Follow our full coverage of COP29 on ThinkLandscape.
From 11–24 November, world leaders gathered in Baku, Azerbaijan, for the 2024 UN Climate Change Conference (COP29).
Here’s what we saw at the biggest climate event of the year. Read our COP29 wrap-up for a deeper analysis of what happened in Baku – and where it leaves us now.
And there we have it: COP29 is a wrap – and it ends with a deal, too, but at what cost?
In the early hours of this morning, the Azerbaijani COP presidency brought the gavel down on an agreement that left no one particularly happy.
The final text on climate finance sets a goal of USD 300 billion per year by 2035, “with developed countries taking the lead,” and “calls on all actors to work together” to increase this sum to the USD 1.3 trillion per year asked for by the G77 and China.
It states that these funds should be drawn “from a wide variety of sources, public and private, bilateral and multilateral, including alternative sources,” without specifying further.
The text also “decides to launch the ‘Baku to Belém Roadmap to 1.3T’ aiming at scaling up climate finance to developing country Parties” – in other words, delaying any further financial commitments until COP30.
Global South countries and civil society reacted angrily to the deal, with India, Nigeria, Bolivia and Cuba raising objections that ultimately fell on deaf ears, with the COP presidency seemingly determined to seal the deal no matter what.
Predictably, Global North countries were much happier at not being required to stump up trillions, but even they were disappointed with the deal’s lack of ambition in other areas and called out certain parties – heavily implied to include Saudi Arabia – for their interference.
Ultimately, you get the impression that Global North countries were coerced into feeding off scraps, with the alternative – no deal, and hence no climate finance goal – being potentially much worse.
The Azerbaijani COP presidency also faced criticism from all sides, not least for its decision to push through the final text before all objections had been heard so that the summit could be wrapped up.
Just before 11 PM last night, all participants received an email stating that shuttle buses to and from the venue would continue until 4 AM on Sunday morning. That turned out to be almost the exact time the final plenary drew to a close. Coincidence?
We’ll be signing off for now, but stay tuned for more analysis and a look ahead to COP30 in our wrap-up article on Tuesday.
Last updated: 22:30 Baku time (UTC+4)
Negotiators are working overtime at COP29, and so are we. But will it all be in vain?
Let’s start with the good news: the text on carbon markets under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, agreed on day one, has been officially approved. Technical rules will be worked out next year.
But that’s as good as it gets for now. The rest of the talks are on the brink of collapse.
Global North countries have upped their climate finance offer to USD 300 billion per year, but that has made little difference as the chances of a deal seem slimmer than ever.
The Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) and Least Developed Countries (LDCs) have walked out of the finance negotiations. They’d demanded a guaranteed 30 percent of climate finance, and they clearly feel that their voices are going unheard.
Aside from the latest offer being USD 1 trillion less than Global South countries are demanding, another stumbling block is that it doesn’t account for inflation.
After all, if our math is right, USD 300 billion in today’s money will only be worth USD 237 billion in 2035, based on the current inflation rate.
To be clear, these two blocs have only abandoned the finance talks, not COP29 as a whole, and they’re still very much involved in the negotiations on adaptation, just transition and carbon markets – the last of which is almost final.
But with the COP now running more than 24 hours past its intended finishing time, many delegates are heading home, including the climate ministers and envoys for Australia, the U.S. and Germany.
That means there’s a real danger that COP29 could fail to reach a deal as there might not be enough negotiators left in the room – as happened at the Biodiversity COP16 last month.
In the meantime, Saudi Arabia’s obstructionism has reached new levels, with one of its delegates now accused of directly editing the just transition text.
Last updated: 23:50 Baku time (UTC+4)
The COP presidency has released a new draft text that finally puts some numbers on climate finance for the first time.
It proposes that Global North countries commit to providing USD 250 billion of annual climate finance to the Global South by 2035, and it “calls on all actors to work together” to increase this to USD 1.3 trillion in the same timeframe.
This latter figure – the USD 1.3 trillion that the G77 and China have asked for – includes both “public and private sources,” the latter referring to so-called mobilized finance, which is money that private companies invest on top of the contributions made by governments.
It also “invites developing country parties to make additional contributions” – a reference to countries like China and Saudi Arabia, which are still officially classified as developing countries under the UNFCCC.
After lobbying from COP28 hosts the U.A.E., the new text also includes a reference to last year’s agreement to “transition away” from fossil fuels, albeit only in passing.
Namely, in describing “whole-of-economy approaches to just transitions,” it “recognizes that such approaches include significant socioeconomic opportunities associated with transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems.”
