Closing summary
It’s bedtime in Baku, after a somewhat frustrating day of Cop29 climate talks, so in London it’s time to close the Cop29 liveblog, I’m afraid.
But before I go, here are the main lines from today’s non-action at the summit.
“Cut the theatrics,” UN climate chief Simon Steele told country representatives in Baku, after talks over the key issue of climate finance stalled, with developing countries insisting they need over $1tn a year and richer nations balking at the cost.
There was a lot of frustration at Cop29, with progress on a climate finance agreement very slow. Shirley Matheson, WWF global NDC enhancement lead, said: “There’s a lot of frustration in the room. There’s a lot of anxiety. There’s a need for parties to really get together and work through this.
One of Europe’s top human rights officials accused Cop29 host country Azerbaijan of jailing activists and journalists for their work and opposition to the authorities. Michael O’Flaherty, the Council of Europe commissioner for human rights, called for Azerbaijan to immediately release them.
Australian climate change and energy minister Chris Bowen said reaching an agreement before the week is out was proving difficult. Bowen said the finance goal needed to cover what he called “the big three” issues: the quantum, the contributor base and the structure of a funding agreement.
The internationally agreed goal to keep the world’s temperature rise below 1.5C is now “deader than a doornail”, climate scientists have said. Three of the five leading research groups monitoring global temperatures consider 2024 on track to be at least 1.5C (2.7F) hotter than pre-industrial times.
But senior US officials insisted the world can still meet the 1.5C target, but not without ambitious climate action from China. In recent days, the US and China have reaffirmed joint commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions other than CO2, a rare example of collaboration between the rivals.
Meanwhile, the UK and the US signed a new agreement for civil nuclear collaboration on the sidelines of Cop negotiations. The agreement aims to pool billions in research funds to speed up the development of new technologies such as advanced modular reactors.
That’s about it. I’ll be back with you early doors tomorrow morning to kick the live blog off for another day of climate negotiations coverage.
Relying on natural carbon sinks such as forests and oceans to offset continued fossil fuel emissions will not stop global heating, the scientists who developed net zero have warned, writes Patrick Greenfield, Guardian biodiversity reporter.
Each year, the planet’s oceans, forests, soils and other natural carbon sinks absorb about half of all human emissions, forming part of government plans to limit global heating to below 2C under the Paris agreement.
But the international group of authors who developed the science behind net zero have warned that countries could “cheat” their way towards Paris targets using naturally occurring parts of Earth’s carbon cycle to make it look as if they achieved net zero while continuing to drive global heating.
The study, published on Monday in Nature and led by the University of Oxford, said that naturally occurring carbon sinks such as rainforests and peatlands must be protected so they can remove historic pollution, but never formed part of the original net zero definition developed by scientists in 2009.
The scientists underscored the need for “geological net zero”, which means any future carbon emissions must be counteracted by permanent removal of the pollution from fossil fuels – not from pre-existing natural ecosystems. They urged governments to urgently clarify what net zero means at Cop29 in Azerbaijan or continue to risk catastrophic climate breakdown.
Click the link below to read more:
