Disappointing COP27
COP27, the 27th edition of the United Nations climate conference, focused on global climate policy. Although climate ambitions are being expressed with increasing ease, many countries still did not have clear and concrete action plans or a necessary legislative framework prior to the summit. Sadly, the COP27 did not deliver a new ambitious deal to phase out fossil fuels. Progress was made on a loss and damage fund but this is mostly meant to fight the consequences instead of the causes.
Natural disasters are increasingly forcing the world to think about climate. Forest fires in southern Europe, unprecedented floods in central Italy and drought in many European countries; the past summer in Europe makes it difficult to deny that our climate is changing. Moreover, the situation will worsen in the coming years and decades, especially if no action is taken.
So the call for action was loud leading up to the climate conference, but climate concerns in many countries were drowned out by more acute problems such as the energy crisis, high inflation and the war in Ukraine. The all-too-disappointing outcome of the COP27 climate conference is therefore no surprise.
Fighting consequences instead of causes
A key issue on which no consensus was reached is the gradual exit from all fossil fuels. The final declaration thus remained unchanged on that point compared to last year. This isa clear setback, even if you know that goals still do not result in concrete action in many cases. At the previous climate summit in 2021, more than 140 countries, accounting for nearly 90% of global greenhouse gas emissions, expressed ambition to reduce their net emissions to zero by 2050. To this day, most of those countries still lack the concrete action plans needed to achieve this.
The COP-27 participants did manage to agree on a loss and damage fund for the most vulnerable countries. But even here there are important caveats. By insisting on its status as a developing country in the climate talks, China, the world's largest emitter of new greenhouse gases, will not contribute to this fund. Moreover, there is no actual commitment for funds. So it is unclear who will pay what. This carries the risk that the fund will become an empty shell. Meanwhile, the goal of providing $100 billion annually in climate finance for developing countries from 2020 onwards has also not been met in recent years.
In summary, the climate conference agreed on a band-aid to cover the wound but not a solution to stop the bleeding.
Some positive developments
On the sidelines of the summit, however, some encouraging messages did emerge. For example, the EU announced that it will work towards a net reduction of not 55 but 57% in greenhouse gases compared to 1990 levels by 2030. There is debate as to whether that 2% can be considered an additional effort because it results from a technical adjustment in the way so-called land sinks, including ocean and vegetation, are dealt with. The European Parliament recently decided that land sinks should not be used to meet the 55% net emission reduction target. As a result, the 2% is now added on top of the 55% target that applied previously, which pushes up the total reduction to 57%. This not only means a larger effort but also that there is a cap on emissions that can be deducted from gross greenhouse gas emissions via land sinks.
Good news also came from the U.S. as President Joe Biden renewed the United States' commitment to meet climate goals. A positive sign after President Trump had earlier dropped out of the Paris Agreement.
Still, the prevailing feeling after the climate summit in Egypt remains one of disappointment. Some steps have been taken in the right direction, but progress is slow. Meanwhile, the climate issue is becoming more and more urgent, especially in the poorest countries.