African nations finalizing demands ahead of COP 27

In the lead-up to the 27th United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP 27, African nations are finalizing their demands to present a common position. The summit, set to take place in Egypt in November, has been dubbed by some as the “African COP.” African Union member states are meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, this week to further define their stances. Key focus areas for African negotiators in November will include climate change mitigation; an equitable energy transition; adaptation, loss, and damage; climate finance; and carbon trading. Jean-Paul Adam, the director for technology, climate change, and natural resources management at the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, spoke to reporters Monday about the issues under debate. The goals set out at the U.N. climate summit held last year in Glasgow, Scotland, don’t cut it, he said. Even if countries achieve prescribed nationally determined plans by 2030, global temperatures are slated to rise this century by 2.4 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels — which exceeds the U.N. target cap of 1.5 degrees. “More ambition is needed at COP 27,” Adam said. Climate finance The hope is that new collective and quantifiable goals on climate finance will be established at COP 27, Adam said. Last year, the mobilization of such finance was estimated at $83.3 billion by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, falling short of an international commitment for $100 billion per year. Adam said the $100 billion target was already insufficient. For African climate negotiators, the starting point is $1.3 trillion per year in financing for climate. And further transparency is important because some countries double-count their climate finance commitments or move them around from other sectors to qualify as climate finance. Adam said more clarity is needed on how much will be available from multilateral development banks through the new Resilience and Sustainability Trust at the International Monetary Fund. Market-based mechanisms — such as green bonds, in which funding is committed to environmentally aligned development projects — are also on the agenda at COP 27. Green bond issuances have increased dramatically in recent years, but the African continent is only tapping into 0.4% of these issuances, Adam said. "Without the foundational skills, data, regulatory frameworks and policies to support green finance, developing nations will struggle to offer adequate scale, quality and returns for private investors," according to development agency FSD Africa. Strengthening national treasuries will help make these types of instruments more accessible for African countries. Using key performance indicators, African countries can set climate-aligned goals that bond issuances are linked to, such as the tons of carbon dioxide sequestered or the percentage of land restored or protected. “These types of instruments would then allow African countries, certainly those that already have market access, to also be able to refinance some of the existing, more expensive debt in a more affordable way and link the issuances of their bonds to goals that are associated with climate resilience,” Adam said. Adaptation, loss, and damage African countries are the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. The Horn of Africa is currently dealing with the worst drought in 40 years, putting over 50 million people into high levels of acute food insecurity, while southern Africa has been repeatedly pummeled with cyclones. The frequency and intensity of these natural disasters is on the rise. The Glasgow Climate Pact urged higher-income countries to at least double the provision of adaptation-focused climate finance for the developing world by 2025, compared with 2019 levels. At the previous COP, new pledges of $356 million to the Adaptation Fund were “woefully inadequate,” equating to only 5 cents per person in lower-income countries, Adam said. African delegates have been disappointed by slow progress in mobilizing resources around loss and damage, he said. As major natural disasters slam countries across the continent, nations spend up to 9% of their budgets on adaptation. African negotiators want more clarity on how much grant funding and loans are included, as well as the role of the private sector. “It is obvious that the majority, in the context of very vulnerable countries, has to come as grants, but this needs to be defined very clearly,” Adam said. Funding to support countries seeing climate impacts must be predictable, he said, meaning that it shouldn’t be vulnerable to unilateral decisions or geopolitics and must come on top of existing financing. Carbon credits African countries are guardians of some of the world's most important natural carbon sinks — which they can monetize. These include the Congo Basin peatlands, which absorb the equivalent of three years’ worth of global emissions. Because of this, African countries can meet 30% of the world's sequestration needs by 2050, Adam said. But such places are under threat. The rate of deforestation on the continent is the highest among all regions in the world, and the Democratic Republic of Congo plans to auction off its peatlands to oil companies. “A well-structured carbon credit system can allow African countries to protect at-risk resources and generate income from the protection of those resources,” Adam said. Guidance around implementing carbon trading is on the agenda for COP 27. Supervisory bodies are needed to enable this trading, and country-level capacity must be strengthened for nations’ participation. "This represents an opportunity for African countries to mobilize their own resources in a reliable and transparent way,” Adam said. Through nature-based carbon removal, Africa can generate revenue of between $15 billion and $82 billion per year, depending on the price of carbon. At $50 per ton, it would generate $15 billion. At $120 per ton, which is closer to the price required to meet sequestration needs globally, the revenue potential is $82 billion. The average price of carbon in Africa is about $10 per ton. But with the creation of high-integrity regional registries, there is an opportunity to raise the price, Adam said. The global carbon market is linked to "Changing climate goals and policies, economic hardship and uncertainty fueled by crises like the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine, rising oil and gas prices, and growing speculation," according to the United Nations Development Programme. A ‘just transition’ Africa has the smallest carbon footprint of any region. Its nations account for less than 4% of global emissions, yet the continent represents 17% of the world’s population. As such, African nations are calling for a “just transition” that allows them to increase their energy consumption, through both renewable and nonrenewable sources, to hit industrialization and development targets — similar to what high-income regions of the world were able to do. Renewable energy is the most cost-effective solution, Adam said, but it's a sector requiring high amounts of initial capital costs that pay off later. Some countries have limited natural reservoirs for renewables, such as geothermal energy or hydropower. In these cases, transition fuels are needed — with natural gas as the preferred fossil fuel to play a temporary role, as opposed to dirtier options like oil and coal, Adam said. Gas can cover baseload power generation needs — the minimum levels of power required for the electrical grid at any given time — while countries simultaneously bring renewable energy online, he said. The Guardian reported this week on a technical document prepared by the African Union that pushes for an expansion of fossil fuel production across the continent. “In the short to medium term, fossil fuels, especially natural gas will have to play a crucial role in expanding modern energy access in addition to accelerating the uptake of renewables,” the document reportedly states. But many are warning against this. The International Energy Agency said last year that to limit the global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees, there must be no new investments in fossil fuels. The lead-up to COP 27 The Africa Climate Talks took place last week in Mozambique, where academics from the continent shared research findings. This week, regional roundtables on climate finance are taking place in Ethiopia, as is a meeting of the African group of climate negotiators. The Climate Change and Development in Africa conference was tentatively set for mid-August in Abuja, Nigeria, but the event has been postponed, with new dates expected soon, Adam said. Africa Climate Week begins at the end of August in Gabon. A meeting of African ministers is scheduled for Sept. 7-9 in Cairo. “This meeting will be particularly important to finalize a lot of the asks around financing at COP 27,” Adam said. Ahead of the U.N. climate conference, there is also a presummit proposed for October in DRC.