Achievements of COP 18: The Doha Climate Gateway

At the UN Climate Change Conference in Doha, Qatar
(COP18/CMP8), governments have taken the next essential step in the global
response to climate change. Countries have successfully launched a new commitment period
under the Kyoto Protocol, agreed a firm timetable to adopt a universal climate
agreement by 2015 and agreed a path to raise necessary ambition to respond to
climate change. They also endorsed the completion of new institutions and agreed
ways and means to deliver scaled-up climate finance and technology to developing
countries.

“Doha has opened up a new gateway to bigger ambition and to
greater action – the Doha Climate Gateway. Qatar is proud to have been able to
bring governments here to achieve this historic task. I thank all governments
and ministers for their work to achieve this success. Now governments must move
quickly through the Doha Climate Gateway to push forward with the solutions to
climate change,” said COP President Abdullah bin Hamad Al-Attiyah.

The Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on
Climate Change (UNFCCC), Christiana Figueres called on countries to swiftly
implement what has been agreed in Doha so that the world can stay below the
internationally agreed maximum two degrees Celsius temperature rise.

“I congratulate the Qatar Presidency for managing a complex and
challenging conference. Now, there is much work to do. Doha is another step in
the right direction, but we still have a long road ahead. The door to stay below
two degrees remains barely open. The science shows it, the data proves it,” said
Ms Figueres.

“The UN Climate Change negotiations must now focus on the
concrete ways and means to accelerate action and ambition. The world has the
money and technology to stay below two degrees. After Doha, it is a matter of
scale, speed, determination and sticking to the timetable,” she said.

In Doha, governments also successfully concluded work under the
Convention that began in Bali in 2007 and ensured that remaining elements of
this work will be continued under the UN Climate Change process.

The next major UN Climate Change Conference – COP19/ CMP9 –
will take place in Warsaw, Poland, at the end of 2013.

The results of COP18/CMP8 in more detail

1) Amendment of the Kyoto Protocol

The Kyoto Protocol, as the only existing and binding agreement
under which developed countries commit to cutting greenhouse gases, has been
amended so that it will continue as of 1 January 2013.

– Governments have decided that
the length of the second commitment period will be 8 years.

– The legal requirements that will
allow a smooth continuation of the Protocol have been agreed.

– The valuable accounting rules of
the protocol have been preserved.

– Countries that are taking on
further commitments under the Kyoto Protocol have agreed to review their
emission reduction commitments at the latest by 2014, with a view to increasing
their respective levels of ambition.

– The Kyoto Protocol’s Market
Mechanisms – the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), Joint Implementation (JI)
and International Emissions Trading (IET) – can continue as of 2013.

– Access to the mechanisms will be
uninterrupted for all developed countries that have accepted targets for the
second commitment period.

– JI will continue to operate,
with the agreed technical rules allowing the issuance of credits, once a host
country’s emissions target has been formally established.

– Australia, the EU, Japan, Lichtenstein, Monaco and
Switzerland have declared that they will not carry over any surplus emissions
trading credits (Assigned Amounts) into the second commitment period of the
Kyoto Protocol.

2) Time table for the 2015 global climate change
agreement and increasing ambition before 2020

– Governments have agreed to speedily work toward a universal
climate change agreement covering all countries from 2020, to be adopted by
2015, and to find ways to scale up efforts before 2020 beyond the existing
pledges to curb emissions so that the world can stay below the agreed maximum 2
degrees Celsius temperature rise.

– A significant number of meetings
and workshops are to be held in 2013 to prepare the new agreement and to explore
further ways to raise ambition.

– Governments have agreed to
submit to the UN Climate Change Secretariat, by 1 March 2013, information, views
and proposals on actions, initiatives and options to enhance ambition.

– Elements of a negotiating text
are to be available no later than the end of 2014, so that a draft negotiating
text is available before May 2015.

In Doha, the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announced he
would convene world leaders in 2014 to mobilize the political will to help
ensure the 2015 deadline is met.

