This article will be updated throughout the day and an edited version will be sent out each evening as a newsletter – you can sign up here.In today’s bulletin:
Fossil fuel transition removed from drafts on cutting emissions
Campaigners: No deal better than a bad deal
Saudis oppose anti-fossil fuel and pro-human rights language
New draft text proposes $250bn per year in public climate finance by 2035
A keenly awaited, slimmer version of the draft text for the post-2025 climate finance goal (NCQG) finally proposes some figures for the amounts that should go to help developing countries tackle climate change.
The text offers a “core” goal of $250 billion a year by 2035, which would come from a wide range of sources “with developed country parties taking the lead”. This is far below what developing country groups were asking for in the three years of talks.
Ali Mohamed, Kenya’s special envoy for climate change and chair of the African Group of Negotiators, called the proposed figure “totally unacceptable”, adding, “$250 billion will lead to unacceptable loss of life in Africa and around the world, and imperils the future of our world”. But a US official said it would be a tough target to meet.
“It is [a] joke,” said African Group finance negotiator Alpha Kaloga in a post on X. “BAD DEAL,” he added. His words come hours after campaigners held a press conference to say no deal on finance was better than a bad deal.
The Alliance Of Small Island States (AOSIS) said in a statement that the text shows “contempt for our vulnerable people” and called it a “shoddy placebo goal”. “We appeal to the moral conscience of those who proclaim to be our partners to stand with us”, they added.
Bolivian negotiator Diego Pacheco, who represents several large emerging economies, told Climate Home the goal was “not serious” and not aligned to the Paris Agreement.
The new public finance goal – which would replace the existing $100-billion-a-year goal – would contribute to a wider goal of at least $1.3 trillion a year by 2035 “from all public and private sources”, the text says.
Climate finance is not a hand-out.
It’s an investment against the devastation that unchecked climate chaos will inflict on us all.
It’s a downpayment on a safer, more prosperous future for every nation on Earth.#COP29
— António Guterres (@antonioguterres) November 22, 2024
Developing countries had called for an overall goal of around this size, but wanted $600 billion of it to be public money with the rest consisting of private investments mobilised by government cash.
Leading economists Amar Bhattacharya, Vera Songwe and Nicholas Stern, who are co-chairs of the Independent High-Level Expert Group on Climate Finance, said the $1.3 trillion is in line with their analysis of needs for developing countries excluding China. But they said the $250-billion core figure “is too low and not consistent with delivery of the Paris Agreement”.