Returning from the Global Climate Action Summit (GCAS) in San Francisco (12-14 September), organised at the initiative of Jerry Brown, Governor of California, the delegation of three MEPs stated, on Saturday 15 September, that they were counting on the EU to take on the leadership of international climate talks at the COP24 (Katowice, in December).
Francesc Gambus (EPP, Spain), who headed the delegation, accompanied by Bas Eikhout (Greens/EFA, Netherlands) and Lynn Boylan (GUE/NGL, Ireland), said the three MEPs stated their full support for the efforts undertaken by the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Patricia Espinona, to seek to build an ambitious consensus that will turn the framework created by the Paris Agreement into a working system providing clear rules, transparency and funding.
Non-governmental players took centre stage to seek to enhance the level of commitment and ambition of all parties by the COP24 in Katowice, despite the loss of goodwill on the part of the US administration. Gambus said he was encouraged by the mobilisation of all non-state players. “Despite the announced withdrawal of President Trump from the Paris Agreement, the message coming from San Francisco is one of possibility, ambition and urgency. In our conversations with US actors there was no sign of resignation, but a heightened commitment to stick to the pledges that the US made three years ago in Paris”, he said in a press release.
He went on to call on the EU to “step up to the plate to fill the leadership gap which works as a drag on the UNFCCC process”, saying that “if we do not, no one else will”.
In San Francisco, European Climate Action Commissioner Miguel Arias Cañete and Governor Brown decided, on 13 September, to strengthen EU/Californian cooperation on carbon markets.
Over the next 12 months, European and Californian officials will step up the frequency of exchanges, in particular on the role of carbon pricing as a signal for long-term investment for innovative technologies, and on the principles for price alignment. These exchanges will fuel the “Florence Process”, a venue for open dialogue and information exchange including China, Canada and New Zealand. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)