Revelations by a watchdog group reinforce doubts about chemical recycling, a technology promoted by the city in a collaboration with ExxonMobil and other companies.
HOUSTON—The message on the signs at the recycling drop-off site here was clear, and warmly welcomed by area residents who visited on a recent autumn Saturday to stuff bags of plastic waste into large green metal containers.
Climate Change
Analysis: England’s most ethnically diverse areas are 15 times more likely to face extreme heat
Neighbourhoods in England that are home to the most minority-ethnic people are 15 times more likely to face extreme heat than the least diverse areas, according to Carbon Brief analysis.
People with the lowest carbon footprints – who therefore contribute less to climate change – are also more likely to live in areas that experience high temperatures.
This is based on Carbon Brief analysis that combines satellite data on heat exposure with data on per-capita emissions, ethnicity and levels of deprivation across England.
Thousands of deaths in the UK have been attributed to heat in recent years and the threat is expected to grow as climate change worsens.
But heat is also felt differently across the country, with certain groups both more exposed and more vulnerable to dangerous temperatures.
Broadly, the analysis shows how those subject to the “urban heat island” effect in English cities, often in low-quality housing and with little access to green space, are more likely to experience extreme heat.
Experts tell Carbon Brief that policymaking should reflect the reality of climate change “amplifying” inequalities across society and provide help to those most in need, such as more heat-resilient social housing.
Heat threat
As greenhouse gas emissions and global temperatures rise, more people in the UK are likely to become ill or even die due to extreme heat.
Heat has killed around 6,000 people in England over the past three years, according to government figures. This is roughly double the number killed over the same period between 2016 and 2018.
Scientists have repeatedly linked extreme heat – and the resulting deaths – to climate change.
In June 2025 alone, more than 260 people died in London due to a heatwave, according to a recent attribution study that linked the event to climate change.
Government advisor the Climate Change Committee (CCC) estimates that the number of heat-related fatalities in the UK each year is set to triple by 2050, without adaptation measures.
Around half of homes in the country are already at risk of overheating and the CCC expects this to reach 90%, if global temperatures rise by 2C above pre-industrial levels.
However, these risks will not fall equally across society, with children, the elderly and disabled people more vulnerable to heat-related illness. There is also evidence that poorer communities and people of colour are more vulnerable to extreme heat.
Such communities also tend to have lower carbon footprints than those that are whiter and wealthier.
This fits with the broader concept of climate justice, which describes how people who are least responsible for climate change often end up bearing the brunt of its effects.
Carbon footprints
To investigate these issues, Carbon Brief combined detailed satellite data on heat exposure across England, provided by 4 Earth Intelligence, with neighbourhood-level carbon footprints compiled by the Centre for Research in Energy Demand Solutions (CREDS).
The CREDS dataset provides estimates of per-person carbon footprints, indicating how much the average person in each neighbourhood is contributing to climate change.
Due to data availability, this analysis focuses exclusively on England, the nation that experiences the most extreme heat in the UK.
Every neighbourhood is scored based on its “heat hazard”, meaning the likelihood that it will experience higher relative temperatures during hot weather, compared to surrounding areas.
The analysis then zooms in on the 10% worst-affected neighbourhoods in England. These neighbourhoods have a heat hazard score of 4 or 5, meaning that they face higher exposure to heat than 90% of areas around the country. (For a full explanation, see Methodology.)
The figure below shows that neighbourhoods with lower carbon footprints are twice as likely to face high heat hazard scores than areas with higher carbon footprints.
Specifically, it shows that 13.4% of neighbourhoods with the lowest carbon footprints are among the English areas most exposed to heat hazards. In contrast, only 7.0% of neighbourhoods with the highest carbon footprint are among the most heat-exposed areas.
Neighbourhoods in England with lower carbon footprints are often in dense, urban areas, where people tend to be less reliant on cars and more likely to live in energy-efficient flats.
Areas with higher carbon footprints are commonly found in rural areas, where travelling by car can be a necessity due to limited public transport.
Also, particularly in south-east England, people in these rural neighbourhoods are often wealthier, meaning they spend more money on flights and other high-emitting luxuries.
Ethnicity and deprivation
Carbon Brief also analysed the heat threat facing deprived neighbourhoods in England and those that are home to more people of colour.
Information about how many people identify as black, Asian and other minority ethnicities in each neighbourhood is based on 2021 census data, via the Office for National Statistics.
As the chart below shows, there is a clear correlation between the number of people of colour living in a neighbourhood and the likelihood of it facing extreme heat during periods of hot weather.
The most ethnically diverse neighbourhoods – where roughly half or more of the population are people of colour – are 15 times more likely to have high heat hazard scores than the least ethnically diverse neighbourhoods, where almost everyone is white.
Among the most diverse areas are parts of Newham in east London, Saltley in Birmingham and Spinney Hills in Leicester, all of which are inner-city areas.
The least diverse neighbourhoods range from coastal parts of Redcar and Cleveland in North Yorkshire to the rural villages of south Somerset. None of England’s hottest 1% of neighbourhoods are in this bracket.
Additionally, Carbon Brief assessed the relationship between levels of poverty and heat risk, based on England’s indices of deprivation dataset. This covers several measures of deprivation, including income, employment and health.
People living in the most deprived English neighbourhoods are more than three times as likely to face high levels of heat hazard as those in the least deprived neighbourhoods, as shown in the figure below.
The correlation between poverty and extreme heat is less extreme than the one between heat exposure and ethnicity.
While many of England’s most deprived areas are in cities, they are also clustered in some rural and coastal areas – such as parts of Cornwall and Lincolnshire – which tend to be cooler.
Urban heat island
The key phenomenon captured by this analysis is the urban heat island effect. This describes how cities – and particularly areas with dense buildings, roads and stretches of concrete that absorb heat – tend to be hotter than the surrounding countryside.
Cities such as London, Manchester and Birmingham have reached temperatures up to 5C hotter than the surrounding areas in recent decades, due to this effect.
The diagram below shows how air flows circulate between rural and urban areas, forming “heat domes” over cities.
Inner-city areas in England are also home to many people facing high levels of deprivation, as well as large black and Asian communities. Many of these communities are therefore exposed to more dangerous temperatures due to the urban heat island effect.
Access to green spaces, even within cities, also influences exposure to the urban heat island effect. Research has shown how people in deprived areas and people of colour – particularly black people – are more likely to live in areas with less access to green spaces.
There is already extensive scientific literature that uses satellite data to demonstrate the urban heat island effect in cities and other locations.
A number of studies have also used this data to show how people of colour and those living in poverty are more exposed to extreme heat. Much of this research has come from the US, where historic housing inequalities have created stark patterns of segregation in many cities.
A project led by environmental policy researcher Dr Angel Hsu of the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill shows how, globally, “cities are burdening lower-income populations with higher heat exposure”, as she tells Carbon Brief.
Given this, Hsu adds that “it’s not surprising to us to see similar disproportionate exposure patterns among UK neighbourhoods”.
Other researchers tell Carbon Brief that it is important to be wary of satellite data, as it does not precisely capture the air temperatures experienced in these neighbourhoods.
Dr Charles Simpson, who researches the health and economic impacts of climate change at University College London (UCL), notes:
“Satellite-measured surface temperature does not always correlate with the air temperature – what you are measuring includes a lot of road surfaces and rooftops. The air temperature is thought to be more directly relevant to people’s health and their cooling needs.”
Previous research has found that satellite data can therefore overestimate the urban heat island effect compared to data from weather stations.
These stations, however, are not widespread enough to allow comparisons with detailed neighbourhood data. They are particularly lacking in more deprived areas in England, potentially making measurements there less reliable.
Other scientists tell Carbon Brief that, in the absence of a comprehensive ground monitoring network, satellite measurements can serve as a stand-in to estimate heat exposure. Dr Chloe Brimicombe, an extreme-heat researcher based at the University of Graz, explains:
“Although it’s not a good indicator of perceived [temperature], it is a good indicator of what regions are most built up and have the environments that are most vulnerable to heat.”
‘Amplifying’ inequalities
There is a growing body of evidence gathered by activists, scientists and local governments around the UK revealing the unequal burden of climate change.
Dr Charles Ogunbode, an assistant professor of applied psychology at the University of Nottingham who specialises in how people experience climate change, tells Carbon Brief that this kind of data helps to clarify the links between climate change and inequalities:
“We can’t avoid dealing with the issue of social inequalities and climate change is just basically amplifying those things. It’s highlighting them, it’s revealing them. So whatever policies we put in place – be it in the health sector, be it in the climate sector – addressing those inequalities has to be an essential part of whatever those responses are.”
There are many factors influencing how people experience heat that are not captured in Carbon Brief’s analysis.
Previous work by researchers at the University of Manchester and Friends of the Earth has explored this issue, including an analysis of more than 40 indicators that could make neighbourhoods more “socially vulnerable” to heat.
This reveals similar outcomes, with people of colour and those contributing the least to climate change generally more vulnerable to its impacts.
One of the biggest factors that contributes to people’s exposure to heat extremes in the UK is the country’s housing stock, which is “not fit for the future”, according to the CCC.
UK homes have generally not been built for hotter conditions and poorer people are more likely to live in badly adapted housing. Those living in small homes, flats and social housing in England all “suffer significantly more overheating” during heatwaves, according to one study.
Dr Giorgos Petrou, a researcher in building physics modelling at UCL, tells Carbon Brief that it is also vital to consider whether households have the ability to adapt to climate change. “Amongst other factors, their capability will depend on their financial means and whether they own or rent their home,” he says.
Experts tell Carbon Brief that the government should act across its policy agenda to not only address extreme heat, but also support those who are most affected by it. This could involve expanding tree cover and renovating old social housing stock in at-risk communities.
Emma Howard Boyd, a former chair of the Environment Agency who also chaired the London Climate Resilience Review, tells Carbon Brief:
“I do think that with [the Labour] government focusing on house building and retrofit, this is a fantastic opportunity to get this right…For those communities that have had the least impact on the environment and climate change themselves.”
Methodology
This analysis collates several datasets that cover England at a neighbourhood level, with “neighbourhoods” defined as lower-layer super output areas (LSOAs). These are small statistical areas used by the UK government, covering populations of about 1,500-3,000 people. There are 33,755 LSOAs in England.
