So, what has been agreed upon? Here are some of the highlights:
Transition to clean energy
• More than 40 countries – including the US, India, EU and China – have backed the ‘Glasgow Breakthrough Agenda’. This is designed to accelerate the deployment and drive down the costs of clean technologies over the next decade.
• Over 20 countries have agreed to divert their spending away from fossil fuels, generating an estimated $8bn a year globally for clean energy.
• The ‘Just Energy Transition Partnership’, a new collaboration between the UK, US, EU and South Africa, outlines long-term plans to aid the latter’s decarbonisation efforts. It is expected to prevent up to 1-1.5 gigatonnes of emissions over the next 20 years.
• 28 companies, including Shell, bp and EDF, pledged to drive the demand for and supply of decarbonised hydrogen as part of the H2Zero initiative.
Deforestation
• Leaders from more than 100 countries, representing about 85 percent of the world's forests, promised to stop deforestation by 2030.
Finance
• The UK has outlined plans to become the world’s first net zero financial centre. Financial institutions will be required to publish their net zero transition plans by 2023.
• The ’Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero’ (GFANZ) saw 450 private financial organisations (including the world’s biggest banks), who control $130tn, agree to finance clean technology.
Methane
• A scheme to cut 30 percent of current methane emissions by 2030 has been agreed upon by more than 100 countries (though China, Russia and India haven’t joined).
Farming
• 45 countries pledged to make farming more sustainable, promising to invested in green agricultural practices, alongside the commitments on methane.
• By 2030, the UK pledged that 75 percent of its farmers will engage in low-carbon practices, Germany will lower land emissions by 25 million tonnes, and Brazil aims to reduce emissions by one billion tonnes by extending its low-carbon farming programme to 72 million hectares.
Coal
• More than 40 countries have pledged to quit coal (the single biggest contributor to climate change), including major coal-dependent countries, Poland, Vietnam and Chile, but not the US, Australia, India or China.
• The original draft of the Glasgow Pact contained a pledge to phase-out coal completely. However, a last-minute intervention from India and China saw this pledge watered down significantly, changing the "phase-out of coal" to "phase-down of unabated coal".
Education
• The UK has outlined plans to put climate change at the heart of the curriculum by 2023. Children will be taught about the importance of protecting the planet and encouraged to help increase biodiversity. They will also be able to track their progress against other UK schools by inputting their data onto a new, virtual National Education Nature Park.
Transport
• All HGVs in the UK will need to be zero-emission by 2040, adding to the previous pledge for phasing out all petrol and diesel cars by 2030.
• A new design for EV charge points, with the aim of creating “one of the most convenient, affordable and reliable charging networks in the world”, has been launched in the UK.
• A multi-donor trust fund, the World Bank’s Global Facility to Decarbonise Transport, pledged to contribute US$200 million over the next 10 years to accelerate the decarbonisation of road transport in emerging markets and developing economies in the Global South.
• A pledge to end the sale of non-electric vehicles by 2040, or 2030 in leading markets, was agreed by 24 countries, although three of the world’s largest car markets, the US, Germany and China, as well as leading automakers – the BMW Group, Renault Group, Hyundai Motor Group and Stellantis – refused to sign the deal.
• 22 countries signed The Clydebank Declaration for green shipping corridors, with the aim of creating at least six zero-emission maritime routes by 2025.
Notably, the two biggest CO2 emitters, the US and China, have also declared their commitment to working together to combat climate change over the next decade, tackling a range of issues, including methane emissions, the transition to clean energy, and de-carbonisation.
Scientists have warned that, unless global emissions are cut by 45 percent by 2030, the target of keeping the temperature rise below 1.5°C (as outlined in the 2015 Paris Agreement), will be out of reach. Research published by the Climate Action Tracker (CAT) on Tuesday calculated that, based on countries’ current 2030 emission targets, global heating will soar to 2.4C. It is therefore crucial that countries go further and bolder in their plans to reach net zero.
Katie White, Executive Director of Campaigns at WWF, said: “It’s essential that we recognise this as the start line, not the finish. If we are to come close to reaching our 1.5°C target in time, ambition and momentum need to accelerate across the board.”
The manufacturing industry will be at the forefront of turning COP26’s pledges into reality. As British naturalist David Attenborough pointed out, “A new industrial revolution, powered by millions of sustainable innovations, is essential and is indeed already beginning.”
Let’s keep that ball rolling and continue to be proactive in striving for a cleaner, greener and more energy-efficient future.
Catch up on further COP26 news here.