Chris Bowen takes leadership role in Cop27 talks as John Kerry praises Australia’s climate U-turn
In a sign Australia has come in from the cold at climate talks after years of being criticised as a laggard, Chris Bowen has been asked to take a leadership role in the final days of faltering negotiations at the UN summit in Egypt.
It came on a day in which Australia’s climate change minister was effusively praised by the US climate envoy, John
Kerry, and signed up to a global alliance that aims to massively expand offshore wind energy.
But the Albanese government drew criticism for not including new funding or commitments in its national statement at the Cop27 conference in Sharm el-Sheikh and resisted calls to join a pledge to end public support for fossil fuel projects overseas.
With three days of scheduled time left at the talks, Bowen was asked to take over the struggling negotiations over how to fund climate financing for poor and vulnerable countries. He will co-facilitate that section of negotiations alongside the Indian climate change minister, Bhupender Yadav.
They will be responsible for getting delegates from nearly 200 countries to agree on text detailing how the world will raise vast sums to support the developing world to cut emissions and adapt to the climate crisis.
Observers have described negotiations in Sharm as slow and often directionless. There are concerns some countries are pushing for changes that would unwind commitments made in a pact agreed at the last climate conference in Glasgow a year ago.
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A leaked draft text on climate finance seen by the Guardian appeared to have dropped a reference to how quickly a long-promised goal of $US100bn of public and private climate finance a year should be reached. The Glasgow pact said it was expected by 2023.
The draft also went backwards in what it said about funding for climate adaptation measures. Where the Glasgow pact said the total should “at least double” by 2025, the new draft said countries should “consider doubling adaptation finance”.
Friederike Röder, from Global Cit