COP29 Curtain Raiser: COP29 Expectations

US election aftermath

Trump’s win in the US election has again drawn attention to the country’s commitment to global climate action. He is expected to try to expand more oil and gas drilling and potentially withdraw - again - from the Paris Agreement. Despite greater geopolitical uncertainty, many of the climate policies set by the Biden administration are likely to prove resilient both at home and in the context of the UNFCCC. A new brief outlines why multilateral support for climate action is still possible in Baku and beyond.

At COP29, the Biden administration is expected to continue to play a strategic role in delivering a new climate finance goal. Expectations are high for the US to submit an NDC at the G20 to prove its commitment to global climate action. A new report from Net Zero Policy Lab shows that countries like Europe, China, Japan and South Korea stand to gain tens of billions of dollars in new opportunities should the US retreat from the clean energy economy.

Hottest year. Again.

As negotiators descend on Baku they will know that 2024 is set to yet again be the hottest year in history, so each of the last 10 years is among the 10 hottest on record. The planet is now the hottest it’s been in 120,000 years, long before humans started choosing safe places to live and farm. For the first time, this year will likely see average temperatures more than 1.5C hotter than they were before humans started burning fossil fuels, though this doesn’t yet mean the Paris Agreement limit has been broken as it refers to temperatures over a longer time period. But the fact we’re seeing such high temperatures - driving disasters like Hurricanes Helene and Milton and the floods in Spain and the Sahel - will focus minds on the urgency of going faster on cutting fossil fuels.

Finance

COP29 needs to agree to a new climate finance goal - the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG). Talks on the new goal have been taking place for the past three years and reach crunch time in Baku.

The original commitment of $100 billion was met for the first time in 2023, according to the OECD. This year countries are looking at reaching a climate finance goal in the trillions with developing countries requesting between $1 trillion and $1.3 trillion. Striking a deal is key to supporting developing countries in the energy transition.

Azerbaijan

The COP29 Presidency has been busy promoting its 14 initiatives for the conference but so far most of the attention on the country has focused on the ongoing human rights crackdown on civil society activists and journalists as well as its own poor energy record. The major oil and gas exporter is rated as having a ‘critically insufficient’ NDC and has plans to expand investments in oil and gas (expected to rise by 14% by 2035). Amongst its initiatives is a $1bn Climate Finance Action Fund - if launched successfully it would see fossil fuel-producing countries and companies contributing to climate finance.

Fossil fuel phase out: MIA, NDC pressure

Countries are expected to announce their new climate plans in the first days of COP, along with the COP leadership Troika of Azerbaijan and Brazil, and the UK. The UAE revealed its national climate plan on November 6th, with analysts calling the plan ‘deceptive’ while outlining it falls short of meeting the 1.5C target. New Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) are due by February 2025 and are expected to build on the Global Stocktake and the COP28 deal where countries committed to ‘transitioning away’ from fossil fuels and also set targets for renewable energy capacity and energy efficiency. Earlier in September, 20 organisations signed a ‘10 tests for NDCs letter’ outlining what makes a good NDC.

Science

The Global Carbon Budget, the annual gold standard report for carbon emissions and progress measurement towards the Paris Agreement goals, will be out on November 13th, with a global snapshot of the past year, projections for 2024, and country level data to help understand the leaders and laggards. The reality versus rhetoric is also not lining up on CDR. The 2024 State of Carbon Dioxide Removal report says 7–9 billion tonnes of CO2 per year will need to be removed by 2050 to be Paris 1.5 aligned. Currently only 2 billion tonnes are removed each year.

Scientists are worried about the changes they are seeing in the climate system. Each year, the Indicators of Global Climate Change release a ‘health report’ and trends are going in the wrong direction across the board. The International Cryosphere Climate Initiative tells us that ‘2 is too high’, triggering an unadaptable rate of sea level rise. Look out for this year’s update from them in Baku on November 12th. Researchers also warned us of how little is understood about overshoot, and reiterated that the best and safest option is to keep temperatures as low as possible.

Trade

Multilateral cooperation at COP is vital because sufficient climate finance is a prerequisite to ensure that trade policies do not hinder developing countries’ transition plans and development goals but rather enhance them. Growing concerns over trade reinforce the need for constructive multilateral cooperation and ambitious commitments on climate finance to support developing countries. The likely shift in the US stance on climate and trade policies provides a space for leadership and room for multilateral cooperation from the EU and BASIC nations, including to overcome past COP tensions centred on carbon border adjustment levies.

