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COP27 UPDATE: Days 8-10, 14-16 November 2022

By Mark Bonner posted 17-11-2022 09:23 AM

  

It's quite difficult to get a sense of where this COP will end up in just a few days’ time; and how achievements will be characterised within a context of this being the “implementation COP” and despite the very important issues on the table.

It is a very different COP to all of the previous ones I’ve attended.

The shades of grey might well be due to the fact that many of the big ticket items are procedural with mandates to continue technical discussions (TD) well into 2023. But some agendas that will host future TD’s next year such as the Global Stocktake will clearly need to move rapidly into an implementation mode if it is to feature as a COP28 milestone.

I also suspect that there are geopolitical shifts in negotiating bloc alliances especially within developing nations including between G77 & China and the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS). I accidentally found myself in the middle of a G77 and China/AOSIS debriefing (which is closed to other constituencies) and emotions were clearly running high with different views being expressed on funding for loss and damage.

Notable events during the past few days include Australia's ministerial reception which was hosted on Tuesday, 15 November 2022. Damian Ogden (GM, Policy & Advocacy) and I attended it, and it turned out to be terrific opportunity to chat with Minister Bowen (and his staff), the Assistant Minister Jenny McAllister along with Australia's negotiating team and civil society participants. It was a great night and many contacts and friends for Engineers Australia made. A huge shout out to the Clean Energy Council and The Carbon Market Institute for sponsoring the event. The International Emissions Trading Association (IETA) reception was also hosted on latish Wednesday, 16 November 2022.

Photo: Assistant Minister McAllister, John Connor, CEO Carbon Market Institute, and Kane Thornton, Clean Energy Council

Photo: Minister Bowen

Damian and I also met with colleagues from Standards Australia. It was a very engaging discussion on engineering-climate standards exploring potential interactions and ways forward to mutually support each others ambitions in this space, with many opportunities to be followed up.

Photo: Mark Bonner, Adrian O'Connell, CEO Standards Australia, Damian Ogden, Abbey Dorian, International Engagement Manager

State of play for negotiations

The start of week 2 at COP27 saw a significant volume of work carried over from week 1 and needing to be finalised by late Wednesday, 16 November 2022. At the time of drafting (930pm on Wednesday, 16 November 2022), many issues were still being discussed by parties and expected to go through to late today; this will then provide for tomorrow (if not part of Friday) for political processes to resolve the red-line issues of Parties or whether they need to get kicked on down the road to COP28 in Dubai.

The week started with many parallel agenda items including the resumption of high-level speeches by heads of delegation (ministers) from early in week 1. Chris Bowen delivered his speech in the morning of Tuesday 15 November.

The minister opened his statement in the language of the Torres Strait and proclaimed that "Australia is back as a constructive, positive, and willing climate collaborator" and that within the decade Australia’s energy mix will be 82 per cent renewable. Bowen refers the shift to net zero emissions not as a "transition" but as a "transformation."

Photo: Minister Bowen delivering Australia's statement

Bowen also declared Australia's intention to bid to host COP31 in 2026. and made explicit reference to the "climate emergency" while announcing an additional $900 million to support the Pacific family’s development and resilience. Finally of note is the Government's delivery of  Australia’s first Annual Climate Change Statement on how its tracking against its NDCs.

But he did not agree to Australia signing the clean energy transition partnership in support of moving away from “unabated fossil fuels.” To access the full transcript, use this link.

At an informal Stocktake Plenary by the COP President on Monday, 14 November 2022, the President laid out three tracks of work for the coming week.

  • Finalise the technical work (there are 13 outstanding Subsidiary Body (SB) agenda items) including enhanced mitigation ambition, global adaptation goal, loss and damage (including funding) , agriculture (Koronivia Joint Work), gender, and forum on response measures

  • Presidency to consult on finalising COP27’s cover decisions (which is the political signalling of what was achieved at COP27)

  • Ministerial consultations post to commence on 17 November 2022 (the President asked Bowen to lead ministerial level negotiations to help close the finance agenda).

On COP27’s cover decisions, Australia also suggested that a commitment to 100 per cent  renewable energy should be included in the agreed text.

The state of play for many of the outstanding technical discussions remains fluid with the bigger picture often lost (sometimes intentionally) for the detail. For example, Article 6.2 (international trading) discussions seem bogged down in centralised accounting, registry and reporting platforms. The tradable units (known as ITMOs) are expected to start trading in 2023 with some private sector organisations already open for business.

On Article 6.4 (project level trading), the drag on discussions seems to revolve around emissions removals (compared to emissions reductions and emissions avoidance). Often referred to as "engineered" or "made-up" removals, the concern revolves around environmental integrity and Indigenous Peoples’ rights. There may be an opportunity arising from COP27 decision for Engineers Australia to submit its views on different types of "engineered" removal types as well as reversals, leakages, and a complaint mechanism. This may be important if only to decouple the branding of ‘engineering’ from ‘removals’.

Also on the carbon markets radar is translating CDM methodologies and sustainable development tool for transitioning to the Article 6.4 including standardised baselines; expected to be operational in 2024.

Another important agenda item is the Forum on the impact of the implementation of response measures; including just transition and the impacts of phasing down coal power and phasing out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies.

There are plenty of other issues which will get canvassed in my final COP27 summary report.

Final observations

There is activist participation and action here at the COP, but they are (very) orderly and sequential (unilateral) as desired/required by the authorities; I think this has effectively rendered them almost pointless in terms of element of surprise given that their one location is so far away from where government negotiators congregate.

Another notable event was the release of UNEP's annual Gap Report (see link). UNEP find that current policies and pledged announcements (COP26) if met would drive an end of century temperature outcome of about 2.8°C; or if all NDCs under the Paris Agreement were met then temperatures of 2.6°C (unconditional pledges) or 2.4°C (conditional pledges).

In terms of annual emissions, in 2030 the gap between where we need to be and where we might be could be between 20 to 23GtCO2-e (short) to stay within 1.5°C.  UNEP's assessment of Australia's performance against its net zero emissions pledge in 2050 looks to be tracking OK.

Photo: UNEP presentation launching Gap Report, 15 November 2022

I was amazed to realise that global CO2-e emissions in 1990 were about 34GtCO2-e, and after almost 30 years of climate treaties (Convention, Kyoto Protocol, Paris Agreement), had grown to 54CO2-e in 2020 (a 42 per cent increase). Note that many people simply cite the International Energy Agency (IEA) estimate of 31.5GtCO2 as being the global annual emissions estimate (see link) but it should be recognised that the IEA's estimate is for energy only and excludes non-CO2 greenhouse gases (e.g., methane).

In the meantime, penultimate draft texts on many negotiating issues should be available tomorrow morning (17 November 2022)  and outstanding issues better identified and articulated. I've been tracking key issues real-time, but the acoustics in many of the larger meeting rooms makes it almost impossible to hear what is being proposed by the Parties; and while unfortunate at COP27, this has not been my experience in previous COPs attended.

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