COP26 climate deal harder than Paris: Summit president
EU says it needs nuclear and gas for climate fight
LONDON: Success at the upcoming COP26 climate summit is “definitely harder” than the 2015 Paris talks which resulted in a landmark accord, the British minister presiding over the gathering warned yesterday. The October 31-November 12 gathering in Glasgow is the biggest climate conference since the Paris summit and is seen as crucial in setting worldwide emission targets to slow global warming.
Alok Sharma, the British minister in charge of the talks, told the Guardian newspaper that getting nearly 200 countries to commit to the emission targets to limit global temperature rises to less than 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels was a daunting task. “What we’re trying to do here in Glasgow is actually really tough,” he said.
“It was brilliant what they did in Paris” but “a lot of the detailed rules were left for the future,” he added. “It’s like, we’ve got to the end of the exam paper and the most difficult questions are left and you’re running out of time. “This is definitely harder than Paris on lots of levels.”
The task will be made all the more difficult as Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian leader Vladimir Putin are not attending but sending delegations. More than 120 world leaders and around 25,000 delegates are expected in Glasgow. The Paris accord saw 197 nations agree to limit global heating to below 2 degrees but their “nationally determined contributions” (NDCs) — national plans drawn up to implement the deal-have been deemed inadequate. Strengthening those plans will be a key part of negotiations.
“What we’re potentially saying to countries is that if your NDC isn’t good enough, you’re going to have to come back to the table,” said Sharma. He called on the world’s biggest emitter China, whose fractious relationship with the West is another obstacle to agreement, to present its NDC.
“They signed up to the communique in July that we negotiated in Naples, that all the G20 would come up with enhanced NDCs before COP-I reminded them they needed to deliver on that,” he said. UN chief Antonio Guterres said Thursday that the current climate situation was “a oneway ticket for disaster” as he stressed the need to “avoid a failure” at COP26.
The EU needs nuclear power and gas as stable sources of energy while it manages the transition to a low-carbon economy, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Friday.
While the European Union must drastically reduce its CO2 emissions to combat climate change, “it is obvious that we need more renewable and clean energy,” she said at the end of a summit of the bloc’s 27 members. Renewables such as
wind and solar have tumbled in cost and do not depend on imports, she told a press conference, adding that they will offer “a lot of independence” to the EU.
However, alongside renewables “we need a stable source, nuclear; and during the transition, of course, natural gas”, the head of the European Union’s executive body said.
Nuclear power plants have the advantage of emitting almost no CO2 into the atmosphere, while gas-the least polluting major hydrocarbon fuel-provides a stopgap fuel source while alternatives are developed. The European Commission must propose before the end of the year its so-called green taxonomy-a list of energies considered beneficial for the climate.
This will open up access to green finance that will give these technologies a crucial competitive advantage. “Never before has such clear and broad support been expressed for the need to use nuclear energy to achieve our climate goals,” French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday. France, which gets about 70 percent of its power from nuclear and is a major exporter of electricity, is preparing to restart construction of atomic power plants.
“A very large majority of member states” wanted to include both gas and nuclear in the taxonomy, a European diplomat told AFP on Thursday evening. Two other officials confirmed the level of support.
In the context of the current gas price crisis 10 EU states, led by France, published a statement in mid-October supporting nuclear power. But other countries, including Germany, Austria and Luxembourg, are fiercely opposed, pointing to the problem of very long-term storage of radioactive waste.
At the beginning of October, Commission Vice-President Valdis Dombrovskis, defended nuclear power at a meeting of EU finance ministers, calling for recognition of its role “as a low-carbon energy source in our effort” to reduce emissions. —AFP