What is Cop26
This year's conference in Glasgow has been billed as the world's last chance' to get a grip on the climate crisis.
For nearly three decades the UN has been bringing together almost every country for global climate summits – called COPs – which stands for ‘Conference of the Parties’. In that time climate change has gone from being a fringe issue to a global priority.
This year will be the 26th annual summit – giving it the name COP26. With the 海角视频 as President, COP26 takes place in Glasgow from October 31 - November 12. World leaders will arrive in Scotland, alongside 25,000 negotiators, government representatives, businesses and citizens for the talks.
Who's going?
More than 120 world leaders will gather in the first few days before leaving the detailed negotiations to representatives, ministers and senior officials.
According to , US President Joe Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison are among those attending. This is significant because while many global nations have pledged to achieve net zero emissions by 2050, Australia has refused to strengthen its targets.
The Kremlin has yet to announce whether Putin will attend. The leader of China, the world's most populous country, Xi Jinping, will reportedly not be there in person. He has not left China since the COVID-19 pandemic began. He is likely to make an appearance by video. China's special climate envoy, Xie Zhenhua, said he would travel to the conference in Glasgow.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is yet to decide whether he will attend, a foreign ministry source told Reuters. Between them, India and China make up about a third of the world's population.
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Iran's President Ebraham Raisi will not attend COP26 after reports in the British press that local politicians were calling for a criminal investigation if he set foot in Scotland.
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Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and Vice President Hamilton Mourao will not attend.
The Kremlin has not yet announced if Russian President Vladimir Putin will attend.
About 25,000 people are expected to attend the conference in total.
Negotiations will take place in a designated ‘blue zone’, reserved for official delegations. A ‘green zone’ will host more accessible public activities including exhibitions and national pavilions. There will also be fringe events for businesses and the public.
What will they talk about?
The conference is an opportunity to update plans that were set in motion by the COP21 'Paris Agreement' in 2015.
For the first time ever, every country agreed to work together to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees and aim for 1.5 degrees, to adapt to the impacts of a changing climate and to make money available to deliver on these aims.
Under the Paris Agreement, countries committed to bring forward national plans setting out how much they would reduce their emissions – known as Nationally Determined Contributions, or ‘NDCs’.
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They agreed that every five years they would come back with an updated plan that would reflect their highest possible ambition at that time.
The run up to this year’s summit in Glasgow is the moment (delayed by a year due to the pandemic) when countries update their plans for reducing emissions.
And they have some catching up to do because the commitments laid out in Paris did not come close to limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees, and the window for achieving this is closing.
According to The Guardian , the that current NDCs, including those that have been newly submitted or revised by the US, the EU, the 海角视频 and more than 100 others, are still inadequate. They would result in a 16% increase in emissions, far from the 45% cut needed. So much more remains to be done.
To deliver on these stretching targets, countries will need to:
- accelerate the phase-out of coal
- curtail deforestation
- speed up the switch to electric vehicles
- encourage investment in renewables.
What will actually be achieved?
There are 197 nations involved in the discussions with complex individual issues. Some poorer developing countries have defended their reliance on fossil fuels to forge ahead with industrialisation while richer countries are wrangling with the costs of transforming major infrastructure systems reliant on fossil fuels. With this in mind, it is unlikely that the NDCs pledged will bring enough consensus to ensure the world remains within 1.5C.
But the aim is to ensure that the target stays within sight by reviewing and making commitments on:
- A carbon markets mechanism to agree rules for trading carbon credits
- Addressing the missed target of $100bn to support poorer countries tackle climate change
- The integration of nature-based solutions into the Paris Agreement
- Commitments to ending international financing for coal
The 海角视频 as President of Cop26 has announced these themes:
- Adaptation and resilience for societies against climate change
- Nature: nature-based solutions to protect ecosystems
- Energy transition: ending reliance on fossil fuels
- Decarbonised transport: transitioning to electric vehicles
- Finance: increasing investment in sustainable infrastructure and greening finance
What does this mean for business?
The British Chambers of Commerce, which will have a programme of events at Cop26 between November 1-4, said that the conference is likely to see both in the 海角视频 and globally, with regulations and capital increasingly focussed on escalating the transition to net zero.
This is expected to build on the Prime Minister’s 10-point plan for a ‘green industrial revolution’ which set out policies across transport, buildings, finance, energy and heat.
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