<h6><strong>Eduardo González</strong></h6> <h4><strong>The city of Belém, Brazil, will host the summit of heads of state and government for the thirtieth United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30) this Thursday and Friday. Spain will urge the international community to respect the Paris Agreement and implement the roadmap established in 2015 to limit the increase in global temperature to less than two degrees Celsius.</strong></h4> COP30 is an annual global meeting where world leaders, scientists, non-governmental organizations, and representatives of civil society discuss actions to combat climate change. It is considered one of the world's leading events on the subject. The conference itself will take place from November 10 to 21, but Brazil, as the host country, decided to move the summit of heads of state forward to November 6 and 7 because, as Valter Correia, the extraordinary secretary for COP30, stated, “holding it earlier gives us time to reflect more calmly, without the pressure of the hotel industry, without the pressure of the city, and this also helps us to better organize the opening of COP30 without major problems.” This will be the first time that the high-level segment will meet separately from the official COP30 program. In previous years, the summit of heads of state took place after the official opening, during the first few days of the program. COP30 will bring together world leaders and negotiators from the member states (or parties) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), along with business leaders, youth, climate scientists, Indigenous peoples, and civil society representatives from 198 countries, to discuss measures to address the climate crisis: limiting the rise in global temperature to 1.5 degrees Celsius, helping vulnerable communities adapt to the effects of climate change, and achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. The UNFCCC was agreed upon in 1992 and preceded the current 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change. The summit will address important issues such as just and sustainable energy transitions, forest conservation, and biodiversity. There will be plenary sessions with speeches from world leaders and thematic sessions on climate, energy, and nature. In addition, the Tropical Forests Forever Fund Launch Declaration will be presented, and topics such as integrated fire management, sustainable fuels, and action against hunger and poverty in the context of climate change will be discussed. According to the organizers, world leaders will arrive with the clear objective of accelerating the implementation of the Paris Agreement and assessing the progress made since COP29, with particular attention to updating nationally determined commitments (NDCs) and mobilizing the financial resources pledged by developed economies. Last July, UN Secretary-General António Guterres warned that the transition to clean and affordable energy for all “is inevitable” and urged all parties not to miss this opportunity to drive the necessary energy revolution. Last Tuesday, Hugo Morán, Secretary of State for the Environment at the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge, told the EFE news agency that the Spanish government will demand compliance with the Paris Agreement goals at COP30, including the roadmap established in 2015 to limit the increase in global temperature to well below two degrees Celsius, preferably 1.5 degrees, compared to pre-industrial levels. <h5><strong>EU Environment Council</strong></h5> With this objective, Spain will urge at the Extraordinary Council of EU Environment Ministers, to be held this Tuesday, November 4, that “the roadmap set for 2050” be maintained, referring to the climate neutrality target established by the European Union for that year, which would imply reducing net greenhouse gas emissions to zero. “We must be able to respond to a societal demand. Governments cannot move in a direction contrary to what society demands,” Morán declared last Thursday during the event 'COP30 Horizon: Global Boost to the Green, Circular, and Competitive Economy,' convened by the environmental recycling organization Ecoembes. The EU Council of Ministers is presented as the European Union's last opportunity to finalize an emissions reduction target for 2040 before COP30. One of the meeting's objectives is to try to reach an agreement (“general guidelines”) based on the European Commission's proposal to amend European Climate Law in order to reduce net greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 90% by 2040 compared to 1990 levels. COP30 also comes at a complicated time for the Paris Agreement due to the hostility of US President Donald Trump. “It is clear that the United States is currently leading an anti-internationalist bloc outside of multilateral cooperation agreements; it is undermining the very foundations of the United Nations,” Morán warned. Therefore, he continued, the EU must maintain the environmental leadership it has held for years, although “not all countries of the European Union” share this view, he admitted.