Data on vulnerability to heat comes from 4 Earth Intelligence (4EI), which analyses land surface temperature to generate “heat hazard” information at a 30m resolution. This detailed information has been converted into LSOAs by 4EI.
Heat hazard scores are calculated by 4EI, based on the likelihood that a given neighbourhood will experience high temperatures during hot weather, relative to the surrounding area.
Each score corresponds to a different percentile of English neighbourhoods. The bar below shows the percentage breakdown across all LSOAs in England.
The two hottest scores – those coloured in red – correspond to the 10% of English neighbourhoods that have higher heat hazard scores than the remaining 90%.
For simplicity, Carbon Brief’s analysis focuses on the red bars above, meaning neighbourhoods in either the top 90th-99th percentile or 99th percentile of heat hazard. (Neighbourhoods in the 90th-99th percentile have higher heat hazard scores than 90% of areas in England. Neighbourhoods in the 99th percentile have higher heat hazard scores than 99% of areas.)
It shows how these two scores are overrepresented in LSOAs that have lower carbon footprints, more diverse communities and higher levels of deprivation.
Carbon-footprint data is from the CREDS “place-based carbon calculator”, which estimates the average per-person carbon footprint for every LSOA in England. It accounts for emissions-producing activities ranging from electricity use to “consumption of goods and services”.
CREDS assigns the grades “A” to “F” (low carbon footprint to high carbon footprint) to neighbourhoods. Carbon Brief has based its carbon-footprint analysis on these grades.
LSOA-level data on black, Asian and other minority-ethnic populations comes from 2021 census data. English LSOAs were broken down into deciles, based on the percentage of the population that identified as non-white ethnicities.
The lowest decile covered the tenth of LSOAs with between 0 and 2% non-white minority-ethnic populations and the highest covered the tenth with more than 51%.
England’s indices of multiple deprivation dataset also includes LSOA-level information. It provides relative measures of deprivation for LSOAs in England, based on income, employment, education, health, crime, living environment and barriers to housing and services. Carbon Brief broke the LSOAs down into deciles based on the total deprivation scores, from the most deprived to the least deprived.
The post Analysis: England’s most ethnically diverse areas are 15 times more likely to face extreme heat appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Analysis: England’s most ethnically diverse areas are 15 times more likely to face extreme heat
An uptick in heat extremes, driven by human-caused climate change, has caused tropical bird populations to decline by up to 38% since the 1950s, according to a first-of-its-kind analysis.
The study combines ecological and climate attribution techniques to trace the fingerprint of fossil-fuelled climate change on declining wildlife populations.
It shows that an increase in heat extremes driven by climate change has caused tropical bird populations to decline by 25-38% in the period 1950-2020, when compared to a world without warming.
The findings could help to explain why tropical bird numbers have declined even in pristine rainforests, a phenomenon that previously mystified biologists, the scientists say.
‘Chance encounter’
Over the past few decades, an emerging field of science known as “climate attribution” has used a standardised set of techniques to trace the fingerprint of human-caused warming on different elements of the climate system, ranging from worsening extreme weather events to episodes of glacier melt.
The new research, published in Nature Ecology and Evolution, is the first to use climate attribution techniques to detect the fingerprint of climate change on declining wildlife populations.
The study came about following a “chance encounter” between lead author Dr Maximilian Kotz, a climate scientist at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center in Spain, and his co-authors, who are biodiversity experts at the University of Queensland in Australia, while Kotz was completing a research stay in Australia.
Kotz says to Carbon Brief:
“As far as we are aware, this is the first animal climate attribution study.”
The researchers decided to focus on birds, rather than other animal species, as they have the “best available data, covering a good range of different species and geographies”, he adds.
Heat extremes
The authors examine how an intensification of heat extremes could have impacted bird populations, while controlling for other factors known to affect wildlife, including average temperature increase and human pressures, such as land-use change.
Episodes of extreme heat are known to have an immediate and long-lasting impact on birds, Kotz says:
“High temperature extremes can induce direct mortality in bird populations due to hyperthermia and dehydration. Even when they don’t [kill birds immediately], there’s evidence that this can then affect body condition which, in turn, affects breeding behaviour and success.”
Using statistical techniques, the scientists first analyse historical records to identify how bird populations have responded to fluctuations in climate, including heat extremes, over 1950-2020.
The team sourced global data on bird populations from the database that underlies the Living Planet Index, put together by the environmental charity WWF. They note it is the most comprehensive database available, but still has “clear geographic biases”, with global north regions better represented than those in the global south.
They use an attribution framework to estimate the extent to which human-caused warming influenced the changes in heat extremes observed in that time period, then calculate the impact of these climate-change-driven heat extremes on bird population changes from 1950-2020.
(The authors defined “heat extremes” as temperatures within the top 1% of daily temperatures over 1940-70, with data taken from ERA5, a global reanalysis dataset, which combines data from weather stations, satellites and model output.)
To understand how this would compare to a world without climate change, the researchers subtract this impact from the historical records.
Comparing their results to the counterfactual world without climate change allowed them to quantify how bird populations have changed as a result of human-driven increases in heat extremes.
