The Conference of the Parties (COP26) is against the backdrop of multiple climate calamities since the Paris accords in 2015. Enhanced climate change fueled natural disasters from flooding, drought, pestilence, hurricanes, glacial melt, locusts, and heat domes that threaten us all.
The nearly 200 nations and five thousand delegates attending the 26th COP meeting in Glasgow, Scotland, are aware of these facts. They likely know the horrifying climate tipping points we have already crossed and those already activated that will pass in the years and decades to come: drought in the Amazon rainforest, fires in the vast expanse of boreal forests, ice loss in Greenland, accelerating ice loss in West Antarctica, significant loss of sea ice in the Arctic ocean, a slowing of the Atlantic circulation, mass die-offs of coral colonies, the thawing of permafrost and the accelerating ice loss in the Wilkes Basin of East Antarctica.
All of the above tipping points are interconnected; the failure of one could cause all the others to fall like dominoes. If and when the dominoes fall, the result will be a global tipping point where the earth transitions to a hothouse and where human history ends. Some of the attendees likely do not lose much sleep over the dangerous predicament we are in; most do.
In the leadup to COP26, there were hopes that the G20 Summit held in Rome could usher in the end of coal. The attendees did not do so, and those attendees represented 80% of global emissions. The G20 did agree to stop publicly financing coal outside of their borders, so there's that. Domestically? The can is kicked down the road for the next generations to suffer.
As attendees arrived in Glasgow last week, they were greeted with heavy rain and flooding in Cumbria and Scotland. The world's nations are not on track to prevent a 1.5 or a 2.0 world. If promises from Paris were fully implemented, the best-case scenario would be a 2.7 C world. That would be a catastrophic result which we must not ever reach. So the pressure is on for world leaders to act and quickly.
Not that a 1.5 rise would be great news, we are currently at 1.2, and we already witness changes to the climate that makes weather worse. That is because every 10th of a degree will make the changes more frequent and severe.
The schedule in Glasgow and how to measure the conference's success are implementing carbon markets. The rules "actually drive down emissions and provide developing countries the financing" that was promised them in Paris but not delivered. Also, ensuring all nations "measure and report their emissions reductions and how transparent they are with one another." The goal is to stop the greenwashing that certain countries engage in. Lastly, to pressure the attendees to return in 2023 with more vital plans.
As Greta said in a recent interview, "It's never too late to do as much as we can."
Atmospheric scientist Michael Mann writes an opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times on deflection, doomism, and division of their weapons of the fossil fuel industry and their henchmen in governments and media. But it is the delay that bad actors bring to the discussion of events like COP, and he lets them have it with both barrels blasting.
But the D-word du jour is delay. And we’ve become all too familiar with the lexicon employed in its service: “adaptation,” “resilience,” “geoengineering” and “carbon capture.” These words offer the soothing promise of action, but all fail to address the scale of the problem.
Adaptation and resilience are important. We must cope with the detrimental effects of climate change that are already baked in — coastal inundation and worse droughts, floods and other dangerous weather events. But if we fail to substantially reduce carbon emissions and stem the warming of the planet, we will exceed our collective adaptive capacity as a civilization.
When fossil fuel-friendly Republican Sen. Marco Rubio tells Floridians that they must simply “adapt” to sea level rise (how? By growing fins and gills?), he’s trying to sound as if he’s got a meaningful solution when, in fact, he’s offering only empty rhetoric and a license for polluters to continue with business as usual. It’s a delay tactic.
What about geoengineering? Should we engage in an enormous, unprecedented and uncontrolled experiment to further intervene with our planetary environment by, for example, shooting sulfur particulates into the stratosphere to block out the sun in hopes of somehow offsetting the warming effect of increasing carbon pollution?
The law of unintended consequences almost certainly ensures that we will screw up the planet even more. The idea of geoengineering also grants license for continued carbon pollution. There’s a reason Rex Tillerson, former ExxonMobil CEO and Donald Trump’s secretary of State, has dismissed the climate crisis as simply an “engineering problem.” If we can simply clean up our act down the road, why not continue to burn fossil fuels? This, too, is a delay tactic — one that buys time for polluters to continue to make billions in profits as we mortgage the future habitability of the planet.
For the next two days, November 1 and 2, the heads of state will make comments, President Biden will speak today. Here is a partial list of today's schedule:
Heads of State Approximately 13:45 – 17:00
His Excellency Mr. Pedro Sánchez Perez-Castejón, President of the Government of Spain
His Excellency Mr. Mohamed Ould Cheikh El Ghazouani, President of Mauritania
His Excellency Mr. Joseph R. Biden Jr., President of United States of America
His Excellency Mr. Joko Widodo, President of Indonesia
His Excellency Mr. Wavel John Charles Ramkalawan, President of Seychelles
His Excellency Mr. Emmanuel Macron, President of France
His Excellency Mr. Ali Bongo Ondimba, President of Gabon
His Excellency Mr. Juan Orlando Hernández, President of Honduras
His Excellency Mr. Uhuru Kenyatta, President of Kenya
His Highness Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, Amir of Qatar
Resources
Official UNFCCC website (for streaming events, agendas, background information
Official COP26 website
COP26 on Twitter