Published

2 years ago

June 10, 2024

Alice Rush

It’s the start of the second and final week of the annual mid-year UN climate talks, half-way between COPs, which take place every year in Bonn – the old capital of West Germany and the birthplace of Beethoven.

As the 8,000 or so delegates make their way to the World Conference Centre, next to the River Rhine and UN Climate Change’s tower block headquarters, Joe Lo and Matteo Civillini are headed there on the Eurostar thanks to your generous donations!

The first week of the talks passed off relatively smoothly – despite leaving a fair amount of work to finish by Thursday, the last day of the so-called SB60 meetings. Last year, it took nine days and desperate pleading to even agree on an agenda. This year, that was wrapped up without fuss on the opening morning.

That’s not to say there was no drama. At the start of the opening plenary, the head of Climate Action Network (CAN) International Tasneem Essop and Argentine climate justice activist Anabella Rosemberg – got up on stage uninvited.

Essop held up a Palestine flag and Rosemberg a sign saying “No B.A.U. [business as usual] during a genocide”. Both said they were doing it in a personal capacity, rather than as a part of CAN.

After the session was briefly suspended, they were escorted off the stage and out of the venue by UN security. The badges needed to access the talks were taken off them.

A video of the incident shows the camerawoman – CAN press officer Danni Taafe – telling a UN security guard “you’re hurting me”. He replies “good”. Taafe told Climate Home she has asked the UNFCCC how to file a complaint but has yet to receive a response.

Anabella Rosemberg and Tasneem Essop protest at the opening plenary (Photo: Kiara Worth/IISD ENB)

Shortly after the session re-started, the Russian government said it would block the agenda in protest at some of its delegation not receiving visas from the German government.

After some frantic phone calls to the German foreign office, the talks’ co-chairs received assurances that the visas were being sorted ASAP and the Russians agreed to resume.

Climate Home has heard from three sources that visa issues are not limited to the Russians and that some African delegates – both from government and civil society – had not received their visas either, or only did so after a lot of stress.

CAN Uganda’s Proscovier Nnanyonjo Vikman told Climate Home she arrived five days late and had to rebook her flight because of visa delays. She said the talks should be moved away from Germany to a place everyone can access.

“We don’t need to die coming to Bonn – let’s move” she said, adding that many feel “they are being harassed to enter a country that obviously doesn’t like them”.

Finance negotiators wear pink to show commitment to gender-inclusive financing on June 8, 2024 (Photo: IISD/ENB Kiara Worth)

Money talks

With the agenda adopted last Monday, negotiators on the post-2025 finance goal – known as the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) – started exchanging opinions on a 63-page draft text.

At this early stage – with the NCQG due to be agreed at COP29 in Baku in November – many countries are keeping suggestions on specific figures close to their chest, particularly as the UN is due to release a needs determination report in October which will offer guidance.

But the Arab Group has put forward a figure of $1.1 trillion a year from 2025 to 2029. Of this, $441 billion should be public grants and the rest should be money mobilised from other sources, including loans offered at rates cheaper than the market.

The group, backed on this by the G77+China, has even suggested how developed countries could raise that sum – through a 5% sales tax on developed countries’ fashion, tech and arms companies – plus a financial transaction tax.

Military emissions account for 5% of the global total, said Saudi Arabia’s negotiator. This surprised many observers, as Saudi Arabia is the world’s fourth-biggest per capita spender on the military and gets much of its equipment from Western arms companies.

But developed countries insist they can’t stump up all the money and are asking for help. The EU’s negotiator said the NCQG should be a “global effort” while Canada’s said it should come from a “broad set of contributors”. In other words, wealthier and more polluting developing nations like the Gulf nations should also play their part.

But developing countries remain, at least publicly, united against these attempts to differentiate between them. They say developed countries have the money – it’s just a question of whether they have the “political will to prioritise climate change”.

The other emerging divide is whether to include a sub-target for loss and damage in the NCQG. Developing countries want this but developed countries are opposed.