Mapped
The research finds that human-driven heat extremes have had “strong negative impacts” on bird population numbers, with those residing at lower latitudes being the most affected.
The map below shows the percentage change in bird population abundance attributed to heat extremes over 1950-2018, when compared to a world without climate change.
On the map, dark red shows large decreases in population abundance, while light blue indicates small increases. (Abundance refers to the number of individual animals in a given population.)
The research finds that birds in the tropics have experienced the largest declines attributable to heat extremes.
It concludes that an uptick in heat extremes has caused tropical bird abundance levels to decline by 25-38% in the period 1950-2020, when compared to a world without warming.
The range in the size of that impact reflects the results of different models, which each use slightly different techniques to simulate changes to bird populations, Kotz says.
Tropical turmoil
In their paper, the authors note that their finding that tropical birds have experienced the most substantial declines are “consistent” with other studies indicating that “birds in these regions may be closer to the thermal limits at which impacts start to occur”.
They add that the findings are “particularly pertinent, given recent documentation of declining tropical bird populations, even in undisturbed habitats”.
One previous study found that in a “relatively undisturbed” part of the Amazon rainforest, bird abundance declined by more than 50% from 2003 to 2022. Similar results were found in a forest in Panama.
The authors of the new study say:
“The source of such declines have been noted as unknown, yet they are of a similar order of magnitude to our estimates of the impacts of intensified heat extremes.”
Their results suggest that “in tropical realms, climate change impacts on bird populations may already be comparable to land pressures that lead to habitat destruction and degradation”, the authors say.
This has “potential ramifications” for commonly proposed conservation strategies, such as increasing the amount of land in the the tropics that is protected for nature, they continue:
“While we do not disagree that these strategies are necessary for abating tropical habitat loss…our research shows there is now an additional urgent need to investigate strategies that can allow for the persistence of tropical species that are vulnerable to heat extremes.”
In some parts of the world, scientists and conservationists are looking into how to protect wildlife from more intense and frequent climate extremes, Kotz tells Carbon Brief.
He references one project in Australia which is working to protect threatened wildlife following periods of extreme heat, drought and bushfires.
Informing forecasts
As well as shedding light on what could be behind the rapid decline of birds in the tropics, the findings also underscore the importance of examining changes in climate extremes, rather than just annual global temperature rise, says Prof Alex Pigot, a biodiversity scientist at University College London (UCL), who was not involved in the research. He tells Carbon Brief:
“Most of the models that have been used to make projections of risk to biodiversity under future climate change use long-term climate averages and so the results of this study suggest that our existing risk assessments could be missing these critical impacts of climate change.
“We urgently need to address this and develop early warning systems to be able to anticipate in advance where and when extreme heatwaves and droughts are likely to impact populations – and also rapidly scale up our monitoring of species and ecosystems so that we can reliably detect these effects and feed this information back into our models to refine our future projections for biodiversity.”
Dr Peter Soroye, a biodiversity scientist at the Wildlife Conservation Society Canada, who was also not involved in the research, agrees:
“It’s not just that the climate is getting gradually warmer every year with climate change, it’s that climate change is also driving increasingly frequent and severe extreme temperature events that are putting wildlife at risk.
“As we more fully understand the importance of extremes, it seems increasingly important to consider them when we model or project changes in biodiversity over time.”
The post Fossil-fuelled heat has caused tropical birds to decline by ‘up to 38%’ since 1950s appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Fossil-fuelled heat has caused tropical birds to decline by ‘up to 38%’ since 1950s
This year marks a decade since nations successfully negotiated the Paris Agreement, a landmark treaty that has been the guiding force for international climate politics ever since.
Yet, with another round of negotiations looming at COP30 in November, there has been growing discontent with the UN climate process.
Critics say the talks are not doing enough to accelerate emissions cuts, tackle fossil fuels or raise climate funds for developing countries, among other concerns.
Influential figures in climate politics and civil society groups say COPs are in need of an “urgent overhaul” and have launched various manifestos for change.
This has been recognised by the Brazilian COP30 presidency, which has acknowledged the “growing calls for change” and asked parties to “reflect on the future of the process itself”.
All of this comes amid concerns about a “crisis” of multilateralism, widespread conflict and escalating climate hazards.
Carbon Brief asked 16 leading experts about how they think the UN climate talks could be reformed, including Christiana Figueres, Todd Stern, Prof Navroz K Dubash, Bernice Lee, Paul Watkinson, Dr Joanna Depledge, Dr Jennifer Allan, Sandrine Dixson-Declève and Li Shuo.
The contributors’ answers are presented via the thematic sections below.
- Has the Paris Agreement been a success?
- How could the negotiations themselves be improved?
- Can UN climate talks drive faster emissions cuts?
- How could COPs ensure broader accountability?
- Do UN climate talks need majority voting?
- What should the role of the COP presidency be?
- Do fossil-fuel companies have too much influence?
- Are COPs too big?
- How could COP participation be improved?
- How can COPs drive change outside the UN process?
Has the Paris Agreement been a success?
