New Jersey has begun to feel the impacts of climate change, specifically increased extreme weather events from Nor’easters to hurricanes like Irene and Katrina. Climate change, according to the Rutgers Climate Change Resource Center, will also greatly impact New Jersey’s economy, infrastructure, and residents’ public health. And while policy changes are being devised at the municipal, state, and national levels, nations are also banding together to reduce the worst impacts of global climate change.
The COP26 conference, hosted this year in Glasgow, Scotland, concluded less than 2 weeks ago on November 12th. Negotiations had been ongoing since October 31st. One of the main goals of the summit was to “keep 1.5 degrees within reach” (COP 26). What exactly does 1.5 degrees of warming mean and why is it important? Well, while COP26 is the convening of public and private sector leaders, science is the underlying framework of the negotiations.
The importance of 1.5 degrees lies within the IPCC’s findings. The IPCC, the International Governmental Panel on Climate Change, is the premier source for climate science and provides information for governments to inform their climate policies. It is well-known within the scientific community that natural systems do not change linearly, but with tipping points. The IPCC’s findings tell us that 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming above pre-industrial levels is a tipping point. This means that generally past this rise in temperatures, climate impacts will go from destructive to catastrophic, with fundamental natural systems greatly altered.
What was COP26?
To combat the rising urgency of climate change across the world as conveyed by climate scientists, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was incorporated into the United Nations system. UNFCCC, according to its own website, “is the United Nations entity tasked with supporting the global response to the threat of climate change” (UNFCCC). Within UNFCCC, the highest decision-making body is called the Conference of the Parties, COP for short. The COP meets annually and first met in 1995, making 2021 the 26th meeting of the COP. This is the meaning behind the title of this year’s climate summit: COP26.
This year’s COP meeting is also linked to the landmark Paris Climate Agreement signed in 2015. The Paris Climate Agreement is a legally binding treaty in which 190 nations across the globe agreed to collaborate to achieve the agreement’s goals: to limit global temperatures increasing to only 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, all with the intention that over time countries will be able to reduce emissions further to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. According to the inner workings of the Paris Climate Agreement, climate actions occur on a 5-year cycle with the prospect that nations will continue to make increasingly ambitious promises. COP26 is significant because it is the first reconvening (one-year off-cycle due to the COVID-19 pandemic) of the nations with new climate targets in place.
Political leaders, prominent business people across industry sectors, and outspoken climate activists all were in attendance at the summit over these past two weeks. The summit hosted over 25,000 attendees, who came together to discuss one central issue: global climate change. Prominent global figures in attendance include U.S. President Joe Biden, Chinese President Xi Jinping, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi; together they lead nations which together emit 50% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.
What was (not) achieved at COP26?
COP26 was a chance for nations to update their climate action plans that started at the Paris Climate Agreement. These plans are called Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and display the nuances of the COP26 Summit. For context, before the Paris Climate Agreement, UN Scientists projected our planet was on a path towards 4.0 degrees Celsius of warming, over double the 1.5-degree goal. With their 2030 NDCs considered, that projection was brought down to 2.5 degrees of warming. While this is a significant decrease in potential warming, 2.5 degrees of warming is still very dangerous according to leading climate scientists. And 2.5 degrees is currently the lowest possible projection of warming, in an ideal scenario where all countries adhere to their climate plans at full.
However, there is hope. Many nations have committed to achieving net-zero emissions, meaning that they emit the same amount of greenhouse gases that they take out of the atmosphere. 2030 targets are currently not up to par with aggressive, long-term plans for net-zero emissions by mid-century. By aligning mid-century targets and 2030 targets at COP26, the conference keeps alive the goal of limiting warming to only 1.5 degrees Celsius.
All interrelated to the science-based goals of 1.5 degrees of warming, the conference discussions also centered around other urgent issues: coal usage and funding for developing nations. Coal usage, for the first time, was discussed with a clear plan for reductions. However, India, a developing nation and the 3rd largest greenhouse gas emitter in the world, resisted. Last-minute, they proposed and changed the resolution language from “phase out” coal to “phase down” coal, a more ambiguous and unbounded target.
Furthermore, developing nations were promised by richer nations in 2009 a fund of $100 billion dollars per year to support their climate efforts. Developing nations often argue that “rich countries are responsible for most of today’s climate change impacts because they started emitting carbon much earlier than the rest of the world” (BBC). To make matters worse, developing countries are often at the forefront of current climate impacts and have limited resources to repair damages and build resiliency. While the funding as of 2019, reached $80 billion, $20 billion short of their goal, developed nations at COP26 did promise to at least double climate adaptation funding specifically. This increase to nearly $40 billion dollars will help to begin to reduce the inequality between adaptation possibilities for developing versus developed countries.
Conclusions
In an increasingly changing world, ambitious national climate plans, especially from the world’s top emitters—India, China, and America—are essential to protect humanity from the worst climate effects. While there is still a sense of climate urgency from some (100,000 marched for climate justice in Glasglow during the climate negotiation), many of us are ignorant or oblivious to the climate changes occurring right around us. Although governmental action and private sector action are critical to mitigating this crisis, with a problem as immense and pervasive as climate change, every person has a role to play. While it is important to make changes within your own home—for example, turning off the lights in unoccupied rooms—I urge you to additionally look into how climate change will impact our community and consider what further actions you can take to help reduce those risks. We have the potential to support global efforts, nationally, within New Jersey, and even within our town. Let us work to ensure that our climate goals, what we want our future to look like, are met.
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