After the Glasglow and Sharm el Sheikh climate summits, the call for the COP28 in Dubai, between November 30 and December 12, is presented as one of the last opportunities to avoid environmental collapse. Experts demand a radical positioning of the international community at a time when it is not about being catastrophic, but about definitively face a reality that does not allow delays or empty statements. The three main challenges of the United Nations Conference on Climate Change are the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, adaptation measures to climate change and financing for the most vulnerable countries. The Kyoto Protocol, in 1997, and the Paris Agreement of 2015, outlined the guidelines for restrict CO2 emissions into the atmosphere. The most optimistic expectations limited the sustainable increase to about 1.5 degrees. Today, only about 10% has been cut in the forecast, with a temperature increase predicted in 2100 of 2.5 degrees. The minimum objective is to ensure that global emissions of polluting gases reach their peak in 2025 and fall by half before the end of the decade.
The experts consulted by EL PERIÓDICO in the special that we published this weekend on the summit agree that it is a question of strict survival and that, if the measures to be taken do not arrive immediately we are close to a point of no return in the health of the planet. The Intergovernmental Panel of Experts against Climate Change warns in its latest report that we live in a decisive time that will define the future in the short and medium term and they call for binding commitments that cannot be delayed any longer. Facing this reality means choosing economic development models that are compatible with sustainability of the planet. Although social concern about global warming has increased, undertaking the transition is not always easy; it requires modifying habits and neutralizing denialist discourses that find accommodation in resistance to change. Government action (through the promotion of laws and the provision of public resources, subsidies and other fiscal aid) should facilitate this path.
COP28 has other hot topics on the table, related to the greenhouse effect. One, that of the adaptation faced with a state of things that, at this point, we can only mitigate and, another, the thorny issue of financing directed to the most vulnerable countries, for the first time on the summit’s priority agenda. It is a responsibility of the states that have polluted the most throughout history, because it would be completely immoral if the bill to pay had to be assumed by underdeveloped or developing countries. The European Union leads the demand, with the idea of exceeding 100 billion dollars from 2025 with verifiable mechanisms of involvement and with a hitherto unknown effectiveness.
The roadmap is clear, but requires collaborative will, without delays or half measures. It remains to be seen if in Dubai we can finally prevent, as the Secretary General of the United Nations warned, “our planet from going towards the climate precipice.”