The Dods Guide to COP21

The United Nations climate change conference kicks off in Paris on Monday and is expected to produce an agreement on how to cut greenhouse gas emissions until 2030, and thus limit the global temperature rise to 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels. 

The conference is all the more important in light of the 2009 Copenhagen summit, which failed to set up a legally binding treaty, even though it was the first time all of the world’s developed countries and the biggest developing countries agreed on the principle of limiting emissions. 

Scientists identified the 2C target as the threshold above which global warming becomes irreversible. Although global temperatures have continued to rise since 1998, they have done so at a slower rate.

In order to avoid repeating the last minute chaos of Copenhagen, countries were required to submit their national targets for cutting GHG emissions, the so-called Intended Nationally Determined Contributions or INDCs. In this briefing we provide an overview of the pledges submitted, as well as the most contentious issues that are expected to dominate the agenda over the next two weeks.

Dods EU monitoring produced a complimentary guide to help you understand all the events that are happening during the conference.

In addition to that, Dods EU Monitoring will deliver a daily newsletter to update you on the progress being made, and the reactions of stakeholders.