For a successful COP26, we will not only need to raise the ambitions of the National Climate Plans but support the climate vulnerable developing countries and also advance the Paris Rulebook.
That means all the countries updating or submitting new National Climate Plans that collectively keep limited warming down to 1.5C within reach, as it is clear that is not the case right now. No country escape’s the climate crisis but those emitted the least and the most affected. That is why we will need to deliver the $100 bn annually to the developing world as promised in Paris even before the COP begins, as it has become an issue of trust. And finally the rule book has to have a common time frameworks for reporting and action required to help enhance pledges, to hold anyone to account.
Only then can we say we have had a successful COP26 at Glasgow.
A version of the above blog was published as a letter in the Evening Standard on the 7th of October with a supporting response from their editor.