Todd Stern, former US special envoy for climate change: Paris has performed well in some respects, including strengthening both its temperature and emission goals in light of evolving science. It also led to a first global stocktake that called for tripling renewable energy and doubling energy efficiency by 2030 – and transitioning away from fossil fuels – in order to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.
Bernice Lee, distinguished fellow and senior advisor at Chatham House: It can be hard to remember that the process remains one of the most successful multilateral endeavours in recent history. It has delivered what few thought possible: agreement among nearly 200 countries on a global issue that cuts to the core of national sovereignty, economic models and domestic politics. That the COP process delivered the Paris Agreement – and more recently, an agreement to transition away from fossil fuels – is no small feat. It is also easy to forget that, prior to Paris, the world was on track for a catastrophic 4-5C of warming. Today’s pledges, while still inadequate, have bent that curve closer to 2.5-3C – still unsafe, but a meaningful shift…Rather than dwelling on the system’s imperfections, the question is whether it can evolve, realistically and politically. Dismantling the current system is unlikely to yield a stronger or more equitable one with the authority to override national decisions. The current process, after all, emerged from the ruins of earlier failures.
Kaveh Guilanpour, vice president for international strategies at the Centre for Climate and Energy Solutions: In the aftermath of every COP, there are calls to reform the UNFCCC. But we should be aiming for an evolution, not a revolution, for three reasons. Firstly, a revolution would almost certainly not result in something stronger than we already have. It is hard to imagine that it would be possible to adopt the Paris Agreement in the current geopolitical and economic context. Secondly, the Paris Agreement is working, albeit not fast enough. Thirdly, and most importantly, the biggest barriers to the effective functioning of the UNFCCC and delivering on the Paris Agreement are deficiencies in the underlying politics. No amount of tweaking of the UNFCCC process can make up for that.
How could the negotiations themselves be improved?
Dr Monserrat Madariaga Gomez de Cuenca, environmental lawyer at Legal Response International: It is time to fully acknowledge that there is a crisis of trust in the UN climate process and take appropriate measures to limit it. Parties mistrust each other and stakeholders mistrust the limited results emerging from 30 years of climate talks.
Paul Watkinson, former EU climate negotiator: Whilst the negotiating process can be frustrating, it remains essential. I would focus on making the workload more manageable, for example by grouping items on agendas and organising work on a multiannual basis. The aim should be to give enough time to every item – rather than addressing everything together each time – and develop the understanding that not every item needs a negotiated outcome at each meeting.
Kaveh Guilanpour: [We should] embrace the role of multilateral negotiations at the core – and recognise that this is what attracts world leaders and non-parties to COPs – but work towards contextualising the negotiations in a wider ecosystem of climate action, to which they are clearly linked. Do not place all expectations only on the negotiated outcomes.
Christiana Figueres, former executive secretary of the UNFCCC: We could…streamline repetitive and overloaded agendas – and elevate the accountability of COP presidents through a public oath of office, potentially administered by the UNFCCC bureau, that reminds the COP presidency of its role.
Dr Joanna Depledge, research fellow at the University of Cambridge and former UNFCCC secretariat staff member: Overall, the negotiations have proved resistant to anything but very limited reform. Why so? The fact is that many of the perceived inefficiencies are not flaws as such, but inherent to a global process where all nations are sovereign and equal – and all want a say. They are also inherent to the very issue of climate change, which, because it is so multifaceted…inevitably spawns an ever-expanding agenda, while attracting ever more government and civil society participants. And process is politics: moves to restructure the negotiations inevitably come up against powerful forces who know how to maximise their influence in the existing system and far prefer the status quo.
Dr Monserrat Madariaga Gomez de Cuenca: [COPs should] avoid rushed, closed-door negotiations without party consultations, which make implementation impossible. When draft text appears in the eleventh hour and is forwarded to the closing plenary without proper discussion, the possibilities of parties gaslighting each other on the actual “meaning” and “intention” of the text multiply. Language such as “transitioning away from fossil fuels” or the path towards the “Baku to Belém Roadmap to $1.3tn” – where the wording is not clear – allows parties to cherry-pick the most favourable interpretation, undermining the implementation of decisions that were already difficult to achieve.
Dr Joanna Depledge: Streamlining agendas and limiting government delegation size are worth fighting for, but imposing criteria for selecting COP hosts and excluding private companies involved in high-carbon activities are non-starters. If the real problem is that the COP is not taking decisions in line with the science, then the answer is not tinkering around the edges of procedure and process. What is needed is a major strategic rethink and more fundamental reforms – notably to decision-making practices and voting – as I argue elsewhere.
Harjeet Singh, founding director at the Satat Sampada Climate Foundation: The process must change: streamline negotiations, review consensus rules and ban fossil-fuel lobbyists from influencing texts. Centre the voices of Indigenous peoples, frontline communities and civil society. And scale up public climate finance to enable a just transition and real support for adaptation and addressing loss and damage – by making polluters pay. The recent International Court of Justice advisory opinion has reinforced the demand for climate reparations. COP30 must open a new era of accountability and justice.
Can UN climate talks drive faster emissions cuts?
Dr Jennifer Allan, senior lecturer in international relations, Cardiff University: The UNFCCC is only as effective as parties allow it to be. The Paris Agreement is working precisely how some feared and how some major emitting countries hoped. It is premised on the promise of transparency: that national reports and the global stocktake, coupled with principles of progression, will – somehow – inspire climate ambition. But transparency is not the same as accountability.
