CCAC at COP29: Daily Updates - 13 November 2024

COP29 Continues

Live from Baku, today was the second and final day of the “World Leaders’ Summit” component of COP29, with global leaders addressing the plenary and providing their national perspectives. Some world leaders criticized the attendance at this year’s Summit, pointing out that the leaders of the top 13 emitting countries, who collectively contributed approximately 70% of greenhouse gas emissions in 2023, were not represented by their Heads of State. 

The afternoon session, the “Leaders’ Summit of the Small Island Developing States on Climate Change”, convened high-level speakers to address the urgent action that is required by SIDs to manage the deepening crisis they fact on the front lines of climate change. UN Secretary General, António Guterres, called for rapid deployment of climate finance for developing countries, defining it as “climate justice”, and noting that the $100 billion target was not nearly ambitious enough. Notably, 33 SIDs are already a part of the Global Methane Pledge, and the CCAC is providing support to several SIDS on super pollutant mitigation internationally and is pleased to support the Federated States of Micronesia as a Global Methane Pledge Champion. In the Pacific, the CCAC is committed to build on the priorities identified at the Pacific NDC 3.0 Forum and workshops held earlier this year in Vanuatu, Samoa, and Fiji, with research showing that super pollutant mitigation can reduce cumulative sea level rise by 22% by the end of the century.

Elsewhere at COP, multilateral development banks issued a joint statement to increase climate finance, announcing a goal of increasing this finance to $120 billion by 2030, a roughly 60% increase on the amount in 2023. Read more here.

Super Pollutants at COP29

Following yesterday’s launch of the Global N2O Assessment, the CCAC organized a press conference to highlight the key findings of the report, featuring Rick Duke, CCAC Co-Chair and US Deputy Special Envoy for Climate, David Kanter, Associate Professor at NYU and Co-Chair of the Assessment, and Kaveh Zahedi, Director of the Office of Climate Change, Biodiversity and Environment at the Food and Agriculture Organization. Watch the press conference here.

In line with the theme of the afternoon, Martina Otto spoke at an event hosted by the Moana Blue Pacific Pavilion, alongside representatives from Pacific SIDs, and later delivered a keynote address at a side event titled “unlocking the potential for financing methane mitigation from solid waste for the NDCs and beyond”, co-hosted by the World Biogas Association and the International Solid Waste Association.

In their own words at the Leaders’ Summit of the Small Island Developing States on Climate Change

“I lead a country which experienced in the first half of the year a 50-year drought. Then on the first day of the second half, we experienced the earliest category five hurricane on record. The island was devastated by flash flooding and landslides, all in a couple of hours. We are not here to beg, or to ask for sympathy, It is one planet. It may be small islands today, but it will be Spain tomorrow and Florida the next day.”

Dickon Mitchell, Prime Minister of Grenada

"Let us ask ourselves, what if this was my home, my family? This shared sense of humanity should inspire us to work towards tangible, transformative outcomes over the coming days, ensuring that COP29 concludes with meaningful progress. These appeals have been voiced countless times, including myself, at previous COPs. Yet here we are again, frustrated by inaction, unheard and facing resistance to the necessary scale of climate finance. For the sake of those most vulnerable, we must set a path forward that aligns with the urgent realities we face. My country is ready, again, to play its part. The question remains, are we ready to act decisively and collaboratively for future generations?"

Mark Brown, Prime Minister of the Cook Islands

We Don't Have Time X U.S.: The Other Half of Warming: Super Pollutants

Watch the broadcast recording on the role of governments in raising ambition and action on super pollutants.

Speakers:

• Rick Duke, Deputy Special Envoy for Climate, U.S. Department of State
• Durwood Zaelke, President, IGSD
• David Kanter, Associate Professor of Environmental Studies, New York University
• Martina Otto, Head of Secretariat, Climate & Clean Air Coalition, UNEP

In case you missed it

As part of yesterday’s session, the UK announced an ambitious NDC 3.0 update, with Prime Minister Keir Starmer announcing a commitment to cut 81% of emissions by 2035. The UK is one of a handful of countries that have already released their new NDCs, which are expected by February 2025. The CCAC has been calling for increased ambition on super pollutant action in national climate plans, and recently released guidelines to support countries to include these pollutants in upcoming NDCs. Read more here.