Highlights and images for 11 December 2023

Delegates at the 28th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 28) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) spent most of the day “waiting until the cows came home,” in the words of one delegate. Everyone was waiting for new texts to be posted on the key outstanding issues.

Want to dig deeper into today's talks? Read the full Earth Negotiations Bulletin daily report.

Showing once again how unfazed they are, negotiators working on cooperative approaches to implement the Paris Agreement (Article 6) were the only ones to continue meeting in technical level informal consultations. All other issues were being discussed behind closed doors, with various people involved, including UN Secretary-General António Guterres.

In the evening, the closing plenaries got under way to gavel through the decisions that were ready for adoption. As these did not constitute a real progression compared to the status at the closing of the Subsidiary Bodies, this brought little relief.

The new text on the Global Stocktake, which was shared in the early evening, was met with deep concern and considered “utterly insufficient.” Many felt the text does not live up to the goal of 1.5°C as the “North Star” of COP 28. Many even said the draft goes back on ambition. Hopes that this text would include strong language on fossil fuels were dashed. The text suggests instead a laundry list of actions parties “could” do, including: 

• limitations on permitting new and unabated coal power generation;
• advancing abatement and removal technologies; and 
• “reducing” consumption and production of fossil fuels to achieve net zero “by, before, or around 2050.”

In evening consultations, ministers did not mince their words when they reacted to the text. Many underscored the document falls “short, way short” of what they can accept and constitutes a “meaningless list of options” that go back on ambition and compromises the 1.5°C target.

Events held in the margins of the negotiations aimed at keeping up the pressure for an ambitious outcome. The Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance, for example, convened a press conference in the afternoon, to underscore:

• global emissions must peak in 2025;
• abatement is not enough; and
• the need for a just, equitable, and orderly phasing out of fossil fuel in the Global Stocktake.