LONDON, Oct 18 Reuters - Representatives from nearly 200 countries will meet in Glasgow, Scotland, on Nov. 31 - December 12 in the climate talks to strengthen action to tackle global warming under the Paris accord 2015.
Amid extreme weather events around the world and after a United Nations Climate Report warning that global warming was near to spiralling out of control, actions of governments at this conference will determine whether it is a success or not.
These are some of the issues that must be resolved:
Six years later, countries in Paris agreed to cut greenhouse gas emissions to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius and ideally 1.5 C. To do this, emissions need to be reduced by 2030 and reach net zero by around mid-century.
As the U.N. conference was postponed last year due to the coronavirus pandemic, this year is the deadline for countries to make steeper emissions cut pledges called nationally determined contributions or NDCs A U.N. analysis of new or revised NDCs submitted by the end of July found that by 2030 113 countries would collectively lower their emissions by 12% from 2010 levels
But the agreed NDCs of all 191 parties to the Paris Agreement combined can increase by 16% in greenhouse gas emissions in 2030 compared to 2010 said, it said.
Around 120 countries have so far submitted revised NDCs, but there is a lack of consistency with no common timeframe for realising pledges. There is also a variety of approaches in NDCs making comparability difficult.
Negotiators also need to agree on shared timeframes for future emissions cuts.
Major emitters China, India, Saudi Arabia and Turkey - responsible for around a third of global greenhouse gas emissions - have not yet come forward with strengthened NDCs and must do so at this conference known as COP 26.
As far back as 2009, developed countries agreed to raise $100 billion a year by 2020 to help developing countries deal with the impacts of climate change.
OECD's most recent data showed that vulnerable countries raised $79.6 billion in 2019 for developed nations, down 2% from $78.3 billion in 2018.
As rich countries are not meeting the $100 billion a year goal, it can break down trust at the climate talks, experts say. And a new finance goal should be worked out for 2025 onwards.
Governments agreed to address the impact of climate change on developing countries, however there is no detail about liability or compensation, a bone of contention for many poorer countries.
A platform to facilitate technical assistance for developing countries was established in 2019 but developing nations want a more robust mechanism to include financing.
The COP 26 Chairman Alok Sharma said that he wants this conference to be the one where coal power is consigned to history.
The United Nations has called for capping coal by 2030 in the big economies; however, ministers from the Group of 20 OECD countries failed to agree on a timeline.
The progress on it broke during the last talks in 2019.
The article urges a robust accounting to prevent double counting of emissions reductions. It also aims to establish a central U.N. mechanism for importing carbon credits from emissions reductions generated from low-carbon projects.