Did you know ECO can be in several rooms at the same time? Usually, ECO finds this quite helpful. Sometimes, though, it just leaves us thoroughly confused.
Take the case of the EU yesterday. In the contact group discussions, the EU stressed that Parties’ targets are not strong enough and ambition needs to be increased to respect the 2°C guardrail, suggesting textual changes accordingly. ECO could not agree more on this point. In a different room at exactly the same time, the CMP was meeting, and ECO heard other Parties stressing that targets are not strong enough and ambition needs to be increased to respect the 2°C guardrail. So Parties suggested a contact group to consider pre-2020 targets and guess what: the EU forcefully rejected this proposal, even though they supported increasing ambition just down the hall.
Can you please just make up your mind?
Now, the EU might be concerned that a CMP contact group would only look at commitments under the KP, meaning those of a limited number of developed countries and not all Parties. If that were the case, ECO would be even more confused. Why has ECO not heard any support from the EU for a process on accelerated implementation in the Workstream 2 negotiations, which would be exactly the forum to discuss this?
We all know emissions need to peak before 2020 to stay below 2°C, so ECO hopes it will hear the EU and other Parties who opposed the CMP group (looking at you, Norway and Australia) support this process in the Workstream 2 decision today.
