COP21 Means Real Change for Our World
I’ve have been really interested in COP21 and I wanted to learn more about it so I thought this might be a good platform to research and understand what is going on at this historic event more in depth.
The 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP21 was held in Paris, from November 30th until December 12th. It was the 21st annual Conference of the Parties (hence COP21).
These international climate talks go back over twenty years. The international political response to climate change first began at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992; the Rio Convention included the adoption of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The UNFCCC which actually began its work on 21 March 1994, now has a huge membership of 195 parties. This convention created a plan of action aimed at stabilizing atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases (GHGs) to avoid dangerous interference with the natural climate system.
The main objective of these annual Conferences of the Parties is to review the convention’s last plan and how they worked over the last year. The first COP took place in Berlin in 1995 and the most significant meetings since then have included COP3 where the Kyoto Protocol was adopted, COP11 where the Montreal Action Plan was produced, COP15 in Copenhagen where an agreement to reconfigure Kyoto Protocol was unfortunately not realized and COP17 in Durban where the Green Climate Fund was created.
The conference in 2014, COP20, which preceded the current one was held in Lima. This conference attracted over 15,000 official delegates. The conference concluded with a draft document that laid the initial groundwork for a new global climate deal, called the Lima Call For Climate Action.
There were over 400 conferences, which coincided with COP20, in which new research projects and initiatives were presented. The largest commercially-focused event during COP20 was Sustainable Innovation Forum of 2014, high profile speakers, celebrities and over 500 pre-approved delegates representing the private sector, government, UN agencies and civil society all were in attendance. During the two week long conference, COP20, over 140 press conferences were held and more than 900 journalists from around the world covered the international event.
COP21, which is also known as the 2015 Paris Climate Conference, for the first time in over 20 years of United Nations negotiations, aimed to create a universal, legally binding agreement on climate change, with the aim of keeping global warming below 2 degrees Celsius. This ambitious goal is part of what made COP21 an international media spectacle.
Since the conference was held in France, the host played a leading international role in this conference. COP21 has been one of the largest international conferences ever held in the country. The conference was expected to attract close to 50,000 participants including 25,000 official delegates from governments, organizations, UN agencies, and others.
Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC was excited to see the cooperation on such a wide, international scale. She says: “The cooperation of over 190 countries in securing many positive outcomes owes much to the patience and persistence of the COP President—Manuel Pulgar-Vidal—and the spirit of Lima as we look forward to Paris—the city of lights and the city of love for our shared future and shared environment.”
For this conference, the SIF extended into two days to bring the freshest young talent and cutting-edge innovation to the forefront which, Climate Action and UNEP’s did in order to show their commitment to fostering innovation through including those who will see the affects of climate change in the talks about solutions for the long term. These solutions were agreed upon by collaborating with knowledge centres, like universities to create a platform to allow young people to cultivate and advance their innovative talent.
During this conference speakers included representatives from industry, UN bodies, NGO, youth, faith and indigenous peoples, to ensure that a wide demographic is represented during the conference.
Before the conference began, 146 national climate organizations publicly proposed plans, which were known as Intended Nationally Determined Contributions, INDCs. These suggestions actually called for less aggressive commitments, they were estimated to limit global warming to 2.7 degrees Celsius by 2100. For example, the EU suggested a commitment of 40 percent reduction in emissions by 2030 compared to 1990.
Before this conference, a culmination of entities talked in Marseilles, France about global warming in the Mediterranean during the MedCop21 on June 4th and 5th of this year. Another meeting that took place before COP21 in order to prepare for this major international conference was held in Bonn on October 19th to the 23rd of this year, with environmental advocates from around the world.
Since the conference has concluded I can talk about the most interesting part: the agreement. The conference reached its main objectives, meaning for the first time ever a global agreement on reduction of climate change was achieved, which was adopted by nearly all states! The agreement will become legally binding if at least 55 countries, that represent at least 55 percent of global greenhouse emissions, (basically) ratify it into law. Unfortunately, it is expected to take effect in 2020 (it should be much sooner than that). According to the organizing committee, the agreement, basically, limits global warming, by 2100, compared to pre-industrial, to below 2 degrees Celsius. Thankfully, for low lying coastal lands the agreement doesn’t stop there. Parties must pursue to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius. A 1.5 degrees Celsius goal will probably require a zero level in emissions sometimes between 2030 and 2050. However, no detailed timeplan or country-specific goals for emissions were stated in the final version of the Paris Agreement – as opposed to the previous Kyoto protocol.
Works Cited
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“Historic Paris Agreement on Climate Change 195 Nations Set Path to Keep Temperature Rise Well Below 2 Degrees Celsius.” UNFCCC. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Dec. 2015.
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Nuccitelli, Dana. “The Paris Agreement Signals That Deniers Have Lost the Climate Wars.” The Guardian. N.p., 14 Dec. 2015. Web. 14 Dec. 2015.
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