24/11/21
Cop: Talks in Baku torn between mitigation and finance
Edinburgh, 21 November (Argus) — Developing and developed nations remain at
loggerheads on what progress on climate finance and mitigation — actions to cut
greenhouse gas emissions — should look like at the UN Cop 29 climate summit. But
Cop 30 host Brazil has reminded parties that they need to stick to the brief,
which is finance for developing countries. Concluding a plenary where parties,
developed and developing, listed grievances, environment minister Marina Silva
recognised "the excellent progress achieved" on mitigation at Cop 28. She listed
paragraphs of the Cop 28 deal, including the energy package and its historic
call to transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems. "We are on the
right track," she said, talking about mitigation, but "our greatest obligation
at this moment is to make progress with regard to financing". "This is the core
of financing that will pave our collective path in ambition and implementation
at Cop 30," Silva said, adding that $1.3 trillion for developing countries
should be "the guiding star of this Cop". Parties are negotiating a new
collective quantified goal (NCQG) — a new climate finance target — building on
the $100bn/yr that developed countries agreed to deliver to developing countries
over 2020-25. But developed countries insist that a precise number for a goal
can only be produced if there is progress on mitigation and financing structure
for the NCQG. "Otherwise you have a shopping basket but you don't know what's in
there," EU energy commissioner Wopke Hoekstra said. Some developing nations said
they need the "headline number first". Some developing countries, including
Latin American and African nations as well as island states, have also
complained about the lack of mitigation ambition. Cop is facing one of the
"weakest mitigation texts we have ever seen," Panama said. But they also
indicated that financial support was missing to implement action. Developed
countries at Cop 29 seek the implementation of the energy pledges made last
year. "What we had on our agenda was not just to restate the [Cop 28] consensus
but actually to enhance and to operationalise that," but the text goes in the
opposite direction, Hoekstra said, talking about the latest draft on finance.
Whether hints that Brazil has mitigation in focus for next year's summit will be
enough to assuage concerns from developed countries at Cop 29 on fossil fuel
ambitions remains to be seen. The communique of the G20, which the country
hosted, does not explicitly mention the goal to transition away from fossil
fuels either. The developed countries' mitigation stance grew firmer after talks
on a work programme dedicated to mitigation, the obvious channel for fossil fuel
language, was rescued from the brink of collapse last week. Discussions have
stalled, but another text — the UAE dialogue which is meant to track progress on
the outcomes of Cop 28 — still has options referring to fossil fuels. But in
these negotiations too, divisions remain. "The UAE dialogue contains some
positive optional language on deep, rapid and sustained emissions reductions and
the [Cop 28] energy package, climate think-tank E3G said. But Saudi Arabia has
made clear that this was unacceptable, while India, which worked to water down a
coal deal at Cop 26, is pushing back on the 1.5°C temperature limit of the Paris
Agreement. Negotiators are starting to run out of time. Draft after draft, the
divide fails to be breached with no agreement on an amount for the finance deal.
"We cannot talk about a lower or higher number because there is no number,"
noted Colombia's environment minister Susana Muhamad. The next iteration should
have numbers based on the Cop 29 presidency's "view of possible landing zones".
The fact that the draft text on finance has no bridging proposal is a concern,
non-profit WRI director of international climate action David Waskow said.
Finance was always meant to be the centrepiece of Cop 29. Parties have not
formally discussed the goal in 15 years, and have been trying to prepare for a
new deal through technical meetings for the past two years. But the discussion
needs to end in Baku. By Caroline Varin Send comments and request more
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