COP 26 Day 8 | Will ministers ever agree?
Euronews Green delivers a Special COP26 email to my mailbox every day during the two weeks it is running (01-12 November 2021). I’ll publish it in its entirety for those who are interested. This is the fifth in the series.
Today’s takeaway
As COP26 enters its final and decisive week, ministers from all over the world are arriving in Glasgow with a challenging task at hand. They must reach a consensus between almost 200 countries on the rules that will govern the implementation of the 2015 Paris agreement.
Positions are still far apart, according to many observers. A long list of contentious issues includes international carbon markets, deadlines for climate targets and accountability mechanisms.
Loss and Damage – the theme of the day – remains another sticking point. Little progress has been registered so far on the demand from climate-vulnerable countries to receive compensation for the damages caused by historic emissions of wealthy nations.
Meanwhile, the UK COP26 presidency announced several hundreds of millions of pledges of funding to support communities struggling to respond to climate change.
Yet numerous developing nations expressed their pessimism about the progress of negotiations on Monday, saying pledges were high in quantity but low in quality.
“We have not done nearly enough,” said former US President Barack Obama as he spoke at the summit.
Praising young people’s climate action, he told them: “I want you to stay angry, I want you to stay frustrated. But channel that anger and that frustration to keep pushing for more and more.”
In case you weren’t able to follow along this weekend, here are five key takeaways from global climate marches on Saturday.
At a glance
Has the UN ‘failed to address’ the root causes of climate change?
As negotiators and COP attendees were having a well-deserved rest, a People’s Tribunal took place on Sunday. Made up of activists, experts, NGOs and even a former COP negotiator from the Global South, the mock tribunal heard four hours of evidence against the UN organisation.
Could airplane pollution be solved by fuel made of sunlight and air?
Aeroplane fuel can be made out of just sunlight and air, say scientists in Switzerland. A new system has been created on the roof of ETH Zurich University where engineers are testing whether this type of fuel generation can work in the real world. So is making plane fuel out of natural elements too good to be true – and how does it actually work?
Read more
Green hydrogen: How half the water in a toilet flush could power your home for days
Emission-free hydrogen could, one day, entirely replace fossil fuels – and a start up in Germany believes it has the key ingredient to make it accessible to all. Born in a climate-change affected South Pacific Island, Vaitea Cowan believes deeply in green hydrogen technology.
Read more
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5 Responses to “As Seen from Afar 11/08/2021”
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Thanks, Lona. Nice that Obama is saying loudly “we have not done nearly enough” – especially since he’s one of those who did not do nearly enough. I forgat exactly what pollutant is was, there are so many, but I vividly remember, during his first term, customizing a petition on one of them and making the point that his own daughters have respiratory allergies, and letting this go on ehwn he could stop or at leat reduce it doesn’t exactly make him the best father. Of course, compared to most others, he did take some action … just “not early enough.”
I respect a man or woman who can own up to mistakes they made in the past and admit they could have done better.
Oh, I absolutely do too.
Comment form Mitch –
This is all so fascinating, but there have been similar breakthroughs in technology, that I’ve read about, in years past, and never heard of again. I expect that they were bought up by fossil fuel companies, and deep sixed. There is a history of that, as in what happened to the public transportation
infrastructure in Los Angeles, once GM bought it up, in the early 1900’s. What? You never heard of the trolley lines in L.A.? That’s the whole point.
I would love to see real commitment, and progress come from COP26, but, as I have indicated, I’m more than a bit skeptical about it.
Mitch
I’m with Mitch since I also know of an engine from the 1960’s that would have gotten hundreds of miles per gallon bought by a fossil fuel company Lona. And on the water sourced hydrogen for powering homes, not real positive for a solution in the midst of an unprecedented drought.
Just read all the help offered was “technical assistance” and “dialogue” for the damages others caused already happening. Horribly immoral.