by P. Homewood, Nov 20, 2022 in NotaLotofPeopleKnowThat

As usual the BBC paints the latest COP as a “historic deal”!

Dust settling on the detail

After hours and hours of intense negotiations we finally have some outcomes from this years COP27.

The dust is still settling, but here is what we know so far.

• Delegates who’ve been working through the night at the UN climate summit in Egypt have approved a major deal on helping poorer countries
• They have agreed to set up a fund to pay for some of the loss and damage being inflicted by global warming
• Many of the most controversial decisions on the fund have been kicked into next year when a “transitional committee” is expected to make recommendations for countries to then adopt at the COP28 next
  November
• Those recommendations would cover “identifying and expanding sources of funding” – referring to the problematic question of which countries should pay into the new fund
• The overarching agreement from the summit – called the “cover text” – does not raise ambition on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from what was agreed at the COP26 summit in Glasgow last year

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Although a fund has been agreed in principle, there is no agreement about how much is put in, or who pays. Crucially there is no agreement that countries like China, India and Russia will pay a penny. The agreement to set up the fund is meaningless without answers to these questions.

And there is also no agreement to reduce emissions beyond COP26 pledges. In particular developing countries are under no obligation whatsoever to reduce emissions, as a condition for receiving this money.

As WWF put it, the loss and damage fund will be a downpayment on disaster!

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