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The draft COP26 agreement follows a fine line for Reuters to encourage climate action

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© Reuters. A delegate walks past a photo of the Earth at night at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow, Scotland, UK on 11 November 2021. REUTERS / Yves Herman

By Kate Abnett, Elizabeth Piper and Simon Jessop

GLASGOW (Reuters) – A new draft agreement for the UN Climate Conference in Glasgow on Friday is pushing countries to be more ambitious in their plans to tackle global warming as they move in a fine line between the demands of developing and richer countries.

While the proposal upheld the nation’s main demand for tougher climate commitments next year, the weakest countries said they needed a more ambitious financial compensation agreement, with contributions from rich countries responsible for global warming to the poorest countries suffering the worst storms. droughts and rising sea levels.

The new draft, which seeks to ensure that the world will cope quickly enough to prevent global warming from happening, is a balancing act: it seeks to accept the demands of climate-vulnerable nations, the world’s biggest polluters and economically-based nations. fossil fuels.

Some countries said the proposal would maintain the target of the Paris Agreement with global warming 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels, which scientists say would limit the most serious impact.

“If the text currently on the table suffers any blows it may suffer, yes, we are holding on to our nails,” said Grenada’s climate minister Simon Stiell, when asked if the latest proposal had a 1.5C target at hand.

At the summit, which ends on Friday, negotiators have been working around the clock to try to reach an agreement that nearly 200 countries can agree on, although many delegates hope to open the conference over the weekend.

NEW COMMITMENTS

The COP26 conference has so far not made enough commitments to reduce emissions to reach the 1.5C target, so the draft calls on countries to renew their climate targets in 2022.

However, this request was made in a weaker language than a previous draft, and did not offer an ongoing annual review of climate commitments promoted by some developing countries.

He said that renewing climate commitments should take into account “different national situations,” a phrase that some developing countries would like, saying that the requirements for leaving fossil fuels and reducing emissions should be lower than developed economies.

The document specified that scientists say the world should burn oil, gas and coal by 45% by 2030, mainly carbon dioxide emissions compared to 2010 levels, and by zero zero by 2050, to reach the 1.5C target.

This would set a benchmark for countries ’future climate commitments.

FINANCE

Climate finance remains an obstacle.

Poorer countries are angry that rich nations have yet to live up to their 12-year promise to help reduce emissions by $ 100,000 billion a year by 2020 and help them adapt to the worse impacts of climate change.

The new draft expressed “great regret” for the lost goal, which now rich countries expect to meet in 2023, but did not offer a plan to ensure it arrives.

He said that from 2025 onwards, rich countries would have to double the funding they now put in to help poor countries adapt to climate impacts, as from the previous draft, he did not set a date or basis.

The agreement pledged to create a global facility to deal with the growing loss and damage it is causing to countries affected by climate change. However, it has not specified whether this will include new funding.

In a COP26 talks, a group of countries that are pushing for high climate ambition – including the US and the European Union – said on Friday they would seek a tougher deal on losses and damage.

“Loss and damage is too essential for us to settle for workshops. We need to strengthen actions against loss and damage,” said Tina Stege, Marshall Islands climate representative, a group representative.

FOSSIL FUELS

The draft contained an explicit mention of fossil fuels, which if agreed would be the first for any UN climate conference.

But he rated the previous text as saying that the world must commit itself to removing coal energy “continuously” – the dirtiest power – and “inefficient” subsidies for fossil fuels in general.

The Arab nations, many of them large oil and gas producers, opposed the writing of the previous draft.

Jennifer Morgan, executive director of Greenpeace International, said that “the key line for the phasing out of coal and fossil fuel subsidies has been severely undermined.”

But others were less concerned.

Bob Ward of the Grantham Institute of Economics in London said “not all fossil fuel subsidies are effective”.

And E3G think-tank Chris Littlecott said the use of the term “constantly” would be called a “coal industry bluff,” demanding that all plants that weren’t shut down have to pay for technology to clean up their emissions.



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