COP26: New draft agreement maintains key requirement of ambitious targets for temperature rise

LAST UPDATE 14:04

A new draft agreement at the UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow today retained the basic requirement for the countries of the conference to set more ambitious targets for global warming, while calling on them to phase out inefficient subsidies for fossil fuels that overheat the planet.

The draft proposal was drafted by the countries hosted by Britain at the COP26 conference, and must be approved by the approximately 200 countries represented at the conference, which are analyzing its details today.

The work of the mentioned conference was scheduled to be completed yesterday, Friday.

The proposal has retained the key condition for countries to draw up stricter climate commitments from next year, in an effort to bridge the gap between current emission reduction plans this decade and -A substantially- more drastic reductions required according to scientists, to stop the rise in global temperature, above 15 degrees Celsius, with catastrophic consequences.

The draft proposal seeks to unblock the much-needed funding talks that dominated the COP26 conference, with assurances that rich countries, the emissions of which are largely responsible for causing climate change, will provide the necessary funding to the poorest countries.

The poorest countries are facing huge costs from the worsening weather conditions due to storms, drought, but also rising sea levels.

The same plan calls on rich countries to double their financial support by 2025, compared to 2019 levels, to help poor countries adapt to the effects of climate change.

The previous draft agreement had used 2020 levels as its focal point, with countries at odds today over “dealing with the catastrophic consequences” and the enormous costs already faced by climate change. The plan maintained a requirement for countries to phase out “obsolete carbon offsets” with reference to power plants that do not use carbon capture technology, as well as “unsatisfactory subsidies for fossil fuels”. “.

But the plan’s prediction that countries “should step up their efforts” to meet the above requirements seems weaker than the previous plan, which called for countries to phase out more quickly.

However, this is the first reference to fossil fuels within the UN conclusions at a climate conference, if it survives, from the ongoing negotiations today and remains stable within the provisions of the final text.

Countries, including China and Saudi Arabia, major producers of fossil fuels, tried to change the wording of the text as a whole yesterday, according to representatives close to the talks.

The latest text emphasizes that countries need to support a “right transition” when gradually reducing solid fuel subsidies, a reference that is needed to help workers and areas dependent on the fossil fuel industry move to cleaner ones. sectors of industrial activity, but also jobs.

Source: ΑΠΕ-ΜΠΕ