Negotiating the climate

The 26th iteration of the Conference of Parties (COP) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was held over the past two weeks in Glasgow. The primary purpose of the conference was to take stock of global commitments in light of the Paris Agreement (2015), which calls for restricting global temperature rise to 2 degree Celsius with the enhanced ambition of limiting it to 1.5 degree Celsius. Needless to say, as has usually been the case with such events, Glasgow, too, promised a lot but delivered little more than…

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COP26 comes to an end with ‘imperfect compromise’ in Glasgow

The Glasgow Climate Pact, as it is being called, calls upon countries to accelerate the transition towards low emission energy systems including by rapidly scaling up deployment of clean power generation and including efforts to phase down coal power and inefficient fossil fuel subsidies. India pushed through a last minute intervention during the final plenary to weaken the language on coal from “phase out” to “phase down”. Despite protests from many countries the weaker text was officially adopted. Irfan Tariq, DG Environment from Ministry of Climate Change in Pakistan who attended…

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COP26: New global climate deal struck in Glasgow

The Glasgow Climate Pact is the first ever climate deal to explicitly plan to reduce coal, the worst fossil fuel for greenhouse gases.The deal also presses for more urgent emission cuts and promises more money for developing countries – to help them adapt to climate impacts. But the pledges don’t go far enough to limit temperature rise to 1.5C. A commitment to phase out coal that was included in earlier negotiation drafts led to a dramatic finish after India and China led opposition to it.India’s climate minister Bhupender Yadav asked…

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Pakistan asks China to Resolve Pending Issues of ML-I, Energy Projects

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Pakistan has asked China to direct its Export & Credit Insurance Corporation Sinosure to resolve the pending issues pertaining to ML-I and six energy projects. “We have written two separate letters to National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) for resolution of issues hampering the financial close of six energy projects and the term sheet for ML-I project,” Khalid Mansoor Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on CPEC Affairs said while talking to selected group of journalists here on Tuesday. He said that Chinese companies in power sector have an overdue…

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Lenders Offer More Loans for Energy, Vaccines

Two major multilateral institutions –– the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank – are exploring avenues to sell more loans to Pakistan and their senior level delegations had back-to-back meetings with various cabinet members on Tuesday. As part of these interactions, the ADB has formally offered $700 million worth of another loan for Covid-19 vaccination on top of an ongoing $500m loan for procurement of vaccines. A separate delegation of the World Bank also discussed various infrastructure, energy, clean drinking water, drainage, education, health-related projects already being funded by…

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