Asked why, the EU’s negotiator told Climate Home the Paris Agreement “does not provide any basis for liability or compensation”, and that climate finance under the NCQG should consist only of two categories: mitigation and adaptation.

The talks’ co-chairs – Australian Fiona Gilbert and South African Zaheer Fakir have slimmed down the sprawling 63-page document they presented to Bonn into a mere 45-page one. Negotiators will continue hashing it out this week. Talks continue (and are livestreamed) at 3-5 pm today and tomorrow.

Technical fights over carbon markets

After talks over the Paris Agreement’s carbon offsetting mechanisms collapsed in dramatic fashion at COP28, negotiators are trying to pick up the pieces.

A vast number of issues remain on the table, but diplomats have selected a number of highly technical elements to wrangle over in Bonn.

Observers said the mood is more cordial than in Dubai, but the underlying battle between a tighter regulatory regime and a ‘no-frills’ approach is still very much alive.

Much discussion time last week was taken up with the thorny issue of establishing a process for countries that host offsetting projects to authorise the release of carbon credits.

This is important as approval triggers a so-called ‘corresponding adjustment’, meaning governments can no longer count those emissions reductions towards their national climate targets.

A sizeable group of developing nations – including China, Brazil, the African Group and least-developed countries (LDCs) – want to be able to revoke or revise those authorisations in certain circumstances under Article 6.2 – the mechanism for bilateral exchange of credits.

That would afford them flexibility in case they give out too many offsets and this puts hitting their own climate targets at risk. But a group of developed countries and small-island states are pushing back.

Negotiators are also debating once again whether activities aiming to “avoid” – rather than reduce – emissions should be allowed in the new UN carbon market under Article 6.4. Most countries are against that, while only the Philippines are actively pushing for their inclusion.

As some observers have pointed out, giving a green light to the inclusion of emission avoidance could create some perverse incentives, such as fossil fuel companies promising to leave some oil or gas fields unexplored, then quantifying the avoided emissions and selling them as carbon offsets.

Transparency call

UN Climate Change head Simon Stiell has just made a speech reiterating a call by COP29 host nation Azerbaijan for countries to get their biennial transparency reports in by November’s Baku summit.

These reports are new. Only Andorra and Guyana have published them so far. They are intended, as Stiell put it, to “shine a light on progress”, showing whether countries are on track with their national climate plans or “are the lights flashing red on the console?”

They don’t have to be perfect, he said. “Nobody is expecting countries facing enormous human and economic challenges to submit a platinum-standard report first time around”. But, he added, “I encourage you all to submit the best possible report you can, this year.”

News in brief

Costly climate damage: Extreme weather has caused more than $41 billion in damage in the six months since COP28, according to a new report by Christian Aid. Four extreme weather events in this time – all scientifically shown to have been made more likely and/or intense by climate change – killed over 2,500 people, it says. They encompass flooding in Brazil, the UAE and East Africa, and heatwaves across Asia. The charity says these figures underscore the need for more loss and damage funding.

How to set a ‘good’ 2035 target: Climate Action Tracker (CAT) has released a guide for the 2035 targets countries must include in their next NDCs, saying they should be ambitious, fair, credible and transparent, with developed countries ramping up climate finance. They also need to strengthen their existing 2030 targets, which “are far from” aligned with the 1.5C global warming limit, it adds. Climate Analytics CEO Bill Hare warns that the CAT projection of warming from current policies is still at 2.7C – unchanged from 2021. “Governments appear to be flatlining on climate action, while all around them the world is in climate chaos, from heatwaves to floods and wildfires,” he warns.

Raise the bar for NDCs 3.0: A new briefing from the Energy Transitions Commission, a coalition of industry and other players in the energy sector, says that if governments reflect existing policy commitments made at COP28 and nationally, as well as the latest technological progress, in the next round of NDCs (known as NDCs 3.0), overall ambition levels could almost triple. That would save around 18 gigatonnes of CO2e per year in 2035 and put the world on a trajectory to limit warming to 2C, the commission says.

