Assessing the Progress of Paris Agreement - Climate Change
iasparliament
December 07, 2018
What is the issue?
The 24th Conference of the Parties (COP-24) meeting to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is held in Katowice, Poland.
With this, it is essential to assess the progress of countries in terms of Paris Agreement (PA) commitments made in 2015.
How is the global warming scenario?
Average global temperatures have crossed a degree Celsius above preindustrial levels.
Such concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (410 ppm) has never been seen by humans before.
Resultantly, today’s children are inheriting an earth that is out of control and heading to be 3-4º C warmer by the end of the century.
Perpetual growth is not viable for any species.
Business-as-usual policies with high consumption by the rich are driving the destruction of ecosystems and mass extinction of species.
The “sixth extinction”, massive destruction of species on earth is ongoing.
In this context, the 1.5 Degree Report, a special publication, was recently released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
It calls for far-reaching, speedy transformative changes by countries in order to stay below 1.5° C.
It emphasises on immediate and drastic drop in GHG emissions through technology and lifestyles, and on mitigation and adaptation.
What was the outcome of the Paris conference?
The Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) were planned ahead of the Paris COP-21.
Under this, each country described the actions it would take and the levels to which GHG emissions would be reduced (mitigation).
Countries also described what they would do to improve their capacity to live in a warmer world (adaptation).
The extent to which these goals required support in the form of finance or technology transfer was also mentioned.
The Paris Agreement (PA) was ratified rapidly and went into force within a year (in November 2016).
The Katowice meeting's objective is to set guidelines, or agree on a rulebook, to implement pledges made by countries at the Paris Climate Conference in 2015.
What are the concerns with PA progress?
Finance - There has been little, if any, progress on finance, technology transfer and capacity development.
Article 9 of the PA calls for financial support from developed countries that is significantly derived from public funds.
This was expected to result in at least $100 billion per year to address mitigation and adaptation needs of developing countries.
Article 9.5 requires developed countries to communicate their levels of support, including pledges of additional finance.
Even a rough estimate of financial needs for implementing all the NDCs puts it at $4.4 trillion.
But the Climate Funds Update of 2018 notes that multilateral funds pledged until 2017 are less than $30 billion.
There have also been charges of double counting and counting of development aid levelled against developed countries.
Response - While the U.S. and its current policies are much to blame for the situation, other developed countries are not doing that much better.
Australia and France have had political turmoil due to their climate policies even while experiencing severe weather events.
Europe is still heavily reliant on coal and European Union emissions were stable in 2014-2016.
The U.K. has been relying on fuel from fracking.
How does the future look?
The implementation of the activities for the PA formally begins in 2020 and concludes in 2030.
The world is currently in the Doha Amendment period, or the second phase of the Kyoto Protocol, which has not been ratified.
In a couple of years after the start of the PA implementation, there will be review on progress and decisions on more stringent targets for the future.
This renewed commitment towards the future means that countries have to trust each other.
So fulfilling obligations is a foundation of future ambition and action.
What is required?
What is required for India is credible, accurate and verifiable numbers on the climate flows expected from developed countries.
Such reliable flow will encourage and persuade all countries that commitments made will be fulfilled.
There also has to be a general agreement on how to estimate adaptation.
Countries with high emissions should alter their lifestyles considerably, for the transformational change that 1.5 Degree Report calls for.
As extreme events are on the rise, the separate stream referred to as “loss and damage” needs attention.
This is a provision for support to poor countries experiencing economic and non-economic losses and destruction from climate change events.
There has not been much progress on this issue by the task force set up to advance it, which also needs to be addressed at Katowice.
