Star COP21 Episode 6: The return of climate ambition

This article is part of the Climate Nerd Chronicles.

Well. This is the end. COP21 is over, and our Star Wars Special is coming to its end as well. Those negotiations were a rollercoaster experience for us all, but its issue refilled our hope for the future of the galaxy. Last saturday, a new climate agreement was released that put an end to an endless intergalactic war. Twenty-three years after Rio, the Jedi Order is now reestablished and the global climate agreement saves us all from self destruction.

Luckily, The Climate Nerd team is always willing to learn more and to share its deepest thoughts with you. Let’s go, here are the three most important things we’ve learnt during the COP21.

1.    Sometimes, you need to go through terrible moments to get a victory.

All this started pretty bad. Negotiators came from all over the world to find a solution to global warming. Many of them had divergent interests: some of them wanted to keep the world just as it was, and some others wanted a total shift. Solving the issue required tenacity and abnegation. Jabba the French may keep you locked inside the Blue Zone for days and nights. Palpetrol may build a new Death Carbon Star – more powerful than ever – to threaten the Rebel Alliance and keep the galaxy under its control. Insidious delegations and lobbies led by Palpetrol may want to seduce you and force you to join their cause.

Negotiating is all about making hard choices when you have limited resources and time. The whole challenge of those two weeks was to make the Climatum Falcon destroy the Death Carbon Star before it was too late. But before achieving this, there were some issues to deal with : can we destroy the shield of OPEC countries who want to keep the oil business active and lucrative ? Shall/should we peak the oil production of the galaxy soon and shift to 100% renewable energy spaceships fleets in order to reduce emissions? Is Han Solo ready to lend his beloved spaceship to his friend Lando to make sure he has the best available technology to achieve his mission ?

Michael Bay’s version of the Paris Agreement

Publicité

Charlie and the Agreement Factory

This article is part of the Climate Nerd Chronicles.

Year 2015 – one of the biggest international events ever is happening in Paris: the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21). This conference, organized under the jurisdiction of the UNFCCC (United Nations Factory for Convention on Chocolate Conservation), aims at finding a global agreement to avoid the disappearance of chocolate through climate change. For example, the delegates have to find consensus on the very controversial chocolate mousse recipe. Before the beginning of negotiations the related paragraph looked like that:

Chocolate mousse [shall]/[should] be made with [milk products]/[vegan products] with [white]/[milk]/[dark] chocolate and [shall]/[should]/[may]/[must] be preserved in a [plastic box] [glass box] [can] [reusable box].

All the Countries (or Parties) came as negotiators, while the members of civil society are observers.

Willy Fabius when asked what to expect regarding the outcome of COP21

Romeo and Juliet at COP21

This article is part of the Climate Nerd Chronicles.

He was American, she was from the Marshall Islands and more than an ocean separated them. More than anything Gods could create. Under the lights of the Conference Of Parties,while the world looks intently toward Paris as the climate slowly changes, they were looking at each other. In the corridors filled with journalists, in the rooms fooled by greying diplomats and government leaders, through the windows of different universes…

First meeting in Copenhagen

Star COP21 Episode 5: Self interest Strikes Back

This article is part of the Climate Nerd Chronicles.

After the text was released yesterday, late in the evening, a wind of hope blew across the entire galaxy. The last draft of the Paris agreement was quite ambitious and the Uncertainty Bearers brackets were scarce. The COP21 outcome seems now very close and looks better than most observers would have dreamed of even before its beginning. However, the text still has to be accepted by the Parties, and therein lies the rub.

The Fossil Fuel Empire, mainly through the infamous Saudi Kamino Fuels Suppliers, has led another successful offensive in delaying decisive action against them. The members of the Galactic Senate cannot agree neither on finance, nor on ambition, nor on differentiation. There  will be no agreement today, as was agreed. We will have to wait for tomorrow at best to discover the final agreement, and who knows how the text will look by that time?

 

 

When you hope the negotiators will save the planet with a global agreement.

 

Gender Equity and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Negotiation Process

This article is written by Bindu Bhandari.

It’s the 10th of December today, United Nations Human Rights Day; a day to celebrate the ongoing work on achieving inclusive and integrated approach for recognition of minimal essential rights to living a life of dignity by each and every human. While the second of week of the climate talks Conference of the Parties 21 (COP21) is ongoing, the atmosphere in Le Bourget (COP 21 venue) feels warm and jubilant despite the chilling cold of December. And why not? After all, it’s the second week, the week of high hopes and aspiration for a climate agreement that safeguards our rights and ensures of upcoming generation as well to live as the current generation does.

The calm before the storm?

This article is written by Elizabeth Buchan and Sabrina Marquant.

It is mid way through the second week of climate talks (also known as COP21) in Paris, which are expected to deliver a new international agreement on climate change that takes effect in 2020. The final landing zones of the remaining sticking points have the potential to dramatically alter how effective this agreement and its implementation are, to avoid the dangerous consequences of climate change. These remaining elements will be frantically thrashed out by countries’ Minister’s and negotiating teams in the next couple of days.

2016–2020: What will happen before the Paris Agreement enters into force?

This article is written by Clément Bultheel.

This article was first issued by I4CE – Institute for Climate Economics in ClimasCOPe #6

Source, UNFCCC Climate Action Now, Summary for Policymakers, November 2015

The emissions reductions targets announced by the United Nations Framework on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Parties for the second Kyoto Protocol commitment period (2013–2020) are not sufficient to limit global temperature rise to 2°C¹. This 2°C limit is widely accepted as a ‘tipping point’ for dangerous climate change, and was agreed as an international warming threshold at climate talks in 2009 in Copenhagen. To close this gap during the pre-2020 period, collective actions that aim to cut GHG emissions and mitigate climate change, both by governments and economic actors, must be strengthened and amplified.

Star COP21 Episode 4: A new COP

This article is part of the Climate Nerd Chronicles.

After one week of intense UN climate negotiations, Luke Skywalker finally reaches the much sought-after “blue zone”. By the end of the two weeks, twenty thousand people from all over the galaxy will have entered there. Who are these accredited people of the blue zone? What are they doing here? Here’s an inside look.

All galactic species inside the blue zone coexisting peacefully… most of the time.

The COP21 Northern Lights – Part 1

This article is part of the Climate Nerd Chronicles.

Inspired from the Trilogy His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman

Lyra and her daemon were moving alertly around the empty Plenary Hall, careful like wolves steping on ice, facing an unknown still territory. The immense Hall was dimly lightened by few spots: on all the walls and the dim screens hung to the far-away roof, Lyra could see immobile leef-shaped green flames. A mouse on her shoulder, Pantalaimon turned into a owl and opened his wings away from her shoulder; Lyra kept walking close to the endless rows of white tables. She was looking intently at this Congress of Chairs: all had the name of a country. Around the sound of her breath, her steps on the parquet, and the flap of Pantalaimon’s wings, she could hear the ever-present conversation of long-neck microphones. This silence had the weight of decades of past discussions.

Star COP21 Episode 3: the revenge of the negotiators

This article is part of the Climate Nerd Chronicles.

A fierce battle is happening in the Gallactic Senate. Delegates from all around the galaxy argue on different blocking points as the future of all their citizens is endangered by the colossal amount of green house gases released in the universe by the Power Plants and the imbalance it creates in the Force.

    Queen Amidala has rallied a lot of supporters to her cause over a lot of topics. Due to the unavoidable effects of climate change, some catastrophes are bound to happen. The desolated Tatooine planet, well known for its harsh living condition -which caused a lot of youngsters to turn into terrible bandits- might see its temperature rise so much that no human life could develop there anymore. And the sea level rise in the Maldives satellite is predicted to recover all emerged land by the end of the century. The senators of the most endangered systems have been advocating for years to get some sort of acknowledgement and compensation for their terrible losses through the concept of “Loss and Damage”. The rich Republicans from Global North are on the verge of accepting the inclusion of this mechanism in the final text and the Separatists of Global South are on their way to a small victory.

Saudi Arabia entering the negotiation room