Forests missing in NDC action: Despite global commitments to halt deforestation by 2030, only eight of the top 20 countries most responsible for tropical deforestation have quantified targets on forests in their current NDCs, says a new report from the UN-REDD Programme. Current NDC pledges submitted between 2017–2021 do not meet the 2030 goal to halt and reverse deforestation, it adds. NDCs must integrate existing national strategies to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+) – which 15 of the 20 countries have adopted – while the NDCs 3.0 should include concrete, measurable targets on forests, it recommends.

The post Bonn bulletin: Crunch time for climate finance appeared first on Climate Home News.

Bonn bulletin: Crunch time for climate finance

Climate Change

European, island states seek clear future for global roadmap to cut fossil fuels

Published

15 hours ago

June 12, 2026

Alice Rush

The global roadmap on transitioning away from fossil fuels now being developed should be a “continuing conversation” which is part of UN climate talks, not just a one-off report, several governments told the Brazilian COP30 Presidency on Friday in Bonn.

During a 90-minute exchange of views at the annual mid-year climate talks in Germany, several European governments and the Marshall Islands said the roadmap that Brazil is due to finish by November should be incorporated into the official negotiations.

Any such push is likely to be resisted by nations whose economies are reliant on fossil fuel production. While Russia did not speak on Friday, it has said in earlier written submissions that the roadmap should not be referenced in any document approved by governments at UN climate talks.

At COP30 last year, Brazil tried to get governments to agree to produce a roadmap on how to transition away from fossil fuels but the proposal did not win consensus, with major nations like Saudi Arabia and Russia opposed.

Feedback in Bonn

To save the day, Brazil’s COP30 president André Aranha Corrêa do Lago promised at the closing plenary in Belem to draw up a voluntary roadmap in consultation with interested governments. Over 20 countries have officially submitted their opinions on this roadmap and, in Bonn on Friday, Corrêa do Lago sought their views – and those of civil society – in person after the presidency presented its findings so far.

The roadmap will also incorporate outcomes from the first global conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels held in Santa Marta, Colombia, in April and attended by around 60 countries.

A negotiator for the Marshall Islands told Friday’s meeting that at COP31 this year all governments should “welcome the collaborative effort behind the roadmap and the Santa Marta conference and for this work to be taken on to COP32 and beyond”.

Jun 11, 2026

Politics

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UN data shows a smaller number have signed up to cover the mid-year climate negotiations in Germany than in any year since the COVID-19 pandemic

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Jun 9, 2026

Politics

COP31 leaders unveil global targets, with spotlight on electrification

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A spokesperson for Switzerland said on behalf of a group of nations which includes South Korea and Mexico that the roadmap must be a “sustained process, not a one-off report” and “we would welcome an ongoing platform for dialogue, for learning and cooperation including among fossil-fuel production countries”.

“We expect more than a document, rather a process whereby we come together to develop concrete steps, recommendations and tools to prepare for the transitions,” she said, calling on the COP31 co-presidents Australia and Turkiye and COP32 host Ethiopia to “take up the leadership” for implementing the roadmap”.

Global stocktake response

France’s negotiator said the roadmap “is a process and we will need continuing discussions” as “implementation needs time”, while the UK called for a “continuing conversation, including as we head towards the second [global stocktake]”.

The global stocktake (GST) is an official five-yearly report into how the world’s governments are doing on their Paris Agreement goal to limit global warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial temperatures.

The second stocktake will be published in 2028 and governments are likely to negotiate a response to it, which could include new commitments to reduce emissions, at COP33 that year. The response to the first global stocktake included the landmark COP28 commitment to transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems.

Activists and Indigenous people take part in a Stop EACOP campaign protest against fossil fuels during the UN Climate Change Conference (COP30) in Belem, Brazil, November 13, 2025. REUTERS/Adriano Machado

“Even though it’s not a formal part of the negotiation agenda, the roadmap can be a key input for the entire information-gathering phase of the second GST,” Enrique Maurtua Konstantinidis, an independent climate policy consultant, explained to Climate Home News.

