This year’s Climate Summit started a few days back, but it has already brought news. Most recently, the United States’ high ambition is a return to the Coalition, an informal United Nations grouping that has made the 1.5° target a key element of the Paris Agreement. Now, this coalition wants to ensure that COP26 is not wasted and that participants take real and concrete measures to stop climate change.
“The High Ambition Coalition was instrumental in ensuring that the High Ambition Coalition of 1.5° would be part of the Paris Agreement, and will now play a key role in Glasgow. [onde decorre a Cimeira do Clima], by assuring that it will be carried out”, declared a member of the US government.
What can be translated as the “Coalition of High Ambition” is made up of more than 60 developed and developing countries that are committed to presenting ambitious goals to combat climate change.
The withdrawal of the United States to this alliance may make the goal of limiting temperature rise to 1.5 degrees centigrade more feasible.
This Tuesday (2), during COP26 work in Glasgow (Scotland), High Ambition will call on coalition governments to step up their efforts to reduce emissions of polluting gases and use of coal, in order to achieve the 1.5° target . .
The coalition will also ask rich countries to double the climate finance currently given to poor countries so that they can adapt to the effects of climate change.
The third major objective of this informal group is to eliminate funding for fossil fuels.
John Kerry, the US special envoy for climate, said earlier this year that the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting temperatures to 1.5 degrees was based on a “high ambition coalition and the hard work of children. Developing island states”. Together, “they realized that this goal was inevitable—and thank God they realized it,” as science came to prove it, they declared.
US President Joe Biden thus joins an international agreement with EU countries to control emissions of polluting gases, especially methane.
The latest UN study on the matter has revealed that greenhouse gas emissions have reached new records. Methane – a gas 80 times more polluting than carbon dioxide – was raised 262% above pre-industrial levels.
fear for the future
“The High Ambition Coalition has set the standard for what needs to happen at this summit,” Tina Stage, the UN special envoy for climate in the Marshall Islands, said on Tuesday. List three of the group’s goals for COP 26.
“Start limiting temperature rise to 1.5 degrees through real and concrete actions like gradual elimination of coal; making radical changes in adaptation. [dos países mais pobres], with at least twice the current funding; And ensuring that we have all the necessary resources to address this crisis, including the loss and damage that we have already experienced today. “
One of the coalition’s member states told the Guardian (British daily) that fears that the 1.5-degree target was at risk served as the impetus for the reappearance of the informal group. “We are extremely concerned about 1.5. That is why we are seeking ways to keep this goal achievable”, he announced.
The High Ambition Coalition was formed in 2014 by the Marshall Islands’ chief negotiator with the aim of securing the Paris Agreement signed a year later.
It now wants to implement the goal of limiting temperature rise to 1.5 degrees, requiring at least 45 percent reductions in polluting gas emissions by 2030 compared to 2010 levels.
According to scientists, if this goal is not achieved, some of the effects of climate change, such as melting, will become irreversible. Many small islands are also at risk of flooding due to rising sea levels.
COP26 started on Sunday (31) and will end on 12 November. Leaders and representatives from around 200 countries participate.
