Dear EU ministers, welcome (back) to Glasgow! Many of you have been here with your heads of states and governments less than a week ago (or have stayed on). Entering the final days of COP26, a lot is at stake to achieve an outcome which advances a fair approach to Fair for 1.5°C, and as you know the EU will be critical in achieving this. While ECO does not know yet exactly which EU ministers will take up leading roles in ministerial consultations, we expect all of you to champion ambitious and fair climate action (and not just rhetoric).
ECO welcomes that the High Ambition Coalition Leaders’ Statement, to which many European leaders signed up to, “recognises the need to increase resources for averting, minimizing and addressing loss and damage.” From the many statements by climate vulnerable parties, loss and damage actions, side events, tweets and hallway conversations, ECO has learned in the first week that there is a huge need in particular for additional resources to “address” the occurring and escalating loss and damage. So the EU must champion, in support of most affected countries, people and areas, agreement of concrete steps here in Glasgow for providing new, additional and needs-based loss and damage finance and a system to deliver that finance to vulnerable developing countries, alongside a permanent agenda item on loss and damage, and the operationalisation of the Santiago Network.
In week 1, Parties have greatly advanced the technical work on the different elements in relation to Article 6, but that does not yet secure an outcome which excludes undermining mitigation ambition needed for 1.5°C (for example by carry-over of old Kyoto surplus credits), and which excludes violating human rights for the sake of “cooperative approaches” to emission reductions. Operationally effective safeguard mechanisms must not be sacrificed just to get a deal.
On Common Time Frames, ECO welcomed the move of the EU in its October ministerial decisions to support a system of 5 year time frames, and it should not back down from that in favour of a 10 year system. We clearly want the EU to stand up for a 5 year system, and see there is wide support among the Parties.
When it comes to climate finance, ECO thinks that, as the world’s largest contributor, the EU has a responsibility to set the direction of travel, and ensure strong COP outcomes which reflect climate vulnerable needs, gender equality, and pays attention to recovery and debt. Since the Paris Agreement committed parties to mobilise US$600 billion over 2020-2025, that’s all that we would expect, and ECO thinks Parties would do well to update the delivery plan to reflect that. ECO would also like to remind EU Ministers that we are far from achieving a balance in mitigation and adaptation finance in the $100b. Since the EU collectively has a better adaptation share than other Parties, and as many Champions in the Champions Group in Adaptation Finance know, it would do well to leverage more from others by ensuring strong references to scaling up adaptation finance to achieve a 50% share in the total (the COP decision text would be a nice place for that to sit).
ECO has been sitting in on discussions on the new collective quantified goal after 2025, and while the EU has been a little shy on setting out its priorities for the substance of the goal, ECO is sure that it will be keen to take forward lessons on the $100b. ECO suggests that the process for deciding the goal is developing country needs and science-based, and that it includes – at a minimum – the consideration of subgoals for mitigation, adaptation and loss and damage, with a new subgoal of the collective quantified goal for adaptation finance from a floor of at least $50b per year. Engaging civil society and experts in a robust and inclusive process will ensure the best outcomes, which should advance the rights of Indigenous Peoples and women.
Finally, the outcome of COP26 (and the EU’s performance) will be measured in particular whether it sets a way forward for closing the still too wide gap to the 1.5°C limit. The discussions on the “cover decision” are particularly relevant here. It should clearly recognise the gap and that much more needs to be done NOW (and not by 2050) in order to “collectively reduce emissions by 45% in 2030 from 2010 levels”, as identified by the IPCC. The Paris Agreement foresees the possibility of submitting new NDCs anytime, and this COP can give an additional push here by clearly requesting to do so as soon as possible and no later than COP28, which can be complemented by additional short-term measures. Finally, as ECO is excited that phasing out fossil fuels has been talked about much at this COP, it also calls on the EU to get behind an end of licensing or permitting for fossil fuel production from 2021 onwards, and to phase-out fossil fuel combustion.