This Time Transition Means Phase Out
This Time Transition Means Phase Out

I attended the first week of COP28 in Dubai. The hours-long lines in the sun of the first few days are now a memory and I'm eagerly awaiting the text of the COP decision. Hopefully countries will end the meeting with an ambitious final agreement but, at the moment, it seems doubtful because of a particularly contentious point: the language surrounding a fossil fuel "phase out" or "phase down". It was expected to be this year’s biggest sticking point and it has lived up to expectations.

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Climate Policy Lab2023, Author - Travis Franck, COP28Comment
The Climate Community at COP28 – Banking on the Small Wins While Fighting for Better Collective Ambition
The Climate Community at COP28 – Banking on the Small Wins While Fighting for Better Collective Ambition

The COP negotiation process has been stuck forever in lexical semantics, with respective countries arguing over each word in the negotiating text to ensure the least amount of global climate action burden for themselves. Nevertheless, establishing a loss and damage fund and mobilizing finance for the adaptation fund are significant wins so far, and these small wins continue to provide hope for a more significant collective ambition in the future.

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Climate Policy Lab2023, Author - Easwaran Narassimhan, COP28Comment
Taking Stock of COP28
Taking Stock of COP28

The end of the first week of the annual climate negotiations nearly always produces a feeling of malaise and pessimism.  And sure enough, as we conclude the first week of #COP28 in Dubai, the progress in the global climate negotiations seems too slow, the outcomes too uncertain, and the whole scene to be strangely divorced from reality (or perhaps a true reflection of the actual political pressures on the process). The main concrete progress in the first week, on the first day, was on operationalizing the Loss and Damage Fund, with some initial pledges made by Europe ($250 million +), the United States ($17.5 million), and a few other countries. The US also made a pledge to the Green Climate Fund of $3 billion (with no clarity how it will pay for it given Congressional opposition).

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Climate Policy Lab2023, Author - Kelly Sims Gallagher, COP28Comment
Heat and Health at COP28
Heat and Health at COP28

The negotiations and fanfare have officially kicked off at the 28th Conference of the Parties in Dubai with reports of over 80,000 people attending the conference this year. After two days of speeches and plenaries at the high-level Climate Action Summit, world leaders have announced a series of large commitments – some meaningful, some symbolic – and most have headed back to their home countries. Starting yesterday (December 3rd), the conference shifted focus to key negotiations and thematic days. The backdrop of the conference is sunny, hot Dubai. We are currently in one of the cooler times of the year, but limited tree cover means significant sun exposure in the lines to get into the venue. Once inside Expo City, you can mostly manage to stay cool in the shade, but the venue is sprawling and the walk from one end to the other is long and primarily outdoors. Overall, it is an interesting setting for talks about limiting global warming to ‘well below 2 degrees Celsius’. The heat here – apparently nothing compared to the summer months – puts the dangers of a hotter world into stark perspective.

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Climate Policy Lab2023, Author - Bethany Tietjen, COP28 Comment