday (12), but already promise to extend until Saturday (13).
“COP26 urges countries to accelerate the phasing out of coal and fossil fuel subsidies,” says the text proposed by the COP26 presidency, but which has yet to be evaluated by each country’s negotiators.
According to observers at the negotiations, the call is historic. If approved, it will be the first time that the UN Climate Convention recognizes the need to eliminate fossil fuels as a climate measure.
The proposal recognizes that the world must limit global warming to up to 1.5ºC (while the Paris Agreement allowed a window of up to 2ºC).
The draft also cites that efforts to reach that goal must include nature-based solutions — which raises political recognition of combating deforestation as a tool to contain climate change.
Although this energy source is the main emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, its elimination did not appear as an imperative in the negotiation texts. The Paris Agreement opens up the possibility of offsetting emissions through actions such as planting trees — an alternative that makes it possible, through compensation, to maintain fossil sources.
The draft made by the UK includes items that were requested by the different COP negotiating blocs. Countries are yet to speak out in rounds of consultation with the presidency on the text.
One of the proposals included in the draft was proposed by the forum of countries most vulnerable to the climate: the creation of an annual cycle of climate ambition. The intention is to provide a means of recording new announcements, which countries must make annually, as the targets announced so far are far from the effort needed to contain global warming.
The proposal is viewed positively by the British presidency, by African countries, by environmentalists and observers of the negotiations. However, it is considered impractical by delegations from emerging countries — such as China, Brazil, India and Russia.
According to negotiators, the proposal does not consider the impossibility of creating and implementing public policies on an annual basis.
Although proponents make it clear that they do not intend to annually review the NDCs (an acronym for national climate goals, called determined national contributions), the intention of the annual cycles is to call for extra efforts, going beyond what was promised.
For observers, countries are already doing this with new political announcements at the Climate COPs. With the novelty, they would gain only a means to be accountable and avoid misleading advertisements. Negotiators respond that the idea still needs to be agreed upon and regulated — which would further delay negotiations.
In an interview with the Brazilian press, observers of the negotiations showed optimism with the proposed text. For Fernanda Carvalho, WWF climate and energy coordinator, the British presidency was able to include ambitious proposals in the text. The challenge now, according to her, will be to keep them in the final document.
The news is concentrated in the decision that communicates the conclusion of COP26, covering important issues that are outside the Paris regulation, but that need additional efforts, such as financing, increasing the ambition of climate goals, adaptation and damages.
On the other hand, negotiators from several blocs interviewed by the article believe that the new text does not bring significant advances to the regulation of the Paris Agreement.
The Paris rulebook has been under negotiation for five years and there are still three outstanding items: transparency, common timeframes, and Article 6, which introduces the carbon market mechanism—allowing the sale of greenhouse gas emission credits to anyone. it is falling short of its climate target and bringing financial resources to those who are contributing to the reduction of emissions.
Signed in 2015 and in force since 2016, the climate agreement is based on climate goals created freely by each country, which decide how much and at what pace they can contribute to the goal of limiting global warming to between 1.5ºC and 2ºC. However, compliance with the agreement depends on the creation of common technical rules that allow countries to be held accountable for progress.
Considered the main challenge of regulation in Paris, the carbon market is under pressure from the private sector. Although the world already has regional markets, creating a global framework for market rules should increase the reliability of traded projects, warming the market and increasing the value of green assets.
According to specialists who observe the negotiations, the new text published this morning failed to unlock important points in the regulation of Article 6, which remains open.
For negotiators, the technical level of diplomacy has already exhausted the capacity for conversation and only a political agreement can resolve the impasses. The Environment ministers have been heading each country’s delegations since last Tuesday. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is back at COP26 this Wednesday to help unlock the deals.
Although Brazil arrived at the conference with a speech of flexibilization of postures, observers from the negotiation rooms affirmed to the report that these changes had not been observed.
Brazil remains Brazil, said a negotiator from a developed country, referring to the maintenance of classic positions on article 6.
In the negotiation on transparency, the fight is well divided between developing countries and the developed bloc.
While rich countries charge a high degree of detail on efforts to reduce emissions, the developing bloc responds that the rich must also provide greater detail on climate finance responsibility, as they account for most of the historic emissions that led to the world to the current climate change scenario.
Since the Climate Convention was created in 1992, the division of responsibility for climate change has become more complex, with the economic rise of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa). In addition to increasing their emissions, with China being the current largest emitter, these countries also gained economic conditions to decarbonize their economies and maintain economic competitiveness.
Much of the ongoing discussions about financing seeks an intermediate solution between historical and current responsibilities.
A suggestion that appeared at COP26 is the creation of a new term, medium-term issuers, to refer to emerging economies, but there is still no acceptance of the bloc, which has discussed financing with the broad bloc of developing countries, the so-called “G-77 plus China”, which includes countries with different conditions to implement climate goals.
The developing bloc also accuses rich countries of not having fulfilled previous promises, with the Kyoto Protocol and the promise of financing of R$ 100 billion, which would increase the distrust of future promises that are not very detailed, in addition to affecting the legitimacy of requests of increasing the ambition of climate goals.
Signaling in the trading corridors is one of careful optimism. Countries show willingness to find solutions, but they still have to change configuration several times in the coming days.
The journalist traveled at the invitation of Instituto Clima e Sociedade.
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