Comments on draft COP26 text (1/CMA.3)

Commenting on the publication this morning (12 November) of the new Draft Text on 1/CMA.3, Bob Ward, Policy and Communications Director of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Science, said: “This text appears to deal with many of the major issues that need to be resolved, but some important aspects still need to be finalised and may take some time to conclude. The text “requests”, rather than commits, countries to deliver updated and more ambitious pledges by the end of next year, recognising that the planned emissions cuts collectively are still not consistent with holding warming to no more than 1.5 Celsius degrees. The call for countries to phase-out unabated coal power and inefficient fossil fuel subsidies is very important and historic. Unabated coal power releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and all subsidies for fossil fuels are inefficient. The text is also right to emphasise the need for rich countries to honour their pledge to deliver $100 billion a year to help developing countries, and to begin urgently a process of mobilising finance from all sources, both public and private, to deliver a significant increase in investment in the transition to zero-carbon and climate-resilient economies.”