Promises and compromises at COP26

THE Glasgow session of the 26th Conference of Parties (COP26) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) came to a dramatic end late last week. After much jostling and lobbying, the meeting had to be extended by a day to arrive at the consensual Glasgow Climate Pact (GCP) desired by the host country, the UK.

It seems hard lobbying for slowing the phaseout of coal and fossil fuels was done by Russia, Saudi Arabia, China, India and others. The European Union and Switzerland made a strong pitch for ‘the exit of coal’. The GCP that was finally adopted contains the last-minute Indian amendment that watered down the text as “including escalating efforts to phase down unabated coal power, and phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies”. This compromise on the phaseout of fossil fuels gives latitude to these countries as it indicates the beginning of the end of the sordid carbon era.

A grim-faced COP president Alok Sharma expressed hope that the final deal had “kept 1.5°C within reach, but the pulse is weak”. He added that the deal drives “progress on coal, cars, cash and trees” and is “something meaningful for our people and our planet”. “The COP26 outcome is a compromise, reflecting the interests, contradictions and state of political will in the world today,” the UN Secretary-General (UNSG) Antonio Guterres tweeted.

As usual, thousands of delegates

had assembled in Glasgow to desperately limit the catastrophic effects of global warming. The delegates and activists used different means to draw attention to the feared climate doomsday scenario. In a remote video address, Tuvalu Foreign Minister Simon Kofe chose to stand in knee-deep seawater to show extinction faced by small island states.

No big miracles were expected in the divided assembly of 197 sovereign countries. They came together amidst hard core economic and political interests to save the earth from the brink of apocalyptic climate disaster. It amply showed huge disparity in scientific warnings, aspirations in public posturing and desired actions. The draft text of the Glasgow outcome had expressed an “alarm and utmost concern that human activities have caused around 1.1°C of global warming to date and those impacts are already being felt in every region”.

In a signed article on October 29, the UNSG had expressed hope that countries will show seriousness in addressing the climate change induced “planetary emergency”. There is a grim scenario wherein the UN reports show that actions of the governments so far simply do not add up to what the situation urgently requires. “Increasing temperatures will make vast stretches of our planet dead zones for humanity by this century’s end,” he said. The UNSG has also called for the developed countries to “urgently meet its commitment of at least $100 billion in annual climate finance for developing countries”.

COP26 started with an ambitious goal of global greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) reductions to limit global heating to 1.5°C as well as to have net-zero emissions by 2050. This necessitates reduction of global emissions by 45 per cent by 2030. Hence, the climate negotiations revolved around pushing these targets. Premised upon equity and climate justice, the Indian Prime Minister’s address on November 2 promised net-zero emissions only by 2070.

The COP meeting is an annual ritual that has been played out since the UNFCCC was adopted at the UN headquarters on May 9, 1992. It opened for signatures during the Earth Summit at Rio de Janeiro on June 4, 1992, and finally came into force on March 21, 1994. In June 2022, the UNFCCC will attain the age of 30 years.

The seeds for global action on climate change were sown by the General Assembly resolution 43/53 of December 6, 1988, that regarded it as a “common concern of humankind” since climate is an “essential condition which sustains life on planet earth”. Hence, in order to protect the climate system for present and future generations, the 1992 UNFCCC has the primary objective (Article 2) of “stabilisation of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system”.

The UNFCCC has been designed as a ‘framework convention’ and the first global instrument that designated climate change as a common concern of humankind. With subsequent two instruments, 1997 Kyoto Protocol and 2015 Paris Agreement, the climate change regime now uniquely comprises three legal instruments that seek to address the global climate problematique. Climate change is a predominantly global crisis. It is just one component of the larger environmental crisis endangering our planet.

There has been grudging acceptance that humans have become the single biggest factor in decisively influencing changing climate. Geologists are the guardians of the earth’s timeline and work with rocks that are hundreds of millions of years old. For them, it seemed absurd that the humans who have been around for the ‘blink of an eye’ have now become a genuine geological force to decide the fate of the earth. However, this finally came to be accepted on May 21, 2019, by the Anthropocene Working Group.

As a corollary, the IPCC’s 2021 sixth scientific assessment report (AR6) has underscored an unmistakable human imprint on changing the global climate. “It is unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land. Widespread and rapid changes in the atmosphere, oceans, cryosphere and biosphere have occurred,” the AR6 said. The completion of three decades (1992-2022) of the UNFCCC now provides a decisive opportunity to attain the 1.5°C global warming threshold by 2050.

The UN General Assembly’s modalities resolution 75/326 of September 10, 2021, has decided to hold the Stockholm+50 event on June 2-3, 2022. The UNFCCC’s 30th anniversary will fall immediately after this event. It will be another defining moment to address the perennial “predicament of mankind” by devising effective global responses for the simmering climate crisis. It calls for an honest assessment of what we have attained in the last 50 years of regulatory processes, use of innovative tools and techniques, and the art and craft of environmental statecraft. How do we define our needs by jettisoning human greed?

In June 2022, the 50th anniversary of the 1972 Stockholm Conference will provide a pertinent occasion for a decisive course correction. “We all have our part to play as we face this existential threat,” Peter Maurer, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Geneva, has said. As time is running out, humans need to mend their ways to salvage the earth’s future imperilled by their own actions.