ADP: We're Doomed.

Prior to the 20th Conference of Parties (COP21) the Secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) produced a draft negotiating text of the agreement that is scheduled to be signed at COP21.

The idea was always that nations would add and modify this text before it became an actual agreement. However this process rapidly spiralled out of control with nations all trying to add their own little exemptions. As a result the text quickly grew from 30 pages to close to 90 pages and some sections not only became unworkable but utterly unreadable.

My hope for the UNFCCC meeting that is currently taking place in Bonn, Germany is that the text would be dramatically cut down to size as individual exemptions were removed and options were agreed upon.

However just before the meeting the Secretariat produced an entirely new draft text that had been cut to probably less then it's bare bones.

This text does included useful sections on the procedural elements of the agreement such as how certain terms will be defined and where the agreement will be deposited after signing. However in terms of the meat of the agreement such as mitigation and adaptation this new draft is so vague as to be utterly useless.

I think the intention was that over the course of the week nations would go off and add to this draft using elements of the previous draft. Unfortunately nations - particularly the poorer and less capable ones - have go off and repeated the exact mistake. That is to say they have simply produced a long list of exemptions for their particular circumstances.

This is extremely alarming because it shows that just 51 days before the deadline many nations still haven't made the break through in thinking that is needed to create a successful agreement.

They still seem to be under the impression that this new agreement will be an agreement like the Kyoto Protocol which it replaces that will last for 10 to 20 years. Under this type of agreement every specific little detail about a nation's individual circumstances does need to be accounted for in the agreement text.

However the type of agreement we are trying to create here is intended to last for 80-100 years. What we're trying to do now is establish the framework under which future arguments will be had.

For example by including a conditional/additional portion on the INDC's we are creating a mechanism whereby poorer nations with good ideas can secure funding for those ideas from richer nations.

In this type of agreement not every detail about a nation's specific circumstances needs to be established within the text because those circumstances will change over the lifetime of the agreement.

A particular example of the problem is that the new text includes vague provisions for a global stock take of progress. This is something that will occur simply as a by-product of an ex post review process. However neither draft of the text outlines a process by which an ex post review will take place.

What I hope will happen over the final day of this meeting and in the weeks running up to COP21 is that nations will go back to June draft and streamline the text by identifying the options they can accept.

For example the reason why I've been going through the June text section by section is because with the changes I've made I consider those sections on mitigation adaptation and loss & damage to be ready for inclusion in the agreement.

I will agree though that I and others need to do more work on streamlining the remaining sections while producing wording for sections that currently do not exist. A section dealing with the peer review process for example.

Unless this work is done prior to COP21 then there simply won't be an agreement to sign and the specific exemptions and reassurances that nations have worked so hard to have included in the text won't apply to anyone.

19:30 on 22/10/15 (UK date).

Edited at around 11:25 on 23/10/15 (UK date) to add;

When I rush I tend to rant.

However another example of how the big picture is perhaps being lost in all the specific details is this issue of transition. Across the course of this meeting nations have been trying to devise a mechanism of how nations that currently submit intensity reductions transition to submitting absolute reductions. The peer review process already provides this mechanism.

As part of the ex ante review nations such as India and China who are on the verge of having to make the transition will likely find two or three nations criticising them for not having already done so. Assuming a group size of eight though this won't be enough to change the synthesis report.

At the first ex post review they may well find that three or four nations are raising the issue. However because the swing nation doesn't feel strongly enough about it the criticism will be left out of the synthesis report.

At the next ex ante these nations might find that it's five or six nations raising the issue changing the outcome of the synthesis report. At the next ex post review the majority of the group will indicate that it's time for the nation to change.

At this point the nation will know that it's next submission will have to be an absolute reduction rather then an intensity reduction having been given 15 years of constructive warnings.

Added to that you will have the work of the compliance committee that this meeting has been trying to develop. However that is an area that still requires a lot of work.

I should point out though that I am deadly serious about there not being an agreement. If either the June text or the new text is presented as an agreement to be signed at COP21  my advice will be that no-one should sign up to it.

I am even at the point of considering delaying the signing to allow the negotiations to continue for another year.

I say that fully understanding that there isn't another year to waste. However it has got to be better to take no action for one year rather then spending the next 10,20,30 years taking action that isn't going to work anyway.