Todd Stern: The Paris regime itself has an important role to play. For starters, the regime needs to develop much more of a broad partnership in the spirit of the 2015 High Ambition Coalition. Part of such a shift will depend on considering whether country emission targets are adequate. Of course, Paris was built on the principle of “nationally determined contributions” and that principle cannot be thrown overboard. But Paris was also built on the promise that it would strive to prevent dangerous climate change, that new emission targets every five years would reflect countries’ highest possible ambition and that global stocktakes would, in fact, take stock.
Claudio Angelo, head of international policy at the Climate Observatory: The “nationally determined” nature of nationally determined contributions (NDCs), and the fact that no assessment of progress is formally done outside the five-year period of the global stocktake, mean that the ambition gap will become more difficult to close the more urgent it becomes to close it. The irony of it is that the Paris architecture was tailor-made to accommodate the idiosyncrasies of the US, which has pulled out of the agreement anyway.
Prof Navroz K Dubash, professor of public and international affairs at Princeton School of Public and International Affairs: A bumper sticker for reform of the UN climate talks might read: “Less talk of ambition; more action on implementation”. An “ambition-first” approach rests on extracting national statements of emissions reduction intent, leveraging these up through country “naming and shaming” and strengthening compliance through enhanced accountability. But the conditions are not favourable for this approach. National politics rarely privilege emissions reductions over other objectives and global politics is increasingly non-responsive to climate shame. By contrast, the conditions for a “learning-by-doing” approach based on on-the-ground implementation appear brighter. Many countries are experimenting with pragmatic efforts to turn their economies in low-carbon directions.
Todd Stern: There is nothing about the nationally determined character of country pledges that says countries cannot be questioned, prodded and critiqued. Protecting thin skin is not as important as protecting a liveable world.
Prof Navroz K Dubash: How might global talks enable learning by doing, rather than doubling down on ambition-first approaches? NDCs could be liberated to be templates for experimentation rather than rigid bases for accountability alone. Detailed sectoral low-carbon development pathways would highlight country commonalities, reveal productive scope for international cooperation and incentivise finance…A renewed international process should be focused on the hard, detailed work of enabling low-carbon, resilient development transitions and less on extracting statements of intent.
Kaveh Guilanpour: [We should] move to an approach where progress is measured predominantly by the impact of implemented national level policies, not NDCs on paper. Focus as much on enhancing international cooperation to deliver implementation as on increasing formal ambition on paper through NDC target-setting.
How could COPs ensure broader accountability?
Paul Watkinson: The biggest opportunity to support implementation is outside the formal process, putting order and structure into the “action agenda”. It has grown enormously in recent years and there have been many valuable initiatives…But there has been insufficient continuity and not enough follow-up and tracking to ensure that what is announced and promised is delivered. That is why I welcome the proposal of the incoming Brazilian COP30 presidency to structure the action agenda around six broad themes, drawn from the outcomes of the global stocktake, including a cross-cutting theme around enablers including the vital role of finance. They have the power, in close coordination with the high-level champions, to relaunch the action agenda on stronger foundations that could serve for years to come.
Dr Jennifer Allan: Within the negotiations, there is a glaring need to track the many commitments made outside of the regular negotiation process, either in presidency-led declarations or cover decisions. A central, publicly available hub needs to collate these promises and track progress. Presidencies may broker these commitments, but have few incentives to follow up on them.
Bernice Lee: What can – and must – change is how the system functions. Every decade or so, the climate regime has adapted – from Kyoto’s top-down legalism to Paris’s nationally determined flexibility. These shifts were not just philosophical, they also enabled new capacities. The collapse in Copenhagen helped catalyse renewable energy investment plans, while Paris introduced NDCs. The next phase must embed delivery and equity more deeply into the process including, for example, mechanisms aligning corporate transition plans with country transition, national policies and sectoral pathways. The outcomes of any reform process should mean fewer theatrics, earlier decisions and sharper accountability. All of this would enhance not only country but also public engagement, as well as the credibility of the global climate process.
Harjeet Singh: Rather than catalysing ambition, the Paris Agreement has been used by developed countries to shirk their historical responsibilities…It is not the Paris Agreement or the UNFCCC that failed – it is rich countries that undermined the system to protect polluters and preserve an unsustainable growth model. True reform begins with accountability. Wealthy nations must be held responsible for their historical emissions and must pay for the loss and damage they have caused.
Sandrine Dixson-Declève, honorary president at the Club of Rome and executive chair of Earth4All: Strengthen climate target enforcement through scientific oversight, peer review and robust reporting – ensuring governments, COP presidencies and corporations are held accountable. [There should be] a permanent scientific advisory body within the COP. Science must be central to negotiations, with all delegations regularly briefed on the latest data around risks, equity, solutions and scenarios.
