Good COP, Bad COP

COP27 gave new meaning to "Good cop, bad cop."

To use a football metaphor, imagine a fullback dropping the ball 27 consecutive games. Maybe it's time to get a new fullback.

In this case, that means two separate COPs each year, one with fossil fuel interests, and one without. Global media, governments, and citizens could decide which COP to focus on.

For example, Sam Meredith reported at cnbc.com November 17, 2022, "Analysis from campaign groups published earlier this week showed more than 600 fossil fuel industry delegates were registered to attend COP27, reflecting an increase of over 25% from last year." I posted September 23, 2022, in "What I Think of COP1 through COP26," below a "car-crushed frog," "It was widely-reported Big Oil had the 'largest delegation' at COP26 strange as hanging their logos on Chartres Cathedral."

Now, many are reporting on the "climate fund breakthrough" noted in Valerie Volcovici, Dominic Evans, and William James' November 20, 2022, reuters.com article, "COP27 delivers climate fund breakthrough at cost of progress on emissions," but other writers, it seemed, lacked the courage and/or knowledge to report what these writers did, "Another section of the COP27 deal dropped the idea of annual target renewal in favour of returning to a longer five-year cycle set out in the Paris pact." This delay is insane given the fast rate of change, hence my suggestion for two COPS each year. 

The reuters.com writers also quoted "a visibly frustrated Alok Sharma, architect of the Glasgow [COP26] deal," regarding COP27, "Emissions peaking before 2025 as the science tells us is necessary? Not in this text. Clear follow-through on the phase down of coal? Not in this text. A clear commitment to phase out all fossil fuels? Not in this text."

Echoing Sharma's frustration, Bill McGuire wrote in The Guardian yesterday, "The big takeaway from Cop27? These climate conferences just aren’t working," "Some old hands have labelled it the worst COP ever, and I doubt many would argue." McGuire added, "Cop is no longer fit for purpose. The whole apparatus is simply too moribund to come up with any measures effective enough, and with sufficient clout, to bring about the changes needed to avoid climate chaos."

I recall after 9/11 when "members of the Hollywood entertainment industry were invited by the Pentagon 'to brainstorm [ . . . .] solutions to those threats,'" according to Michael C. Frank's article in Amerikastudien / American Studies Vol. 60, No. 4, Chance, Risk, Security: Approaches to Uncertainty in American Literature (2015), pp. 485-504. The abstract is here. This focus on creative input is a good precedent for inventing a new COP plan. Many politicians will be reluctant to ban their Big Oil funders from COPs as I suggested, or as McGuire noted, to implement something "less cumbersome and more manageable – something leaner and meaner that zeros in on the most critical aspects of the climate crisis, that does its work largely hidden from the glare of the media, and which presents a less obvious honey pot to the busy bees of the fossil fuel sector. One way forward, then, could be to establish a number of smaller bodies, each addressing one of the key issues – notably energy, agriculture, deforestation, transport, loss and damage, and perhaps others."

COP27 made it obvious the design of this process has to significantly change.

Politicians and Big Oil executives have children too, and may eventually see the shared responsibility to protect all children in every country. Unfortunately, the global community, especially in the global south, can't wait another 10 years or longer.