So, is this the breakthrough we’ve been waiting for?
Well, not really.
Panama’s lead negotiator has pulled no punches, calling the proposal “outrageous, evil and remorseless.”
Amar Bhattacharya, Vera Songwe and Nicholas Stern, co-chairs of the Independent High-Level Expert Group on Climate Finance, were more diplomatic, calling the USD 250 billion figure “too low and not consistent with delivery of the Paris Agreement.”
Civil society groups have described the text as an “insult,” an “embarrassment” and a “bare minimum offer,” calling for the deal to be rejected. They point out that the USD 250 billion goal also includes loans that would put Global South countries further into debt.
The texts on adaptation and just transition, both released along with the finance (NCQG) text, also drew sharp criticism. Kenya’s special climate envoy pointed out that the former lacks indicators to track progress, while the latter is “unacceptable and lacks balance between domestic and international dimensions of just transitions.”
Unsurprisingly, Global North countries were more complimentary. Australia’s climate minister called it a “genuine attempt,” while Germany’s climate envoy said “at least we’re not up in the air without a map.”
Easy to say when you’re not the ones in need, and those comments will offer little consolation to Global South countries as the EU’s proposal of USD 200–300 billion, leaked earlier in the week, has proven spot on.
The two sides are indeed over USD 1 trillion a year apart as the negotiations run into overtime. This COP was originally scheduled to have been wrapped up by 6 PM tonight.
But instead, on we go…
If you thought the COP29 negotiations couldn’t be going any worse, the Azerbaijani COP presidency has managed to upset both rich and poor countries alike with its latest draft text.
Released around 8 AM local time, the new text doesn’t propose a figure for climate finance, merely stating that Global South countries need “USD [X] trillion.”
Nor does it address who will contribute this funding, how it will be raised and delivered, or whether it will cover loss and damage.
Countries were also angered by the text on mitigation, which they said reflected a severe lack of ambition and offered little beyond the ‘UAE Consensus’ agreed at COP28.
After having sabotaged the talks from the start, Saudi Arabia has finally admitted to opposing any text addressing fossil fuels, stating that “the Arab Group will not accept any text that targets any specific sectors, including fossil fuels.” China and Bolivia both agreed with the sentiment.
The COP29 venue was noticeably emptier today than in past days as civil society groups head home, but the negotiations are set to go on for a while longer and are unlikely to be wrapped up tomorrow as planned.
Still, the COP presidency remains adamant that a breakthrough is just around the corner. We’ll find out in the next 24 to 48 hours whether that happens – or if we have to wait another year for COP30 in Brazil.
Looking further ahead, countries have also yet to decide who will host COP31 in 2026, with Australia and Turkey both keen.
Just how big of a blow is Donald Trump’s election win to the climate? The U.S. and India have led the G20 countries in climate action since the Paris Agreement was signed, according to a report by Climate Action Tracker.
We’ll wrap up today with a more positive development from the G20 summit, where Indonesia has announced plans to phase out all fossil fuel-fired power plants by 2040.
With just two more days of COP29 to go, the negotiations are running increasingly late – meaning there’s little to report just yet.
But stay tuned for midnight Baku time, when the Azerbaijani COP presidency will release new draft texts on climate finance, mitigation, adaptation and NDCs.
For now, countries have yet to even start discussing the new collective quantified goal (NCQG) for climate finance as they’re waiting for the new text to detail how this finance will be structured: who will provide it, what it’ll encompass and for how long.
The first point is especially contentious. Countries such as China, South Korea and the Gulf petrostates are still classified as ‘developing countries’ based on their level of development at the Rio Summit in 1992, but their emissions are now much greater than they were back then.
The EU’s lead negotiator has refused to comment on reports yesterday suggesting that the bloc will propose a figure of USD 200–300 billion. Ministers from Uganda and Bolivia were not impressed by those numbers.
Nor were activists from Climate Action Network International (CAN), who promptly gave the bloc the Fossil of the Day award.
Other proposals so far range from USD 440–900 billion, Australia’s minister of climate change and energy has revealed.
Despite having left the negotiations after three days, Argentina will not leave the Paris Agreement, the country’s foreign minister has said.
And as OPEC’s secretary general backs up the Azerbaijani president in calling fossil fuels a “gift from God,” small island states are feeling “abandoned” at the summit, says the lead negotiator on finance for the Alliance of Small Islands States (AOSIS).
It makes you wonder what countries could achieve if they actually worked together for the common good rather than blindly pursuing their own self-interest, CIFOR-ICRAF COO Robert Nasi argues in an op-ed on Forests News.
