Today, 18 September 2015, the Environment Council of the European Union adopted its latest conclusions, setting out the EU position for the UN climate change conference in Paris this December. Although not groundbreaking, the conclusions state and reiterate the EU expectations for COP21and take a holistic view on outstanding matters, including pre-2020 considerations.
The 28 environment ministers agreed on a common stance on three major issues: the pillars of a legally-binding Paris Agreement in order to remain below 2°C of global warming, the implementation mechanisms for such agreement, and the mitigation steps to be taken pre-2020.
Welcoming the G7 Declaration of June 2015, the European Council calls for a “long-term vision of global and sustainable climate neutrality and climate resilience”.
The conclusions stipulate that greenhouse gas emissions peak by 2020, are reduced by at least 50% by 2050 compared to 1990, to eventually achieve carbon neutrality or negative emissions by the end of the century. They propose a five-year cycle within which Parties are required to “either submit new or updated commitments, without falling behind previous levels of commitment, or resubmit the existing ones”. This is important, considering that INDCs submitted thus far suggest that the agreement will fall short of achieving reduction commitments necessary to stay in a 2°C world. With decreasing costs of renewable energy technologies and improved understanding of the substantial co-benefits of climate action - complementing the sustainable development agenda- countries need a regular mechanism to adjust ambitions upwards.
In addition, the EU’s commitment to climate finance and the Green Climate Fund are reaffirmed, with more details to be discussed by finance ministers in November this year.
According to Commissioner Miguel Arias Canete the conclusions represent a solid position based on which the EU will be “a deal maker and not a deal taker” in the upcoming Paris negotiations.
2019 has only just begun, but it is already hard to imagine that there will be other extreme weather events with disastrous consequences such as cyclone Idai happening again this year. In all likelihood, such events will continue to occur as 2019 rolls on. Idai is, once more, proof of how devastating and toxic the mix of climate change, extreme weather events and poverty can be: Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe – countries that rank low in human development but contribute very little to global greenhouse gas emissions – suffer from some of the worst impacts of climate change.
adelphi has relaunched its exhibition Environment, Conflict and Cooperation (ECC) Exhibition to illustrate how unprecedented environmental changes interact with social, political, and economic risks to exacerbate conflict. We invite you to explore our online exhibition and to learn more about urgent issues of our time: climate, energy, migration, extractives, food and water.
Climate security risks are, by all interpretations, a global threat. But when it comes to setting a political climate security agenda, a handful of countries stand out. In an interview with Climate Diplomacy, Michaela Spaeth, Director for Energy and Climate Policy at the German Federal Foreign Office, highlights some of Germany’s goals and challenges in forwarding the issue during its 2019-20 membership in the UN Security Council.
The Planetary Security Conference 2019, which concluded on 20 February, saw a number of workshops being held on the Sahel region and specifically Mali, one of the Conference’s three spotlight regions. These workshops examined the region’s climate-water-security risks as well as the #doable actions and solutions to address these issues.