Near the end of the United Nations climate summit in Sharm El-Sheikh last year, European Union climate chief Frans Timmermans offered a grand bargain to break the deadlock in the two-week negotiations.
The 27-member bloc would consent to the creation of a finance facility to pay for loss and damage caused by climate change, fulfilling a demand made by developing countries. But the EU¡¯s support would come only if all countries agreed on a stronger commitment to eliminate the use of fossil fuels. The loss-and-damage fund promise made it into the final deal at COP27; the stronger agreement to phase out fossil fuels did not.
That defeat still stings for Timmermans. ¡°There¡¯s no way ¡ª no way ¡ª we¡¯re going to achieve any of our goals if we do not do more on mitigation,¡± he said at last week¡¯s Petersberg Climate Dialogue in Berlin, an event aimed at boosting ambition before the annual U.N. climate summit in Dubai at the end of the year. Without stronger action against emissions, ¡°whatever we do on finance, on adaptation, on loss and damage, will fall on short of what we need.¡±
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