By Jim Hayes
The COP29 climate summit in Azerbaijan has come and gone, and as expected, achieved little. There was no new agreement to cut global carbon emissions. The opportunity to ensure keeping warming below 2 Centigrade was lost.
Outside the official events, a larger than ever presence of climate activists was present in the streets and outside the building where the delegates were meeting, Thet could not be missed, and their being there added considerable pressure to what was going on inside the closed rooms.
A great deal of fanfare has been made about the $300 billion annual funding to help developing countries till 2035. It looks good on paper. While this is an improvement, it still lags what is needed. Even greeting this far took a walkout of many nations. They protested the dominance and failure of the richest to act. They had demanded $1.3 trillion in annual funding.
Chandri Raina representing India said that the deal was “a paltry sum.” He expressed the view of many of the delegates. Hr added that “this document is little more than an optical illusion. This, in our opinion will not address the enormity of the challenges we all face.”
Here’s what to know about the $300 billion COP29 climate summit deal
Video from Associated Press
A big problem is that financing agreements have been made in the past. They were not honoured. Rich countries forgot their obligations as soon as the ink dried on the agreements. There is no mechanism to ensure this doesn’t happen again.
Noting this, the United Nations General Secretary Antonio Guterres noted, “It must be honoured in full and on time. Commitments must quickly become cash.”
Another drawback is that this largely depends on private corporate funding. In other words, insistence on reliance on a market-based solution continues. This is tied to the push for emphasis on carbon credits trading. In theory, this is where emission lowering activities buy rights to pollute. These can then be sold to polluting entities.
In practice, this has fed large scale corruption. It also opens opportunities for greenwashing. This is, the rise of projects claiming to reduce emissions or providing alternatives, which do nothing of the sort. Greenwashing serves to bring undeserved credit and hide the truth of what is going on to the public.
It’s said that the new COP29 agreement brings a stronger role for government. This is true. But the private market will remain as the core, and political corruption and close association between the corporate sector and many governments are the reality.
Few experts believe that there will be much change. Erika Lennon of the Centre for International Environmental Law for example, said it would be necessary to make sure these markets do not create “even more problems and more scandals than the voluntary carbon markets.”
There were other complaints at COP29. The most important one is that the wealthiest nations should cover 75 percent of the cost because they are responsible for 75 percent of the accumulated emissions and are far better able to wear the burden.
Of the around 200 countries involved, they don’t all really have an equal say. Them sot powerful dominate. This and the ongoing failure to act as the conditions demand has been putting Cop into increasing disrepute. Calls for reform on how COP is structured are getting louder.
Although the Australian delegation included Prime Minister and Energy Minister Chris Bowen, it took a low key and failed to back the majority of nations. Most of the effort, it seems, was spent on jockeying for position to be allowed to host the next summit in 2026. This has been noticed and Australia’s chances of winning the bis are fading.