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15/12/2021
On December 12, 2015, the Paris Agreement was approved, a document that included in its objectives preventing the increase in the global average temperature from not exceeding 2ºC.
Since this agreement began, a summit has been held every year attended by around 120 heads of state and their representatives meet to show their political commitment to slowing down climate change.
At the last summit held in Glasgow last November, more than 40 countries committed to phase out coal at the COP26 climate summit, including some of the main countries that use it, such as Poland, Vietnam and Chile.
However, some of the countries that depend the most on fuel did not sign up to the commitment, such as: Australia, India, China and the United States, among others.
COP26 objectives
At this summit, there are several issues on the table, but they could be summed up in two:
1. Advance in the decarbonization of the planet (abandon fossil fuels and further reduce CO2 emissions) and
2. Funding to help the most vulnerable to adapt and combat the effects of climate change that they are already suffering.
The countries that attended the Glasgow summit must:
✦ Update and increase emission reduction plans: increase the commitments established in the emission reduction plans of each country (NDC), which are voluntary. They should leave Glasgow refreshed and with further emissions cuts. By 2030, they must be cut in half.
✦ Make the carbon markets work: that the countries agree to establish new rules for the trading of “emission rights”, which until now work in the EU. The objective is to generate a legal framework, at the international level, that allows countries and companies to carry out transactions associated with these CO2 emission rights. It is a very technical and complex issue that should have been closed in Madrid, but it is still pending closure and it is always a stumbling block in negotiations.
✦ Increase financing for climate action: fulfill the commitment of developed countries to finance 100,000 million dollars a year to less developed countries, which are the most vulnerable to the climate crisis. It is a question of helping them to fulfill their commitments with this decarbonization of the planet, but also to face the effects of climate change that they already suffer, but for which, above all, the industrialized countries are responsible.
Are countries on track to meet international climate goals?
In September 2021, the UN warned that the review of objectives carried out by the countries had not been demanding enough, and that this would cause temperatures to rise 2.7 degrees by the end of the century. However, states are facing another challenge this fall that could influence their response: power cuts have caused prices for natural gas, coal and oil to hit record highs in Europe and China.
China, which is the country with the highest volume of emissions in the world, has not yet provided its NDC figure. The big producers of fossil fuels like Saudi Arabia, Russia or Australia do not seem to be willing to reinforce their competitors. India, a key player as the world's second largest consumer, producer and importer of coal, has also not yet committed to an emissions target.
The new focus of energy price tensions shifts from gas to coal. China has changed its policy of trying to reduce polluting emissions by ordering a return to the intensive use of coal to alleviate the lack of electricity supply that it suffers in several provinces. Despite the fact that national production has not been abandoned, in the short term it will not cover the needs of the country. Chinese operators are buying coal in the international market at any price, which is causing a rapid growth of the same, and threatens to leave the rest of the countries shivering with cold for the next winter.
What will happen if the objectives are not achieved at COP26?
With the current outlook, the prediction is that COP26 will not meet the objective of achieving sufficiently solid commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions so that by 2030 these have been reduced by 45% with respect to current levels. This means that the world will not be in a good position to achieve emissions neutrality by 2050, nor to achieve the objective of keeping the increase in temperatures below 1.5 degrees.
Some studies argue that the difference between 1.5 and 2 degrees could mean certain island states being submerged under the sea, the death of coral reefs, extreme heat waves, floods, fires and general difficulties in obtaining good food.
This would mean many premature deaths, more mass immigration, huge economic losses, vast tracts of land uninhabitable, and the outbreak of violent conflicts over resources and food (what the UN Secretary General has called "a hellish future"). .