“The key is for countries not to focus the discussion on defending the roadmap itself, but rather on its content, which is what truly matters,” he added.

At the Bonn event, civil society organisations also supported continuing the roadmap inside the formal climate process.

Natalie Jones, policy adviser for the International Institute for Sustainable Development, told Climate Home News the roadmap should be “an ongoing dialogue where countries can exchange their experiences, best practices and continue implementing the [transitioning away from fossil fuels] consensus”.

Russian resistance

But economies reliant on fossil fuel production are likely to oppose incorporating the roadmap into negotiations in Bonn and at COP summits. Russia’s written submission to Brazil’s consultation says the roadmap was not agreed by governments at COP30.

It says such work should therefore take place on the margins of the UNFCCC process, adding that “ the inclusion of any references to the “Roadmap” in the agenda or in official or informal documents” at Bonn or COP “would constitute a deviation from previously agreed consensus outcomes”.

Other major oil and gas producers like Saudi Arabia have not made written or spoken submissions and the US, as it has left the Paris Agreement, is not involved in discussions. But countries other than Russia are likely to resist incorporating the roadmap into official talks.

The UN climate process needs ambition – the law demands it

The submission by Japan, which is not a major producer of fossil fuels but consumes them from overseas, suggests nervousness about the roadmap. It asks Brazil for clarity on how the roadmap is “envisaged to be utilised” and argues that as many countries continue to rely on fossil fuels for electricity, a full and fast shift to “full decarbonisation” is “challenging.

After Friday’s event, Corrêa do Lago told Climate Home News that “the suggestions and the key milestones of the roadmap are not clear yet”. He added that the next step for the COP30 presidency will be to “sit down in July and August to really prepare” the content.

The veteran Brazilian diplomat added that the roadmap will have a section on the challenges of the transition and another section on solutions.

National fossil fuel roadmaps

Brazil, as COP30 president, is drawing up the global roadmap but its leader Lula da Silva has also ordered his officials to draw up a national roadmap.

In April, France became the first and so far only nation to produce a roadmap, which amalgamated different existing energy and decarbonisation plans and targets. Colombia is reportedly drawing up a roadmap too, based on a draft document by academics.

On Friday, a coalition of nearly 100 civil society organisations called on the COP31 co-presidents Australia and Türkiye to both come up with national roadmaps in order to “lead by example”. Türkiye produces about a third of its electricity from coal, while Australia is the world’s third-largest fossil fuel exporter, the NGOs said.

But in the Brazil-led consultation meeting, a Norwegian negotiator downplayed the importance of separate national roadmaps for transitioning away from fossil fuels.

While they can “have a supporting role”, the official said countries’ nationally determined contributions (NDCs) “must remain the primary vehicle for driving global climate transition.”

NDCs are climate plans, usually containing emissions reduction targets, which the Paris Agreement states governments must update with higher ambition every five years.

The post European, island states seek clear future for global roadmap to cut fossil fuels appeared first on Climate Home News.

https://www.climatechangenews.com/2026/06/12/european-island-states-seek-clear-future-for-global-roadmap-to-cut-fossil-fuels/

Climate Change

Hoover Dam Approaches a Hydropower Cliff

Published

16 hours ago

June 12, 2026

Alice Rush

Big cuts in generating capacity are coming as the Colorado River struggles to meet demand.

Brett Walton, Circle of Blue

Some day in the next 12 months—maybe in late August, maybe not until next spring— Lake Mead will drop below the critical threshold of 1,035 feet above sea level.

Hoover Dam Approaches a Hydropower Cliff

Climate Change

DeBriefed 12 June 2026: El Niño begins | COP31 hosts eye electrification | Atlantic current monitoring at risk

Published

18 hours ago

June 12, 2026

Alice Rush

Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.

