The final act of the COP theater has begun. “Unacceptable”snapped Woepke Hoekstra, in front of a forest of microphones, at the end of a press conference on Thursday, November 21. The European commissioner in charge of climate action had just consulted a new version of the crucial text of this 29my Climate Conference of the Parties (COP29), the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG), that is, the new funding target that will be provided to developing countries to help them succeed in their climate transition. “If we look at the aspects that concern mitigation [des émissions de gaz à effet de serre (GES)], It does not reflect what we ourselves promised. We cannot accept that we act as if the previous COP had not existed. (…) This text goes in an opposite direction. »
Suddenly, the memory of COP28, in Dubai, resurfaced in the last leg of the negotiations. In 2023, the parties managed to agree to include the imperative of a “Transition away from fossil fuels”a first in the history of climate diplomacy.
A year later, faced with the demands of developing countries that expect between 500,000 and 1,300,000 million dollars (between 476,000 and 1,240,000 million euros) in aid, precisely to guarantee this energy transition, those responsible for developed countries They have not yet announced figures. Then they played another card.. During Thursday’s plenary session, the most ambitious rich countries from a climate point of view, particularly the European ones, repeated that there could be no agreement if the words chosen to evoke the reduction of emissions are not reinforced. “Someone said at this COP that fossils were a gift from God, it is good that they stay underground”joked Lars Aagaard, Denmark’s climate minister, referring to the words of Azerbaijan’s president, Ilham Aliyev.
“Then pay for mitigation!” »
The European Union (EU), which has always belonged to the strongest alliances on mitigation, will play this card for as long as possible. Except this year the game promises to be much closer. Having changed the topic, the alliances have evolved. In Dubai, the Europeans, the Canadians and the British could count on the countries most vulnerable to climate change, so many of the African group, South America, the island states, would put pressure on the Gulf countries, India and China to accept a text on an exit from fossil fuels.
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