Ecology

COP26 was supposed to be the “most inclusive COP ever”. Lisa Tostado reports on why the promised cannot be considered fulfilled and where inclusion and representation remain an issue to be addressed urgently.

To avoid further environmental damages due to the use of EU money, the European Commission should suspend funding to the Hungarian government.

Inequalities are striking in the climate crisis. Lisa Tostado unpacks them and reports on the action on payment of climate debt at the COP26 in Glasgow.

Methane is the second biggest contributor to the climate crisis, responsible for about 0.5°C of human-caused global heating so far. One of the main emitters of the powerful greenhouse gas is the oil and gas sector, where methane can leak across the whole supply chain – during extraction, transport, storage and use. The extent to which such leakages occur is only vaguely known, with companies often reporting emissions only on the basis of calculations as opposed to actual measurements. Where measurements are being done, they often show higher emission rates than previously anticipated.

Recent carbon-neutrality pledges may seem ambitious, but merely serve to promote a new set of false climate solutions under a different guise. Such pledges may persuade many people, but the climate isn’t buying it.

Global climate policy is the subject of multiple announcements put to the test over the course of these two weeks of COP26. Between the countries that have established carbon neutrality targets for 2050 (the United States and the European Union) and those looking to 2060 or further instead (Russia, China, India), the major challenge lies not in the deadlines, but in the translation of these dramatic promises into concrete actions.

Lisa Tostado unpacks some basics in the first report during her attendance at this year’s COP26 in Glasgow.

Where in the global dialogue is the aspiration for adaptation, equitable climate finance and inclusivity? What practical actions will the global community take to address these cardinal objectives? For African countries - which have contributed least to climate change but remain most vulnerable to its impacts - these objectives are as important as net-zero ambitions.

The causes of the current global gas crisis are now well understood. Europe finds itself the convergence zone of two supply challenges, related to a shortfall of pipeline supplies and simultaneously an inability to attract deliveries of liquefied natural gas (LNG). Consequently, going into winter storage levels are low, and prices are extremely high. But the UK has been singled out as being more vulnerable than most, why is this so and what lessons can be learnt from the current situation?