COP29 Daily Schedule

WEEK 1:

11 November: COP29 Opening

12 November: World Leaders Climate Action Summit, day 1, Ministerial Dialogue on Renewables, TBC UK NDC announcement

13 November: World Leaders Climate Action Summit, day 2, Troika High Level Dialogue

14 November: Finance, Investments & Trade, Adaptation Fund Dialogue, Ministerial Meeting of the Coalition of Finance Ministers for Climate Action

15 November: Energy / Peace, Relief and Recovery

16 November: Science, Technology and Innovation / Digitalisation

17 November: Rest day.

WEEK 2

18 November: Human Capital, Children / Youth, Health / Education

18-19 November: G20 Heads of State Summit, Rio

19 November: Food, Agriculture, Water

20 November: Urbanisation / Transport / Tourism

21 November: Nature / Biodiversity / Indigenous People / Gender Equality / Oceans /Coastal zones

22 November: Closing plenary

Frances Colón, Senior Director and team leader for International Climate Policy at Center for American Progress, said:

“Under a second Trump administration, U.S. federal climate leadership will stall, but subnational actors–states, cities, and civil society will still drive meaningful climate action. This makes COP29 all the more critical to reaffirm collective ambition and unlock creative solutions for scaling clean energy and climate finance. The world’s climate imperatives remain the same - to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius and achieve net-zero emissions by mid-century. When the stakes have never been higher, countries must step up to meet the moment."

Ali Mohamed, Kenya Climate Change Envoy said:“COP29 comes at a critical time. Talks in Baku have a mandate to deliver on the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) first mooted in Paris in 2015. There is an urgent need to address the financing gap, which has escalated over the years and continues to affect hundreds of millions across Africa. While there is global consensus that COP29 must be a ‘Finance COP’, for Africa that means finally agreeing and making available the trillions of dollars needed annually to tackle the climate crisis and restore trust in the multilateral system. For Africa, it is important that the final goal agreed in Baku should not worsen our debt situation. So, when we say that Baku will be a ‘Finance COP’, we are underlining the fact that the Framework on Global Climate Resilience needs to be translated into actions that deliver on agriculture, water, health, biodiversity, infrastructure and human settlements.”

Li Shuo, Director of China Climate Hub, Asia Society Policy Institute, said:

“COP29 is the first true test for world leaders after this US election. I’m not worried about whether multilateralism will prevail - I know it will, with nations fully aware that these two weeks must deliver strong financial commitments after a year of unprecedented climate impacts if they care about keeping the global economy afloat. But, in light of this election’s outcome, China will be inevitably in the spotlight as a key mediator, alongside the EU. It will be up to them to truly lead the way forward now that one piece of the puzzle may be missing.”

Pepukaye Bardouille, Special adviser on climate resilience to the Prime Minister of Barbados and Director of the Bridgetown Initiative, said:"The reality we are facing going into this COP has been made clear by the endless list of disasters hitting countries around the world: just Hurricane Milton, a single storm in the US, has initial estimates to have caused damages upwards of $100 billion. And that's in a country that has adequate finance, emergency resources and capabilities in place. Every year countries are rebuilding, repaving and dealing with just a little bit more intensity. These costs are adding up. That's why we need to come out of this COP with a climate finance deal: we need a plan on how we are going to finance both the energy transition and adaptation, looking at all the possible sources of finance that have been put on the table."

Linda Kalcher, Executive Director, Strategic Perspectives, said:

“The EU is one of the most reliable partners on climate finance for developing countries, its position for COP29 is unnecessarily defensive. Trump’s election should be a forcing moment to make the EU stop hiding in its own shade. With his background as finance minister, Commissioner Hoekstra is best placed to broker a successful outcome that meets expectations of the Global South. It would be bad optics if the High Ambition Coalition would only come together on mitigation topics.”

Ahead of COP, Canada moves to cap carbon pollution from oil and gas

On Monday, the Canadian government released draft regulations for putting a cap on oil and gas emissions. This news is significant as Canada is the world's fourth largest oil producer and fifth largest gas producer. Between 1990-2022, oil sands emissions in Canada climbed over 460%.

While not yet final, the regulations mean that Canada's biggest polluters - oil and gas companies - must start to do their fair share to cut emissions just like every other sector in Canada. The announcement follows yet another summer in Canada of record-breaking heatwaves, devastating floods and destructive wildfires – made more intense and frequent due to fossil fuel emissions-driving climate change.

Since 2019, oil and gas profits in Canada have climbed tenfold, but the sector has not invested significantly in cutting emissions. Monday’s announcement aims to change that. The draft regulations outline a cap of 35% below 2019 emissions levels by 2030-2032. A cap-and-trade system would be created.

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