Expectations for COP 31 starting today? This year’s COP (the UN Climate Change Conference) comes at a critical time after a year of heatwaves, severe droughts, destructive wildfires destroying homes and wild life, storms, and heavy rainfall, events which are intensifying globally. These resulted in thousands of deaths. And there’s more: the effects of an anticipated very Strong El Niño, rising sea levels, melting glaciers and the thermal expansion of warming oceans which threaten coastal communities and low-lying islands; ocean acidification, habitat loss, and shifting weather patterns which endanger wildlife and reduce crop yields.
These and many other problems, including the growing energy crisis, are on the agenda for the 200 or so nations to negotiate emissions reductions and climate finance in Ankara, Turkey from today (9th) through to 20th November. No doubt these life and death issues will be the subject of fierce debate, but will a clear path emerge at these times of global and climate instability?
Wealthy countries should spend far more on dealing with the climate crisis than the 5% of GDP promised by Nato members for defence because “the climate issue is the security issue”, the host of the next UN summit has said. But The Guardian reports that in comments that are likely to prove contentious, the COP31 president-designate, Murat Kurum, hedged on whether countries should try to repeat a previous agreement to “transition away from fossil fuels” – the primary cause of the climate crisis. Kurum, the Turkish climate change minister, told the Guardian the world was “already in a transition” and suggested fossil fuel use could be addressed indirectly through other steps. Meanwhile Greenpeace has urged governments meeting at COP 31 to take stock of the latest emissions gap data and rapidly scale up action towards a just transition away from fossil fuels to keep 1.5°C alive.
The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has warned that global warming could reach up to 2.8°C this century if current government policies continue, a worse prediction than last year, but rapid emissions cuts could still limit that to 1.7°C to 1.8°C. It said emissions cuts of 18 percent by 2030, 45 percent by 2035 and 69 percent by 2040 – all based on 2025 levels – were needed for this scenario, in addition to carbon dioxide removals.
In its Emissions Gap Report 2026: The Point of Return, the UNEP said the roll-out of renewable energy and climate policies had already yielded cuts to emissions, but a massive acceleration was required to limit the extent of an overshoot of the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit. It had earlier declared the world would exceed 1.5°C warming, likely in the next few years.
At COP31, Greenpeace is calling on states to reaffirm and accelerate action towards the first Global Stocktake energy goals agreed at COP28 in Dubai in 2023: tripling renewable energy and doubling energy efficiency by 2030 and accelerating a just, orderly and equitable transition away from fossil fuels this critical decade.
Friends of the Earth (to which ACE is affiliated) also also laid out its blueprint for the COP calling for holding the government to account when it claims to be leading the way on emissions reductions without taking into account its historical contribution and
*Making sure that solutions to the climate crisis do not amplify existing injustices,
but benefit the hardest hit first.
*Providing international finance to support other countries emissions reductions and
adaptation to climate impacts.
*Supporting a just transition away from coal, oil and gas so that workers who depend on
dirty industries aren’t left unemployed.
*And crucially, actively listening to voices of people from the Global South, Indigenous
people and frontline communities, and amplifying their voices.
It’s clear that COP31 takes place at a time of growing urgency for climate action. It will be an important test of whether greater momentum can be built not just around policies already agreed at previous COP meetings, but whether international climate cooperation can translate political commitments into practical implementation. We cannot afford failure.