Prof Navroz K Dubash: Ambition and implementation can be complementary, but they are not necessarily so. The former is driven by a relentless focus on emissions, comparability in emission pledges and building accountability. The latter is enabled by linking climate to other objectives, seeking country-specific formulations that buy political support and flexible experimentation that allows for learning from failure. Being more, not less, in the sectoral weeds might reveal opportunities not apparent from the stratospheric heights of climate negotiations. Well-developed, home-grown visions of sustainable futures are the most robust basis for developing countries’ legitimate claims for finance and other support.
Do UN climate talks need majority voting?
Erika Lennon, senior climate attorney at the Centre for International Environmental Law: Voting is the elephant in the room. The parties to the UNFCCC have never been able to adopt the “rules of procedure” because they cannot agree on the provision related to voting in the absence of consensus. Instead, they proceed meeting after meeting using them as “draft rules of procedure”. This has created a race to the bottom whereby countries that want to stall progress can do so. For 29 years, other parties have had to agree to the lowest common denominator in the name of consensus.
Claudio Angelo: The decision made in 2023 to “transition away from fossil fuels” needs both fleshing out and monitoring, but it is nowhere to be seen in the formal negotiations towards Belém. Such omissions reflect one fundamental problem of the UNFCCC and one fundamental flaw of the Paris Agreement: the consensus rule. Some countries are now shamelessly backtracking on their previous commitment and saying that any mention of cutting back on fossil fuels anywhere is a red line for them…A handful of countries are holding the future of humanity hostage because they can block whatever they want [due to the consensus rule]. Even COP presidencies that do want to move the agenda forward are afraid to be bold, lest “the process should collapse”. But a process that is unfit for purpose might as well collapse.
Christiana Figueres: In the context of the formal negotiations, we could reconsider our tradition of having to adopt all decisions unanimously. UNFCCC procedures require consensus for the adoption of decisions, not necessarily unanimity. The difference is important and admittedly challenging to manage, but worth examining.
Erika Lennon: The fix would be to adopt the rules of procedure, including the paragraphs on voting. The UNFCCC would then join many other multilateral environmental agreements – and its own financial instruments – that sometimes use majority voting.
Bernice Lee: In recent months, many well-meaning critics have called the UN multilateral climate process broken, arguing it should be dismantled and replaced, but with no viable alternatives waiting in the wings. Reforming core procedures – such as introducing majority voting or amending the convention – would require agreement from three-quarters of countries, followed by domestic ratification. Even without today’s fractured geopolitics, this would be a tall order.
What should the role of the COP presidency be?
Dr Monserrat Madariaga Gomez de Cuenca: [COPs should] avoid adding more pressure by clarifying duties and processes for the COP president. Rules of procedure simply give the COP president the power to formally conduct the negotiations, which should be done in a neutral manner. Increasingly, we see COP presidents setting exceedingly ambitious plans for their respective COPs. Ideas of “success” and “legacy” permeate what should be a facilitative role towards the collective progress of UN climate talks. COPs finish with statements and reports of achievements that do not reflect the actual progress. Reviewing the conduct of negotiations and the role and expectations of COP presidencies could help in restoring some of the damaged trust in the process.
Prof Thomas Hale, professor in public policy at the University of Oxford: The “action agenda” needs to escape the “boom-bust” cycle that shifting presidencies and high-level champions have imposed on it, in which new announcements trump delivery. The COP30 presidency has laid out a positive approach here, but the acid test lies in making it real.
Sandrine Dixson-Declève: Only countries with high climate ambition should be eligible to host COPs.
Li Shuo, director of the China Climate Hub at the Asia Society Policy Institute: Instead of – or alongside – three more paragraphs specifying how the world will “transition away from fossil fuels” or “triple renewable energy”, how about three renewable projects in the COP host country, to be announced in conjunction with the climate summit?…Efforts to advance the implementation agenda through additional multilateral rulemaking and COP decisions risk missing the point. The COP presidency…could showcase a handful of large‑scale renewable energy projects in their own countries, backed by concrete financing. Such a “trade fair” function of the COP would help bridge the widening gap between what is agreed at COPs and what is happening on the ground.
Do fossil-fuel companies have too much influence?
Erika Lennon: The fossil fuel industry’s survival depends on the UNFCCC’s failure, as meeting the goals of the UNFCCC and Paris Agreement undeniably means phasing out fossil fuels. It is therefore no wonder that, since the beginning, fossil-fuel industry lobbyists have been present at COPs and working to undermine ambition.
Dr Jennifer Allan: Presidencies have much to answer for and can be key to raising accountability. COP is becoming the new Davos: a place for billionaires to meet, without scrutiny of their activities or announcements. This must end. Presidencies should revoke invitations to [Amazon chief executive] Jeff Bezos and others who have been offered high-level platforms.
Erika Lennon: Parties could adopt a conflict-of-interest policy to, at the very least, make [fossil-fuel lobbyists’] influence transparent and subsequently exclude those who aim to unduly influence the process. Parties, including the presidency team, could refuse to give them badges…In addition, they could end greenwashing at COPs in the form of corporate sponsorships and pavilions.
Are COPs too big?
Prof Thomas Hale: COP is both too big and too small for an era of implementation. Its cost and complexity eat up scarce resources. Meanwhile, it creates a gravity well that warps the climate community’s work into an annual rush to the end of the year…At the same time, even the biggest COPs are puny compared to the problem. Climate change demands action from all of society…In this complex system, the UNFCCC process plays the critical function of setting agendas and goals. No other body has the multilateral legitimacy to serve as a lighthouse.