Perhaps all that’s left is to celebrate the small victories – and we marked one today as Instituto Zág, the organization behind GLFx Zág Xokleng, won the 2024 Gender-Just Climate Solutions Award in the non-technical category at a side event here at COP29.
In another small win at the G20 summit in Rio, Brazil has announced a new initiative with the UN and UNESCO to tackle climate disinformation.
Once again, there is no progress to report today.
Countries are still debating over the wording of the draft text, with four paragraphs causing particular grief, according to delegates from two West African countries we spoke to today.
The delegates didn’t reveal which four paragraphs those were, but much of today was spent on discussing national adaptation plans (NAPs) – which has now concluded and will resume at the next UN climate meetings in June 2025 – and on the transfer of funds from the Clean Development Mechanism under the Kyoto Protocol.
Saudi Arabia is continuing to obstruct the negotiations, stalling not only on fossil fuels but also on adaptation, reducing emissions and other topics. Could this be a sign of things to come when the oil-rich Gulf state hosts the UNCCD COP16 desertification summit next month?
On top of the 1,700+ fossil fuel lobbyists and more than 480 for carbon capture, there are 204 lobbyists representing industrial agriculture attending COP29. That includes 35 traveling with the Brazilian government, which will host COP30 next year.
While Global North countries have still yet to announce how much climate finance they’re willing to offer, the EU is mulling a figure between USD 200–300 billion a year, officials have revealed.
As a reminder, Global South countries are demanding USD 1.3 trillion. In other words, the two parties are currently USD 1 trillion apart.
But is a trillion a year really as much as it sounds? Rich countries could easily afford it, economists say.
Some ways to raise that money could include levies on fossil fuels, aviation, shipping, plastics, financial transactions and cryptocurrencies, as well as carbon pricing and a wealth tax.
On that note: we’ve been framing the Global North and Global South as two opposing sides, but it’s not exactly black and white, as many delegates from poor countries have argued that China and India no longer qualify as ‘developing countries’ and should therefore start paying up.
After all, China’s all-time greenhouse gas emissions now exceed those of all 27 EU member states combined, according to a Carbon Brief analysis released today.
With little momentum in Baku, attention has turned to the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro, where leaders have made no explicit mention of the need to phase out or even “transition away” from fossil fuels, as was agreed at COP28.
This is likely to make negotiations at COP29 even more difficult, compounding Donald Trump’s election victory in the U.S. and Argentina’s withdrawal from the talks.
In a more positive development, the U.K., Colombia and New Zealand have joined an international coalition to phase out fossil fuel subsidies.
And in the U.S., the outgoing Biden administration has pledged a record USD 4 billion to the world’s poorest countries through the World Bank, though this is unlikely to be funded until Trump takes over in January – if his administration honors the pledge at all.
A shameless plug to close: we hosted a session at Extreme Hangout today, bringing together experts and local leaders to chat about landscape action in the Global South.
We also screened our brand-new documentary The Invisible Corridor – Where Nature and People Grow, which you can also watch here.
It’s the start of a new week here at COP29, but we wish we had some actual news to deliver.
After a deal on carbon markets on day one, followed by the U.K. announcing an ambitious new NDC on day two, the negotiations have been largely deadlocked ever since.
As the clock ticks down, COP29 President Mukhtar Babayev has expressed concern about the lack of progress.
UNFCCC Executive Secretary Simon Stiell was blunter, calling on countries to “cut the theatrics” and get on with business.
But rich and poor countries are still a long way apart on the key issue of climate finance, with the Global South demanding USD 1.3 trillion a year, while the Global North is yet to name a figure.
The frustration was palpable today among civil society groups at the summit.
Nigerian activists rallied to demand climate finance for the Niger Delta, while Climate Action Network International (CAN) awarded South Korea the ‘Fossil of the Day’ for blocking OECD countries from ending USD 41 billion in annual oil and gas subsidies from export credit agencies.
Unsurprisingly, many climate scientists have concluded that it’s now impossible to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius – especially given that we may have crossed that threshold already.
Scientists have also warned that countries could “cheat” by using natural carbon sinks like forests, peatlands and the ocean to offset their emissions rather than actually reducing them.
Back in Baku, the wait for a meaningful deal on finance continues.
The first week of COP29 has drawn to a close. Truth be told, there’s been very little to report all week, but our team did at least get our first taste of the conference today.
Next year’s COP30 hosts Brazil and prospective COP31 hosts Australia drew large crowds at their respective pavilions, but it’s unclear whether it was the program or the free coffee that did the trick.
