Crunch time for rich at COP26 on climate finance for developing countries
The payment by rich countries to developing countries to help them fund their adjustment to climate change is proving to be a major sticking point at the COP26 summit.
Funding has been a fraught issue from the outset of the two-week negotiations, when rich countries admitted that they had missed a $100bn-a-year promise that was made a decade ago.
At the conclusion of the summit, several “cover decision” documents will sum up what countries have agreed at the meeting. Negotiators say the climate finance clauses are the most contentious.
A growing bloc of developing countries says it needs to see more clear financial commitments by the end of COP26, in order to agree the proposals for cutting emissions.
COP26 president Alok Sharma said he would convene ministers late on Thursday evening to try to broker an agreement. “There is still a lot more work to be done,” he said. “Negotiations on finance really need to accelerate, and they need to accelerate now.”
An updated version of the draft texts, expected overnight, was delayed until Friday, in part because of tensions and disagreement over the language relating to money for adaptation and for loss and damage.
India alone has said it wants $1tn in international public funds, as part of its pledge to cut emissions to net zero by 2070. The large number indicates the extent of the disconnect between the various blocs on funding.
Convening in the media zone at the centre in Glasgow, delegates from climate-vulnerable countries and Greenpeace accused the US and EU of blocking ambition and refusing to cough up sufficient money to help developing countries navigate the climate crisis.
“The finance issues have always been the crunch issues in this process,” said Alden Meyer, senior adviser on E3G. “We’re in danger of getting into a least common denominator spiral, where the US and Europe and other developed countries limit what’s possible on finance, and Saudi Arabia, China, and others limit what’s possible on mitigation.”
While some countries were concerned that there was not enough detail nor substance in the draft text, others were reluctant to commit to providing more.
The US has come under particular pressure, as negotiators and activists said it had not given enough despite improving its contribution ahead of the summit to $11.4bn. President Joe Biden’s promise to deliver by 2024 was also too far in the future, they said.
“The Biden administration is in a difficult position, they can’t just snap their fingers and get the money,” said one negotiator. “But the fact is they are doing just one-fourth of their fair share of climate finance.”
Major economies, including the US, have long resisted the idea of a new fund that would provide compensation for loss and damage linked to climate change.
They are also against a mandatory levy on carbon credits traded between countries that would go towards an adaptation fund for poorer countries, hoping instead that voluntary contributions to such a fund would suffice.
“It is very, very important that we have a facility for loss and damage,” said Emmanuel Tachie-Obeng, an official at Ghana’s Environmental Protection Agency. “Look at the disasters that come with climate change. All our farms are being wiped away, our schools are being wiped away. Who is paying these damages.”
One task for negotiators at Glasgow is to agree on a process for establishing a new goal for climate finance for 2025 and beyond, even though the previous goal was not met.
Reaching the $100bn annual target was originally set for 2020, and now is being pushed to the end of 2022.
“We can’t find ourselves in a position of overcommitting, over promising” on climate finance and being unable to commit to the promise, said one official.
Developing countries are also pushing for more transparency on what is “counted” on climate finance, and requiring rich countries to disclose more details about what type of climate finance they are contributing.
“We know the $100bn commitment will not be met before 2023,” said Fekadu Beyene, Ethiopia’s commissioner for the environment. “This gap in funding and failure to deliver on the commitment must be honestly acknowledged in the text — and then it must be addressed.”
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