Climate action: The Dubai conference will be taking the same, inadequate baby steps that previous editions have

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

COP21, the UN Climate Change Conference, led to a new international climate agreement, applicable to all countries, aiming to keep global warming at 1.5-2° C, in accordance with the recommendations of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Since then, progress on reducing CO2 emissions has been glacial.

The Covid pandemic shifted attention away from climate change for a while. But global economic slowdown also led to a slowdown in global emissions increases.

But with global recovery underway, emissions have resumed with equal fervour. IPCC's latest grim assessment of progress on climate action is that world temperatures have already risen by 1.1° C, and could breach 1.5° C increase before 2030, unless global emissions fall by 43%. But on current trends, they are expected to rise by 10%.

To keep temperature rise to 1.5° C, the atmosphere can only accept a net increase in CO2 emissions equivalent to 510 Gt (gigatonnes) of CO2, while current and planned investments would add equivalent to 850 Gt.

To achieve Paris Agreement targets would require a reduction in coal use by 95%, oil by over 65% and gas by 45%. Oxfam has shown that the top 1% of income-earners emit more than the bottom two-thirds of the world's population.

Climate adaptation costs are rising, and will require $127 billion a year in developing countries by 2030. But available funds are only around $25-30 billion.

The Green Climate Fund that was promised $100 billion remains grossly underfunded. A recent G20 Expert Group on the multilateral development banks' (MDB) report has argued for an additional $1 trillion a year. But much of it must be leveraged from the private sector.