The United Nations Climate Change Conference COP26 ended with an international agreement, but global climate activists expected a breakthrough. UN Climate Change Conferences have failed us to come up with a global governance system that can monitor systemised power politics with a shared future among all nations. According to the UN Emissions Gap report 2021, current emission assurances are desperately inadequate and the world would still be on the verge of getting warm by 2.7 Celsius by the end of the century.
Nonetheless, this is the first time after the Paris Agreement that countries are revising their voluntary commitments towards the accord. Pakistan has also submitted its second Nationally Determined Contributions along with more than one hundred countries. These new ambitious contributions would require an immediate response from the international climate finance community towards the global south.
Climate finance was one of the challenging issues at COP26. Developing countries with little emissions demanded developed nations to fulfil their pledge to mobilise $100 billion dollar per year to help them adapt and reduce emissions. While other pledges have seen disappointments, we have seen new promises of rerouting global climate finance towards more renewable energy sources. The Glasgow climate pact called upon multilateral development banks, financial institutions and developed countries to double their adaptation finance in developing countries according to the scale of resources needed. The good news is that adaptation funds were raised to $356 million in the form of new pledges. This however, is not enough for adaptation as the developing world alone would need $70 billion.
As COP 26 continued, a long list of attending countries vowed that they will no longer construct coal-fired power plants in line with the steady coal exit plan. Moreover, statements coming from the signatories called out developing countries to phase out coal by 2030. Such statements faced immediate criticism as top exporters like India, US, China, Japan, Russia and Australia were missing from the coal exit plan. These statements lack the urgency needed to phase out coal in this critical time and allows countries to decide when they can phase out coal.
But until the next COP in Egypt, Glasgow dialogue will help identify solutions and finance sources within and outside the UNFCCC process. To gear up financing in loss and damage, G7 and the Petersburg climate dialogue needs to come up with new proposals.
Glasgow indicated progress but was also disappointing. However, there is general agreement among parties what needs to be done but we can see sheer lack of commitment in terms of when it has to be done which is why timing is critical in this case. Countries also agreed on updating NDCs, ahead of Egypt, and setting new goals with climate finance which everyone has to decide collectively before Egypt.
This COP though, has the greatest financial commitment than any other COP, for instance there was this new declaration of forest which was championed by the UK government providing finance for the forest conservation with the US government backing it. Willingness to provide financial resources was much more progressive as if now, on the other hand no conversation on the equity and accessibility of this finance was seen.
After COP 25 in Madrid, the main issue raised was how to deal with the carbon credits and double counting. Although all components of the Paris Agreement were agreed upon, article 6 was still in blue waters. This time, progress on how to proceed with carbon markets has been made. An updated mechanism is expected in which countries will engage each other on a voluntary basis with a non-market based mechanism. This possibility of engaging through the nonmarket mechanism other than CDM is bringing other subsidiary options with the private sector coming out in front.
One of the biggest issues with COP is the fact that it is still incredibly hierarchical. Western nations still have main governing power while devastating consequences of climate change in the global south are unmatched. This whole idea gives the impression of our colonised legacy and that’s why we need to decolonise climate action. We need more of global indigenous voices as climate change is not an equaliser; those without wealth cannot buy themselves out of homelessness. A successful COP would be one with a sense of togetherness for a commonly owned agenda. Those leaders who are trying to push for the commodification of common goods are signing a death sentence for the entire world.