While Russia made headlines by offering coloring books made by gas company Gazprom, there were few freebies left by today, with Venezuela still stocking a small selection of postcards showcasing its breathtaking scenery.
Dozens of countries put up pavilions adorned with varying levels of decor. Kyrgyzstan showed up with a yurt, Singapore offered free beer, and some of the Gulf states put on glitzy displays even while their negotiators were scuppering the negotiations behind closed doors.
The U.S. had a relatively muted presence at its pavilion, and there was a similar vibe at a separate tent set up by a coalition of local and state governments.
Behind the scenes, its negotiators were busy reassuring others following Donald Trump’s victory, while a Republican delegation also showed up to preach the virtues of fossil fuels.
Notably absent were India, which has been mainly working behind the scenes, and France, whose top negotiator stayed home after a feud with hosts Azerbaijan.
Outside the plenary hall, hundreds of activists formed a human chain as part of a silent protest, with many claiming that they had been muzzled by strict UN and Azerbaijani rules. Most attendees never saw them today, and neither did we.
And on the streets of Baku, the influx of over 66,000 visitors has upended the lives of many locals – especially the city’s poorest and most vulnerable.
Fossil fuels aren’t the only industry looking to sway negotiators: there are at least 480 lobbyists for carbon capture and storage at COP29, according to the Guardian.
As many major world leaders have skipped the conference, UNFCCC executive secretary Simon Stiell has written to the G20 asking them to put climate finance on the agenda when their leaders meet in Rio de Janeiro next week.
Our team has arrived in Baku – but there’s been frustratingly little progress to report today as COP29 wraps up its second themed day, this time on energy and peace, relief and recovery.
The rumors are true: the city does in fact reek of oil as its famously fierce winds buffet the shores of the Caspian Sea, bringing with it the aroma of nearby refineries.
So too, apparently, does the conference itself. Over 1,700 fossil fuel lobbyists have been granted access to COP29 this year, according to an analysis published today by Kick Big Polluters Out.
As was the case at COP28, these lobbyists have outnumbered the delegates from almost any single country – and at least 132 of them were executives invited by the Azerbaijani government as ‘guests,’ according to the Guardian.
That hasn’t deterred the g7+ – not to be confused with the G7, but rather a group of 20 conflict-affected countries from across the Global South – from asking rich countries to double their annual financial aid to help them tackle climate and security challenges across the bloc.
In case you missed it the other day, there are more displaced people around the world than ever. Fossil fuels are only going to raise those numbers further – but that hasn’t stopped the industry from attempting to co-opt the negotiations.
A group of prominent climate experts and leaders have penned an open letter calling for major reform to future UN climate conferences, including strict eligibility criteria to exclude countries that do not support the phaseout of fossil fuels from hosting future UN climate conferences.
This would presumably include petrostates such as Azerbaijan, which has also been clamping down on climate activism since it was awarded the right to host COP29 a year ago.
Now, many activists are skipping the summit entirely, instead opting to demonstrate alongside Greta Thunberg in neighboring Georgia.
In other news, a new UN report finds that 99 percent of methane leaks detected by a global monitoring system have gone ignored, while data from Climate TRACE breaks down how much each city, county, state or province has contributed to global emissions for the first time ever.
COP29 has been billed the ‘finance COP’ – and today feels like an especially important day as the first of seven themed days at the conference, starting with finance, investment and trade. But will rich countries put their money where their mouths are?
World leaders have left Baku after delivering their speeches over the last two days, and now it’s over to their negotiating teams to deliver an actual deal.
As a reminder in case you missed it in our preview article, countries are now looking to agree on a new collective quantified goal (NCQG), now that the previous goal of USD 100 billion a year has been achieved.
Global South countries are pushing for a figure of well over USD 1 trillion by 2035, but their needs are likely to far exceed that.
According to a report published today by the Independent High-Level Expert Group on Climate Finance (IHLEG), the world will need to spend some USD 6.5 trillion per year on climate finance to meet global climate targets by 2030.
But the chances of their Global North counterparts agreeing to that are dwindling as the negotiations grow increasingly fraught with division, especially after Argentina and France withdrew their top negotiators from the summit yesterday.
Away from the conference, Climate Action Tracker has released a new report that finds humanity on track for 2.7 degrees Celsius of warming this century – roughly in line with the findings of the UN report published a few weeks ago.
Meanwhile, Global Witness has zoomed in on the people of COP29’s host country, Azerbaijan, revealing that some 880,000 Azerbaijanis live close to gas flaring sites, which are a major source of air pollution with potentially deadly health impacts.
