CIERP at COP23

By Kelly Sims Gallagher

I am delighted to report that Fletcher was well represented at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change 23rd Conference of the Parties (COP23) negotiations in Bonn, Germany in November 2017. Across the two weeks a total of 26 members of the Tufts community attended the COP. In the second week 7 CIERP-Climate Policy Lab faculty, staff, and students were there, participating in a wide array of events and activities. One highlight for me was participating in a Track II dialogue about how to advance the climate negotiations beyond the Paris Agreement commitments. Here are some other highlights:

Fletcher students participated in many side events and gathered information useful for the Climate Policy Lab (CPL). Notably, Easwar Narassimhan met the Indian Minister of Environment.  

CIERP research assistant Elizabeth Minchew followed up on her CIERP-funded internship in Papua New Guinea last summer to serve on their formal government delegation and participated in the negotiations focused on adaptation for the Alliance of Small Island States.

CIERP Faculty Affiliate and Economics Professor Gilbert Metcalf spoke at several side events, presenting his work on how to link carbon pricing systems, and how to implement different provisions of the Paris Agreement related to market mechanisms. Prof. Metcalf and I also spoke at university networking event entitled Colleges United for Climate Action.

Together with Fletcher doctoral student Easwar Narassimhan and MALD student Stefan Koester, I released our new report on Carbon Pricing in Practice: A Review of the Evidence at an official COP23 side event entitled The Role of Carbon Pricing Mechanisms in Achieving NDC: A View of Multistakeholders.

I spoke at an International Energy Agency side event on Clean Energy Technologies: Tracking Progress and the Role of Digitalization, where I presented on our findings of global investments in clean energy RD&D based on work led by CPL fellow Zdenka Myslikova.

I participated in a special event at the America’s Pledge tent on The Role of Universities in Climate Action where we discussed how American universities are taking action on climate as part of the #WeAreStillIn movement despite the Trump Administration’s decision to withdraw.

Professor of Practice, Patrick Verkooijen, shared our newly launched carbon pricing publication with Latin American ministers and discussed how to advance carbon pricing in the Americas.

Besides the official events and meetings, we hosted a Tufts University booth to showcase mostly the work of our Center and CPL, as well as other environmental programs at Tufts. We shared this booth with the University of Maryland. Students from the Tufts delegation manned the booth to inform the many interested people about our programs and research.

I was interviewed by Climate Studio about the work of the Climate Policy Lab, including our China policy gap analysis. The Climate Policy Lab is working together with UNDP, World Bank and other universities to determine what is working and thereafter working in collaboration with government to implement improve and revise policies. 

Informally, we invited Fletcher Alumni at the COP to join us at a local restaurant for drinks and dinner, so that we could mingle and network more informally. About 25 alums joined us for this fun and festive occasion. We even learned of 2 new senior GMAP alums who work in the field of climate change!

All in all, our trip to the COP was a big success for sharing our research results with experts, policy-makers, and funders, and for making new connections.

Go team!

Prof. Gallagher