Does Anyone Think the COP Meetings Are Useful?

Put your hands down oil company lobbyists.

COP29 ended in Baku, Azerbaijan on Saturday.

Just to set the scene, we're on track for as much as 3.1 C (5.6 F) of warming by the end of this century (2024 U.N. Emissions Gap report), with global GHG and fossil fuels use continuing to rise.

Okay, so that guarantees that our civilization will likely end. I’m sure that focused minds, right?

Developed countries pledged $300 billion a year to help developing nations cope with the impacts of climate change. This is well below the goal to raise $1.3 trillion in climate finance annually by 2035, which was the number under discussion at the beginning of the conference and the number desired by developing nations. That $300 billion was a compromise from the day before when $250 billion was the number developed nations offered.

With the US likely to pull out of the Paris Agreement (again) due to the incoming administration not believing climate change is real, don’t count on the US making good on those payments.

Here is how the details break down.

 $𝟏.𝟑 𝐓𝐫𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐀𝐧𝐧𝐮𝐚𝐥 𝐂𝐥𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐅𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞: Nations agreed to provide $1.3 trillion annually by 2035 to help developing countries adapt to climate change and transition to low-carbon economies.

The $300 billion headline number is in the form of grants and low-interest loans from developed nations. But that $300 billion number is a “promise”, there is no guarantee that the money will show up. Based on the past agreements that have come out of COP, it likely will never materialize. The remaining 1 trillion annually is supposed to come from private investors and new funding mechanisms, like carbon taxes. The details of this trillion-dollar portion of the agreement are not yet finalized. Also, 2035 is insanely too late. We may be locking in a 2.0+ world by then. So COP once again has ended with no one happy, nearly empty promises for help that come much too late.

Some of the meager progress from COP 28 was also lost. Last year, the world agreed to phase out fossil fuels, ending new coal and accelerating energy transition. There was no similar language in this year’s final text.

The message is “Bring on 3.1C. All we have achieved as a civilization over the past 10,000 years will be lost, but at least about 1% of the population will become fabulously wealthy for a few years.”

Why are we still having these meetings?

What are we doing here? When the idea of COP meetings started three decades ago, CO2 concentrations were at 354 ppm (parts per million), and the temperature was 0.3°C hotter than in pre-industrial times.

Today CO2 concentrations are about 423 ppm, and the temperature is about 1.5°C hotter than in pre-industrial times.

COP has become a fossil fuel industry meeting, with over 2,000 delegates from fossil fuel companies attending the meetings. That is a larger delegation than that of any country that attended the meetings. Discussions about actually reducing the oil and gas production weren’t even in the final draft of final document coming out of the meeting. For the second year in a row, the president of the meeting was caught putting together oil and gas deals on the side before the meeting started.

Reforms needed.

On November 15^th, the Club of Rome wrote a letter to those at the UN responsible for the COP meetings, suggesting some much-needed reforms. I wholeheartedly support these. I’ve summarized them slightly for brevity, but I suggest you check out the whole letter yourself. It’s not very long, but all of the recommendations would make COP – if we keep COP – more useful.

1. Improve the selection process for COP presidencies
We need strict eligibility criteria to exclude countries who do not support the phase out/transition away from fossil energy. Host countries must demonstrate their high level of ambition to uphold the goals of the Paris Agreement.

2. Streamline for speed and scale
With the global policy map fully developed, COP must shift away from negotiations to the delivery of concrete action. COP meetings must be transformed into smaller, more frequent, solution-driven meetings where countries report on progress, are held accountable in line with the latest science, and discuss important solutions for finance, technology and equity. This work must be supplemented by the benchmarking of national progress using the UN Gap Reports.

3. Improve implementation and accountability
The COP process must be strengthened with mechanisms to hold countries accountable for their climate targets and commitments. Whilst the Paris framework was intended to operate in “delivery mode”, it is not working because governments are not held to account to ensure that national action plans align with the latest scientific evidence. 

4. Ensure robust tracking of climate financing
A growing proportion of climate financing pledges are now being disbursed as interest-bearing loans, thereby exacerbating the debt burden for climate-vulnerable nations. We need standardized definitions and criteria for what qualifies as climate finance, along with common reporting frameworks and tracking mechanisms to verify climate financing flows.

5. Amplify the voice of authoritative science
Whilst the Climate COP does rely on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and other related bodies, such as the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA), it does not have its own permanent scientific advisory body that is formally part of the COP structure. We share growing concerns that climate COPs do not sufficiently integrate or action up the latest scientific evidence.

6. Recognize the interdependencies between poverty, inequality and planetary instability
New research from the Earth Commission and from Earth4All affirms the important linkages between ecological and social change processes. If the climate COP is to be more impactful, it must acknowledge that the current rate of nature loss (e.g. freshwater scarcity, land and soil degradation, pollination decline, ocean pollution) is affecting the stability of the planet.

7. Enhance equitable representation
Despite the climate COP’s new disclosure rules, a record number of 2,456 fossil fuel lobbyists were granted access at COP28, nearly four times more than COP27. Improving the management of corporate interests within COPs proceedings will require stronger transparency and disclosure rules and clear guidelines that require companies to demonstrate alignment between their climate commitments, business models, and lobbying activities. 

If we keep COP, the above list is a good start. But I’m not too keen on keeping COP. If a meeting cannot meet its mission for thirty years, don’t throw good money after bad. Scrap it. Take the Club of Rome suggestions and build a COP not captured by corporate interests and lobbyists.

Maybe someone is already doing that …

Alternative to COP.

Interestingly, an alternative to COP was held in Oaxaca, Mexico to protest the United Nations climate process, which favors fossil fuel interests. The event focused on a number of issues, including clean energy impacts, the global water crisis, the forced displacement of Indigenous peoples, and resisting the commercialization of natural resources.

Let’s hope this effort grows and COP continues to shrink (attendance at COP was down this year, and more people frustrated with the process are vowing to stop going). Grassroots efforts like the anti-COP are a better way to focus the story on vulnerable groups while citing the hypocrisy of prioritizing corporate and petrostate interests.

For those interested, here are some of the plans from the anti-COP group for next year:

• Global Mobilizations for Climate and Life to be held simultaneously in different geographies during November 10, 2025.

• Mesoamerican Caravan for Climate and Life to take place between October 11 and November 10, 2025.

• Meeting in the Amazon during COP30 to share the progress and results of the tasks, work, and commitments made in Oaxaca.

• Mediterranean Meeting Against Wars and Borders to be held in North Africa (dates to be defined)

What no one ever considers at COP 29.

Degrowth is the answer. The CO2 emissions goals of COP would be easier to meet if we didn’t insist on growth.

But those discussions didn’t happen in Baku.

Maybe in Brazil next year, but I doubt it.

Developing nations can develop and grow, but developed countries don’t need to grow anymore, they are mature. They can continue to develop, but that is different from growth. The COP meetings have dropped the ball on degrowth.

Here is a shout-out to the anti-cop meeting in 2025. Please invite the degrowth community to your meeting. Maybe we could help build a counter-movement together. See you in Brazil.