Dr Jennifer Allan: Climate summits could shift from a talkshop to a demonstration of leadership if invitations are only extended to countries that have submitted and maintained more progressive NDCs and are implementing them.
Prof Thomas Hale: We need COPs to be everything, everywhere, all at once. Alongside a single, two-week meeting in one place, we need lots of smaller, focused meetings in many places. Instead of an intergovernmental process that talks about action, we need to fully shift the “action agenda” into the heart of the UNFCCC. The good news is that the elements of this shift are already well in motion, with more and more cities hosting “climate weeks”…Regional meetings with more flexible formats reach more people, in a more targeted way, much more cheaply and efficiently than a COP.
Dr Jennifer Allan: I’ve been researching the role of side events, pavilion activities and Global Climate Action Hub panels in the “expo” that now dominates COP space and participation opportunities. There has been a decided shift, from a smaller number of events focused on negotiation and implementation to a huge array of panels showcasing new initiatives or national actions. It is about what is new, not following up on what has been agreed. Side events and Global Climate Action Hub events could shift focus under the secretariat and the high-level champions. Pavilion spaces could be reserved for those who can demonstrate that their presence will advance climate action.
Sandrine Dixson-Declève: COPs must evolve from negotiation-heavy forums to more frequent, smaller, solution-focused meetings centred on progress and implementation, with broad stakeholder participation.
How could COP participation be improved?
Erika Lennon: Civil society, youth, Indigenous peoples, women, local communities and people with disabilities, among others, have increasingly faced shrinking civic space in the UNFCCC process. They have to fight to have their voices heard, to be present in the rooms where decisions happen, for access to information and open decision-making, and to assemble peacefully.
Shreeshan Venkatesh, global policy lead at Climate Action Network International: Structural barriers…undermine inclusivity and equitable participation in UNFCCC meetings, from the high cost of accommodation at COPs to discriminatory visa practices and shrinking civil society quotas. These barriers must be dismantled to ensure all parties and stakeholders can participate fully and on equal terms.
Erika Lennon: Parties should incorporate and support participation not only at COPs, but also in climate action and decisions on the ground. They can do this by creating space across all agenda items to hear from rightsholders and ensuring human rights and civic space are guaranteed during all negotiations.
Shreeshan Venkatesh: Civic space and freedoms are under threat, even at COPs. Host agreements must guarantee freedom of speech, assembly and accessibility, backed by an independent body to address violations.
How can COPs drive change outside the UN process?
Sandrine Dixson-Declève: COP must transform from a forum of negotiation to a platform of delivery, inclusion and accountability, anchoring climate action in the lived realities of people and the demands of science.
Kaveh Guilanpour: There should be a thorough and honest analysis of the value add of the UNFCCC process and what is best left to other fora.
Christiana Figueres: While some negotiations remain necessary, the most urgent action has shifted to implementation in the context of market forces and climate economics. There is no doubt that civil society, businesses, cities and communities are moving faster than governments. These actors, traditionally considered and labelled as mere “observers” in the formal UNFCCC space, have become the true engines of transformation. One could consider the pros and cons of creating a semi-detached “real world” space alongside COP – one that amplifies their progress, showcases innovation and feeds actionable insights back into the formal process.
Todd Stern: The Paris regime has a role to play in encouraging and tracking strong action outside its purview. This includes the public and private sectors working together on rapid decarbonisation and on unlocking the kind of large-scale investment needed for countries in the global south to build sustainable and resilient economies.
Shreeshan Venkatesh: The UNFCCC, and other multilateral fora that have become central to the formulation and implementation of climate policy and international cooperation, must align with international law. This includes the recent advisory opinions from the ICJ and the Inter-American Court of Justice, and the obligations they clearly lay out.
Claudio Angelo: [There is] a final, bigger problem, which no UNFCCC reform can solve: the climate regime is a child of the democratic world order and the lynchpin of that world order has become a rogue state. The rise of the far-right and the erosion of democracy are rendering multilateralism itself useless – a world that is unable to stop genocides in Gaza and Sudan can’t solve the climate crisis.
The post COP experts: How could the UN climate talks be reformed? appeared first on Carbon Brief.
-
Climate Change2 years ago
Spanish-language misinformation on renewable energy spreads online, report shows
-
Climate Change Videos2 years ago
The toxic gas flares fuelling Nigeria’s climate change – BBC News
-
Greenhouse Gases1 year ago嘉宾来稿：满足中国增长的用电需求 光伏加储能“比新建煤电更实惠”
-
Climate Change1 year ago嘉宾来稿：满足中国增长的用电需求 光伏加储能“比新建煤电更实惠”
-
Carbon Footprint1 year agoUS SEC’s Climate Disclosure Rules Spur Renewed Interest in Carbon Credits
-
Climate Change2 years ago
Why airlines are perfect targets for anti-greenwashing legal action
-
Climate Change Videos2 years ago
The toxic gas flares fuelling Nigeria’s climate change – BBC News
-
Climate Change2 years ago
Some firms unaware of England’s new single-use plastic ban