This week

El Niño begins

‘DOMINO WEATHER’: The natural weather phenomenon El Niño, which can raise global heat and “bring domino weather effects across the planet”, is now underway, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) declared on Thursday, reported the Washington Post. The Japanese Meteorological Administration also identified the start of El Niño on Wednesday, said Bloomberg. According to the Japanese weather agency, the event is “expected to intensify in the coming months and become very strong later in the year, persisting into at least December”, reported the outlet.

‘SUPER EVENT’: BBC News reported that “many forecasts suggest this could end up as a so-called ‘super’ El Niño” and be “among the strongest ever recorded”. It added: “Coming on top of decades of human-caused warming, it could bring another record-hot year – most likely in 2027 – with disruption to weather, food supplies and economies running well into that year.”

COP31 hosts eye electrification

‘35 BY 35’: COP31 hosts Turkey and Australia have called for countries to support a target of electrifying 35% of global energy use by 2035, reported Politico. Speaking at climate talks in Bonn, Germany, Turkish minister Murat Kurum said that electrification would be a “flagship priority” at the COP31 summit, noted the publication. Kurum added that “electrifying daily life, from transport to buildings and industry” could “protect families and businesses from volatile energy markets”, said the outlet.

WASTE AND BUILDINGS: Climate Home News reported that electrification was one of three priorities unveiled by the COP31 hosts, with the other two being waste and buildings. On buildings, the COP31 hosts “quietly overhauled [their] goal”, Climate Home News said. It reported: “An initial press statement on Monday set out a target ‘to achieve at least a 25% increase in energy efficiency in buildings by 2035’. But…on Tuesday, that was replaced with a different goal to ‘reduce energy consumption intensity in the building sector by at least 25% by 2035’.”

‘HARDEST’ CHALLENGE: Elsewhere in Bonn, UN climate chief Simon Stiell said “governments must stop revisiting climate commitments and start delivering on them”, South Africa’s Mail and Guardian reported. It quoted Stiell as saying: “Tackling the global climate crisis is the hardest but most important thing humanity has ever tried to do together…We are not yet where we need to be. But we are somewhere we have never been before.”

Around the world

ETS EXTRA: The EU has agreed “stronger” price controls on “ETS2”, its planned trading system for heating and transport emissions, according to Reuters.
OCEAN STRESS: The rate of sea level rise has doubled in 10 years amid “severe and accelerating” pressures on oceans, said a UN report covered by Time.
CLIMATE MIGRANTS: Donald Trump’s “immigration crackdown is largely targeting people from the countries most vulnerable to displacement from climate-driven disasters”, according to Guardian analysis.
ULTRA-RICH: Investments by the world’s ultra-rich in 2022 are linked to nearly $1tn in climate damages, according to a Greenpeace Africa analysis covered by BusinessGreen.

Two

The number of bidders for Trump’s auction for drilling rights in an Arctic wildlife refuge, with big oil companies “sitting out the sale”, reported Bloomberg.

Latest climate research

As the Arctic warms, increased iceberg activity could “reshape” deep-sea habitats and “elevate” navigational hazards as maritime traffic expands | Nature
Around 11% of the population of the world’s “rarest great ape”, the Tapanuli orangutan, is estimated to have perished in an extreme rainfall event in Indonesia in 2025 | Current Biology
Canada’s forests are shifting from a carbon sink to a carbon source, due to “wildfires disturbances” | Global Change Biology

(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)

Captured

Solar power has overtaken gas in Asia to become the region’s third largest electricity source behind coal and hydropower, according to Carbon Brief analysis of data from the thinktank Ember. Solar became the third largest electricity source for Asia on an annual basis in April 2026, according to the analysis. In the year to April 2026, solar generated 1,727 terawatt hours (TWh), while gas generated 1,711TWh, it added.

Spotlight

Atlantic current monitoring at risk

This week, Carbon Brief reports on how Trump plans could disrupt efforts to track a major ocean current.

The Irminger Sea, a patch of frigid ocean east of Greenland, plays an outsized role in the Earth’s climate.

Here, surface water that has travelled thousands of kilometres from the tropics grows cold and dense enough to sink to the ocean’s depths – a transformation that must occur for the water to begin a long journey back to the southern hemisphere.

