Stockholm (NordSIP) – COP26 kicked off in earnest on Monday, November 1, with a series of speeches from a wide range of world leaders, dignitaries, and campaigners. The host, UK prime minister Boris Johnson opened the session, imprinting a sense of urgency to the attendees and urging them to “make this COP26 in Glasgow the moment that we get real about climate change.” Joe Biden’s 11-minute address pitched the fight against climate change as an opportunity for investment and added hope that lower-emission energy sources “could create millions of jobs around the world.” Among the most cited speeches that day was the short but powerful one given by Sir David Attenborough. He said that his lifetime had been defined by a “terrible decline” but that young people alive today could witness a “wonderful recovery”.
Tuesday, November 2, saw the first breakthrough to come out of the summit, ‘The Declaration on Forests’. The leaders of more than 100 countries announced their commitment to “halt and reverse” deforestation globally by 2030. The countries involved in the pledge are home to 85% of the world’s forests. The Declaration is backed by USD 12 billion of public and private money, which will mainly help to protect the Amazon and tropical forests in Indonesia and the Congo Basin. Thirty financial institutions also promised to exclude deforestation from their portfolios.
India’s prime minister Narendra Modi announced that the country “will reach carbon neutrality by 2070, as part of a five-point action plan,” a pledge that is hailed as a big turnaround for the world’s third-largest polluter. China’s President Xi Jinping, on the other hand, failed to make any new significant pledges. In a written statement to COP26, he proposed to “maintain multilateral recognition”, “focus on practical action”, and “accelerate green transformation”.
Nordic and UK pension funds came together to announce a collective financial commitment of USD 130 billion to be invested in clean energy and climate investments by 2030, under the auspices of the Climate Investment Coalition (CIC). Pension funds will also report annually on the progress of their climate investments. The governments of all Nordic countries endorsed the pledge.
In another initiative announced that day, known as the ‘Glasgow Breakthroughs’, more than 40 world leaders said they would work together to turbo-charge the uptake of clean technologies by imposing worldwide standards and policies. Five high-carbon sectors will be targeted at first, including agriculture and electricity. The initiative aims to encourage global private investment in low-carbon technologies.
On Wednesday, November 3, nearly 100 countries committed to a ‘game-changing’ pledge to cut back planet-heating methane. Notably, Brazil is among the new signatories to the Global Methane Pledge, spearheaded by the US and the EU. However, several other top-five methane emitters, including China, Russia, and India, have not yet signed the pledge.
In another announcement made at COP26, plans were revealed for the US, the UK, France, Germany, and the EU to help fund South Africa’s transition away from coal. President Cyril Ramaphosa said the money would help South Africa implement its new climate target of cutting emissions by almost a third over the next decade.
Wednesday also saw the launch at COP26 of the ‘Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ)’. The new alliance members, some 450 firms in 45 countries, have committed USD 130 trillion towards the net-zero transition. Former Bank of England governor and GFANZ chair Mark Carney also launched “fresh standards and tools designed to help deploy that capital”.
On Thursday, November 4, leaders from more than 40 countries, alongside businesses and financial institutions, announced a pledge committing themselves to phase out coal power for good. Although some of the world’s most coal-dependent economies, including Australia, China, India, and the US, are missing from the deal, others, including Poland, Ukraine, and Vietnam, have joined the pledge to phase out coal power, with major economies doing so in the 2030s and others in the 2040s.
In a separate pledge, twenty countries, including the US, the UK, and Canada, vowed to end public financing for coal, oil, and gas overseas by the end of next year. The pledge, also signed by the European Investment Bank and four other development banks, commits to spending more resources on the transition to low-carbon power.
Stay tuned.