Was COP 26 A Success?

The COP2 6 climate conference came to an end on 14 November 2021, after negotiations that went past the deadline saw the creation of a deal that has been described as imperfect. The struggle to tackle the climate crisis is by no means over, so let’s take a look at what COP 26 achieved, what it missed and what could have been better.

The good

Some of the good things to come out of COP 26 include the following things:

• Acceptance of 1.5 degrees as the limit for global heating – COP 26 was intended to be when countries would present their national plans for cutting emissions to ‘well below 2 degrees’, as set out in the Paris Agreement in 2015. In the intervening 6 years, there have been questions about what ‘well below’ actually means.

• Agreement to end and reverse deforestation by 2030 – Forests are the world’s lungs, and one of our most important stores of carbon. Unfortunately, accelerating deforestation rates and worsening forest fires mean that carbon sinks are flipping to become carbon sources.

• People power – On the streets of Glasgow and towns and cities around the world, people made it clear that the world was watching. Greta Thunberg led a Fridays for Future march through the centre of Glasgow, and activists such as Vanessa Nakate addressed world leaders, arguing that Global South voices are still underrepresented in climate change decision making.

The bad

Some of the bad things to come out of COP 26 include the following things:

• Coal lingers on – The climate agreement between all 200 of the countries attending COP was close to being agreed on 12 November 2021, before a challenge came in about the wording around the phasing out of fossil fuels.

• Not enough funding for climate adaptation – The richest 1 percent of the world’s population generate the same amount of emissions as the poorest 50 percent. The majority of the latter group live in Global South countries that are on the front lines of climate breakdown, already experiencing heat waves, droughts and increased flooding from sea level rises.

• Unequal representation among delegates – Throughout the run up to COP 26, there have been challenges about how accessible it would be to delegates and activists from poorer nations, due to Covid vaccine inequality.

The underwhelming

Some of the more underwhelming things to come out of COP 26 include the following things:

• Current climate action plans aren’t sufficient – Only a handful of countries submitted NDCs before COP 26. Policies laid out by governments still mean that the world is on track for between 2.4 and 2.7 degrees of heating. The Paris Agreement called for countries to review these NDCs at every fifth COP, which means they wouldn’t have been reviewed again until 2025.

So, while COP 26 did not achieve everything that was hoped for, there are reasons to be hopeful. Visit Utility Bidder to see what you can do to keep up the momentum and make a difference.