COP26 is over. The judgment on whether the climate summit was a success or a failure will depend on your expectations. The result was not the triumph proclaimed by Boris Johnson, nor the total failure described by Greta Thunberg. In both cases their comments felt pre-scripted. The reality was much more complex, with some successes, some serious disappointments and with the eventual impact completely dependent on the degree to which those involved keep to the extensive promises they have made.
COP26 did not save the world, and was never likely to. At best it was another step on a very long journey. What matters now is that the next steps should be more productive in the years to 2025 and 2030 rather than 2050, because the urgency of the challenge is growing. As global economic activity returns to something closer to pre-pandemic “normality,” emissions are rising again. By the end of this year they are likely to be above 2019 levels and with economic growth in Asia still largely fuelled by coal, that trend could continue through the next decade.
Each year will take us closer to the point at which global temperatures will increase by at least 1.5 degrees and extreme weather events will become even more common than in the last few years.
The worst outcome of COP26 would be a belief that the challenges so evident over the last two weeks in Glasgow can be solved with one more heave at COP27 in Egypt next year. If COP26 has taught us anything, it should be that real progress is not likely to emerge from a process of very public diplomacy which can only move forward when there is a consensus between 200 very different countries. At times the meeting in Glasgow was reminiscent of the League of Nations—an utterly worthy and idealistic venture destined to fail because of the false premise on which it was built. World government does not exist. At other times it resembled a circus, with 25,000 delegates, observers, commentators and hangers on.
A new and more serious form of climate diplomacy is needed. The many different strands of the climate crisis—from the technical issues around the reduction of methane emissions and adaptation to the physical impact of climate change in specific locations, to financial transfers to help lower-income countries make the transition as quickly as possible and measures to limit deforestation—should each be treated distinctly by groups with specialist knowledge and with the relevant political leadership. In each case the statements from Glasgow set out ambitions, but the detail needs to be defined if the commitments are to be credible.
Not every problem needs to be solved simultaneously. Few if any of the issues will inspire the subtle and nuanced compromise solutions which usually characterise success if the discussions are played out in full public view. It is noticeable that the areas where real progress was made in Glasgow—as on the reduction of methane emissions—were discussed before the event began. By contrast the debate on phasing out coal use—a move which countries such as India regarded as simply unrealistic—was played out in public, resulting in a negative and downbeat ending to the final session.
The relative failure of the public politics of the COP process in Glasgow overshadowed the optimism and sense of possibility which was evident walking around the pavilions, as I did last week. Multiple promising technologies are beginning to be developed and deployed. The direction of change is now clear enough to stimulate serious investment in a whole range of new sources of supply—from hydrogen and new small modular reactors, to advanced grids and storage technologies. In many ways technology is ahead of politics in presenting solutions.
That process, however, is incomplete. Another coalition of the willing is needed to fund and develop the science and technology which can answer the challenge posed by the Indian environment minister in the final session of the Glasgow meeting. As he said, the poorer countries, of which India is just one, will only move away from coal when there are energy solutions which they can afford. Low cost and low carbon must go together.
The response to Glasgow should therefore be neither celebration nor despair. COP26 has shown us both what is possible and the limits to the delivery of those possibilities. The only realistic response is pragmatism. The negative consequences of a changing climate could begin to affect all of us sooner than we like to believe. Much can be done now to avert the risks and much more is possible, but needs to be proved viable by hard scientific work. We cannot afford to wait for a mythical global consensus. Much more can be done by quiet bilateral diplomacy. The next steps will be partial rather than complete or universal. We must do what we can, with whoever we can, as soon as we can.
