18 October 2024 – This week CISL co-hosted a COP29 panel discussion with Cambridge Zero Policy Forum at its Cambridge headquarters, the Entopia Building.
The event was organised jointly by CISL and the Cambridge Zero Policy Forum, and CISL’s interim CEO, Lindsay Hooper, moderated a panel of expert speakers:
- David Moran (UK Climate Adviser, Caspian Policy Center, and former COP26 UK Regional Climate and Energy Ambassador for Europe and Central Asia)
- Steve Davison (Deputy Director, Cambridge Zero and Higher Education Lead for the Climate Champions Team)
- Dr Joanna Depledge (Research Fellow, Cambridge Centre for Environment, Energy and Natural Resource Governance (C-EENRG)
- Millie May (Political Sciences BSc student, University of Cambridge, ActNow Film Assistant and COP28 Delegate for Young European Leadership).
The discussion provided participants with context about the central Asia region, the COP process, what’s at stake in negotiations, and the voices and factors that will influence outcomes.
The COP context
COP29, which takes place in Baku, Azerbaijan, next month, will see heads of state, climate experts and negotiators come together to agree coordinated action to tackle climate change. Negotiations will have an explicit focus on financing commitments and mechanisms to enable economic transition.
As well as the negotiations, there will also be space for countries, international organisations and other participants to showcase climate action, highlight diverse climate change issues and share knowledge.
David Moran is an expert on the Caspian region. He said: “Azerbaijan has been severely damaged by climate change. Collectively the parties face a range of challenges – not least a range of geopolitical problems. The good news is that world leaders are aware of the risk, there’s an annual climate conference, and they’re focusing on renewables. But countries won’t stop using fossil fuels because the alternatives aren’t changing quickly enough.”
He continued, “The perspective from the Caspian region is very different than it was five years ago. They’re confronted by what they’re suffering and have made the link between what they’re seeing out the window and climate change as an abstract thing. This was a region that looked inwards and many of the countries didn’t talk to each other. For all sorts of reasons – geopolitical, climate and commercial – that has changed and they’ve opened up.”
What to expect?
Dr Depledge went on to discuss potential outcomes from COP29, predicting “There’s almost certainly going to be a ‘Baku Declaration’ or a ‘Baku Action’ or something as long as it’s got the word Baku in it. This has been a real trend since Paris for presidencies to have this headline or omnibus decision coming out. So it will be interesting to see what Azerbaijan decides to do with its headline decision. It’s possible it will be to do with methane, being such a big methane emitter.”
She also discussed how far we’ve come: “I think it’s dangerous to say that we haven’t achieved anything at all over the past 30 years. That plays into the hands of UN and climate skeptics who would like to see the entire COP process blown apart. And I think that would be a big mistake. Things would be a lot worse if we hadn’t had the climate change negotiations.”
And commented on the wider political context: “The elephant in the room is the dire political situation, and the US election being a week before. If, say, Trump is elected, the US negotiating team will be a lame duck.”
Who goes to COP29?
Steve Davison compared the attendees from previous COPs to those arriving in Baku for its start on November 11. “In the UAE [COP28 in Dubai, 2023], there were just short of 100,000 people. The badges fall in to different categories, but the main one is observers. There are also delegation, and overflow badges – which is where many lobbyists fall into. The problem in increasing numbers to COPs, you increase the people who don’t know the process.”
“So UNFCCC have been looking into this and because there’s been so much concern, and because the capacity in Azerbaijan to host this, is much reduced numbers. But they’ve also wanted to increase the amount of Global South representation. This is something that’s always concerned a lot of us – it's been too Global North heavy. Unfortunately, what’s happened in the process is a lot of the active parts of civil society, universities etc, are Global North and so they’ve had passes reduced massively.”
The youth voice
On the topic of getting young people interested and engaged in the COP process, Millie May highlighted: “Intergenerational equity is really important now. Youth make up half of the world’s population, so they should have a say in the COP negotiations. But it can’t be youth-washing or tokenism... How much of the youth’s concerns or demands are actually being heard and how much support are delegations providing to youth in order to create an accessible space for them to advocate in?”
The discussion encompassed questions of vested interest lobbying, the impact of wars and AI, the need to address current economic paradigms, and the role of universities.
The panel concluded by acknowledging that there are also forthcoming COPs on nature and desertification, as well global and regional summits on trade, security and economic matters. The consequences of all of these are relevant to decision-makers across government, business, finance and to civil society. There is a role for universities in creating spaces for conversations that span these inter-related issues.
CISL also hosted a panel discussion on which expert speakers from UNEP-WCMC, Cambridge Conservation Initiative, RSPB and UBP debated the biodiversity crisis, as well as a tiered approach to systems change. Read about the event.
CISL will be attending COP29 with a delegation alongside the University of Cambridge and published a briefing exploring what to expect from the conference: Finance, climate action plans and carbon markets: What to expect from COP29.