3) Completion of
new infrastructure

– In Doha, governments significantly advanced the completion of
new infrastructure to channel technology and finance to developing nations and
move toward the full implementation of this infrastructure and support. Most
importantly, they have:

– endorsed the selection of the
Republic of Korea as the location of the Green Climate Fund and the work plan of
the Standing Committee on Finance. The Green Climate Fund is expected to start
its work in Sondgo in the second half of 2013, which means that it can launch
activities in 2014.

– confirmed a UNEP-led consortium as host of the Climate
Technology Center (CTC), for an initial term of five years. The CTC, along with
its associated Network, is the implementing arm of the UNFCCCs Technology
Mechanism. Governments have also agreed the constitution of the CTC advisory
board.

4) Long-term climate finance

– Developed countries have
reiterated their commitment to deliver on promises to continue long-term climate
finance support to developing nations, with a view to mobilizing 100 billion USD
both for adaptation and mitigation by 2020.

– The agreement also encourages
developed countries to increase efforts to provide finance between 2013-15 at
least to the average annual level with which they provided funds during the
2010-2012 fast-start finance period. This is to ensure there is no gap in
continued finance support while efforts are otherwise scaled up.

– Governments will continue a work
programme on long-term finance during 2013 under two co-chairs to contribute to
the on-going efforts to scale up mobilization of climate finance and report to
the next COP on pathways to reach that target.

– Germany, the UK, France, Denmark, Sweden and the EU
Commission announced concrete finance pledges in Doha for the period up to 2015,
totaling approximately 6 billion USD.

Other key outcomes of COP18/CMP8 in Doha

Review

– Governments have launched a robust process to review the
long-term temperature goal. This will start in 2013 and conclude by 2015, and is
a reality check on the advance of the climate change threat and the possible
need to mobilize further action.

Adaptation

– Governments have identified ways
to further strengthen the adaptive capacities of the most vulnerable, also
through better planning.

– A pathway has been established towards concrete institutional
arrangements to provide the most vulnerable populations with better protection
against loss and damage caused by slow onset events such as rising sea levels.

– Ways to implement National Adaptation Plans for least
developed countries have been agreed, including linking funding and other
support

Support of developing country action

– Governments have completed a
registry to record developing country mitigation actions that seek recognition
or financial support. The registry will be a flexible, dynamic, web-based
platform.

– A new work programme to build capacity through climate change
education and training, create public awareness and enable the public to
participate in climate change decision-making has been agreed in Doha. This is
important to create a groundswell of support for embarking on a new climate
change regime after 2020

New market mechanisms

– A work programme has been agreed
to further elaborate the new market-based mechanism under the UNFCCC, and also
sets out possible elements for its operation.

– A work programme to develop a framework for recognizing
mechanisms established outside the UNFCCC, such as nationally-administered or
bilateral offset programmes, and to consider their role in helping countries to
meet their mitigation targets, has also been agreed.

Actions on forests

– In Doha, governments have further clarified ways to measure
deforestation, and to ensure that efforts to fight deforestation are supported.

Carbon Capture and Storage

– Governments meeting in Doha have looked at ways to ensure the
effectiveness and environmental integrity of projects under the Kyoto Protocol’s
Clean Development Mechanism that capture and store carbon emissions

Development and transfer of technology

– Countries have taken forward work on enabling the development
and transfer of technologies that can help developing countries adapt and curb
their emissions.

Avoiding negative consequences of climate action

– In some cases, the implementation of actions that reduce
emissions could result in negative economic or social consequences for other
countries. In Doha, governments discussed measures to address such consequences
in a special forum.

Source: Doha 2012

The History of Climate Change Negotiations aka Passing the Buck (Video)

COP 18: Bridging the Gulf Between Science and Reality
A Short History of the UNFCCC Conference of the Parties (COP)

Yvo de Boer’s Comments and Predictions Post COP 17 >
COP 18: The History of Carbon and Respective Responsibilities
COP 18: WBCSD on Establishing a Global Carbon Market
Figueres on COP 18: We Need Domestic Legislation

COP 18 Drivers of Deforestation (Video)
Doha progress update by Christiana Figueres on 30 November 2012 (Video)
Christiana Figueres on the Objectives of COP 18 (Video)
COP 18: Major Issues, Flooding in the UK, What We Have Achieved on Climate Change and the US Position (Video)