Our team is writing this en route to Baku, and we’ll have more to report firsthand once we get to COP29 tomorrow – so stay tuned!
How far have we come since countries agreed to “transition away” from fossil fuels at COP28 last year?
Not very far at all – and in fact, fossil fuel emissions are set to grow by 0.8 percent this year to reach another record high, according to data released at COP29 this morning.
Today is the second day of the World Leaders Climate Action Summit, which has seen dozens more world leaders address the stage here in Baku.
Leaders from across the Global South have demanded that rich countries ramp up their climate finance commitments. The prime ministers of Pakistan and Antigua and Barbuda were among the multitude of voices calling for grants, not loans that would mire their countries further in debt.
Bangladesh’s interim leader, Muhammad Yunus, compared the climate crisis with colonialism, saying that there is no reason to even negotiate when the Global North is clearly responsible and should pay for the damage it has caused.
Likewise, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama ventured off script to question the point of these annual climate talks, calling out his fellow leaders for allowing business to continue as usual.
But Argentina will take no further part in the negotiations, with its team having been ordered home. Its president, Javier Milei, has previously described the climate crisis as a “socialist lie.”
A diplomatic spat has kicked off between France and Azerbaijan, with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev criticizing France’s heavy-handed response to pro-independence protests in New Caledonia earlier this year.
In response, France’s minister for ecology, Agnes Pannier-Runacher, has canceled plans to attend COP29, calling Aliyev’s comments “unacceptable.”
No countries announced any major new commitments today, but a group of development banks, including the World Bank, has pledged to increase their climate financing to Global South countries by 60 percent by 2030, reaching USD 120 billion.
Today also saw a new report from Global Witness – which is hosting the protest site cop29.com – revealing that the oil and gas industry is making more than enough profit to pay for all climate loss and damage across the Global South.
As a reminder, this is the second year in a row that the UN Climate Change Conference has been hosted by a petrostate, following the U.A.E.’s hosting of COP28.
Highlights:
After a slow start yesterday, today was the day COP29 really kicked into gear as world leaders took to the stage for the World Leaders Climate Action Summit. But would their words amount to anything of substance?
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has taken the headlines by pledging to reduce emissions by an ambitious 81 percent by 2035 from 1990 levels. This new NDC builds on the U.K’s existing commitment to reduce emissions by 68 percent by 2030, earning cautious praise from civil society.
But that was the only major new commitment today, with the leaders of most major industrialized countries absent from the UN climate summit this year – a year that UN Secretary-General António Guterres has dubbed “a masterclass in climate destruction.”
Those that did show up had three minutes each to address the stage. Barbadian Prime Minister Mia Mottley, a familiar face at climate COPs, has decried the lack of funding for loss and damage and called on rich countries to develop new sources of climate financing.
Another small island leader, Hilda Heine, president of the Marshall Islands, has encouraged fellow Global South countries to make ambitious new commitments even in the face of inaction from the Global North.
There was more to report away from Baku than at the COP29 venue itself. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) released a report revealing that a record 120 million people are now forcibly displaced – three-quarters of whom are in countries highly exposed to climate risks.
Other reports released today found that climate disinformation is more ubiquitous on social media than ever before, while the world is now on track to melt large parts of Greenland and west Antarctica, causing devastating sea level rise.
And yet, oil and gas companies enjoyed windfall profits of almost half a trillion USD in 2022 – nearly as much as the climate finance provided to the Global South over the past five years.
Nor do fossil fuel companies have any legal obligation to slash their emissions, apparently. A Dutch court of appeal has overturned a 2021 ruling ordering Shell to reduce emissions by 45 percent by 2030.
First, a reminder of where COP28 left off: with a historic, yet disappointing, commitment to “transition away” from fossil fuels, as well as the first pledges to the then brand-new Loss and Damage Fund.
This year’s UN Climate Change Conference is much smaller than last year’s in Dubai, with 40,000 to 50,000 people expected to attend, compared to the 90,000 that showed up at COP28.
Several major world leaders are also skipping COP29, with U.S. President Joe Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olof Scholz and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen all missing.
Today’s main headline is that countries have finally agreed rules to govern carbon credits under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement – though some delegates felt that the decision had been rushed through without proper deliberation.
U.S. climate envoy John Podesta has called out President-elect Donald Trump for his climate denial and pledged to push on with climate action, saying “the fight is bigger than one election, one political cycle in one country.”
In reality, the new administration is unlikely to abide by anything the U.S. agrees to at this summit.
Meanwhile, the World Meteorological Organization has announced that 2024 is almost certain to be the hottest year on record – and the first to ever hit 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
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