This makes the Irminger Sea an “action centre” for the mighty Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), the vast system of ocean currents that keeps temperatures in Europe mild.

Last week, the US government announced plans to dismantle ocean moorings installed in the Irminger Sea which, among other things, collect data on the health of the AMOC.

This came as part of a programme to “descope” the Ocean Observatories Initiative, a $368m network of ocean sensors installed in the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

Two of the moorings earmarked for removal in the Irminger Sea form part of an internationally funded, trans-Atlantic AMOC monitoring array, known as OSNAP, that stretches from Canada to Scotland.

Experts told Carbon Brief the move by the Trump administration highlights the vulnerability of AMOC observation systems around the world. These deep-sea moorings – scattered across the Atlantic – collect real-time data on, among other things, ocean current, temperature, pressure and biochemistry.

Prof Penny Holliday, chief scientific officer of the UK National Oceanography Centre, told Carbon Brief that the OSNAP array, as well as the RAPID array at 26N, are “entirely dependent” on research grants that have to be “continually reapplied for”.

“Funding is perilous all the time,” she said.

A report prepared last month by scientists for Nordic ministers exploring the security of funding for AMOC observing systems warned that RAPID and OSNAP were in “critical condition” and faced “material exposure over an 18-month horizon”. Meanwhile, other key basin-wide and global components of the global AMOC observing system were rated as “at risk”.

It is not just US funding that is uncertain. The report notes, for example, that the five-yearly funding the UK provides to RAPID and OSNAP is “at risk from 2027 due to year-on-year budget reductions” at the Natural Environmental Research Council.

(RAPID is funded by the US and UK, whereas OSNAP is backed by five different countries, with the US contributing half of the total financial support.)

Report co-author Dr Femke de Jong from the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research told Carbon Brief that “continued AMOC observations” are under pressure in “multiple countries”. She said:

“While the risk of a declining AMOC to society is starting to be recognised, there is not yet a system or institution in place to guarantee a way to monitor it.”

AMOC monitoring arrays are still in their infancy – RAPID, the oldest, was launched in 2004. Two decades of data captured so far shows that the AMOC is slowing down. However, scientists will need many more years of data to be able to confidently link the decline to climate change, rather than natural variability in the ocean.

NOC’s Holliday points to the disconnect between scientific and funder timelines:

“The timescale of observations needed in order to be able to detect a climate change signal from the very naturally variable ocean is around 40-60 years…. [And yet], in the Netherlands, they have to apply for a new grant for their ocean moorings every two years. They are going to have to do that for 40 years.

“This is a very inefficient way of getting funding for what should be critical infrastructure.”

This spotlight first appeared in Cited, Carbon Brief’s new fortnightly newsletter focused on climate research. Sign up for free.

Watch, read, listen

‘BEYOND GROWTH’: A group of economists set out a “roadmap for eradicating poverty beyond growth” in the Guardian.

OIL CAMPAIGN: Politico reported on how “oil industry allies” are campaigning against attribution science, including by working to discredit a US National Academies report that “will examine research into the ways corporate climate pollution is intensifying natural disasters”.

‘FIGHT BACK’: For the Apocalyptic Optimist podcast, Dr Dana Fisher spoke to historian and author Dr Naomi Oreskes about how to “fight back” against climate misinformation.

Coming up

8-18 June: Bonn climate talks, Bonn, Germany
16-18 June: 11th Our ocean conference, Mombasa, Kenya
18 June: International Energy Agency Global Hydrogen Review 2026 report launch

Pick of the jobs

S-Curve Economics, head of road transport | Salary: £75,000-£80,000. Location: Remote (UK)
UK Department for Energy Security and Net-Zero, speechwriter to the secretary of state | Salary: £62,595-£69,765. Location: London (hybrid)
Basque Centre for Climate Change, postdoctoral researcher for JustBioSolar project | Salary: €27,040-€34,320. Location: Bilbao, Spain
Boston Globe climate science and environment reporter | Salary: Unknown. Location: Boston, US