Climate Change
COP21

A total of 147 world leaders are due to attend the start of the UN conference

Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

A total of 147 world leaders are due to attend the start of the UN conference DOMINIQUE FAGET/AFP/Getty COP21: who’s who

Who is attending COP21? Each country may have its own delegation, but a lot of the negotiation is dictated by groups of like-minded countries.

Made up of the 28 countries tied by laws that already make their 2030 climate pledges binding, regardless of what the COP21 deal says. Miguel Arias Cañete, the EU’s climate and energy commissioner, has been a fervent advocate for the EU, traveling as far as Papua New Guinea and Ecuador to foster alliances.

What Brussels doesn’t want is to be shut out of the room at the very end as happened in Copenhagen. This time around, the bloc’s leaders have made sure to build strong and diverse coalitions. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t differences within the EU.

Members such as Germany, France, the U.K., Sweden, and Luxembourg are eager to shift to renewables and stump up cash for developing countries. Poorer countries in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe instead worry that the proposed remedies are costlier than in other parts of the world, undercutting their competitiveness. Coal dependent Poland promises to be particularly tricky. The new government is demanding a renegotiation of the 2030 commitments on reductions, and a senior politician with the ruling Law and Justice party is even calling for Poland not to sign a COP21 agreement.

Umbrella Group

A loose coalition of countries outside the EU: the U.S., Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Kazakhstan, Norway, Russia and Ukraine. Most of these countries are on the U.N.’s list of wealthy countries, and have one big interest in common: fossil fuels. Eight of the nine produce big and growing amounts of oil, gas and/or coal.

Japan isn’t an energy producer, but relies on imports of all three, even more after the meltdown at its Fukushima nuclear plant. It has been one of the most obstructive countries in climate talks so far, pushing back (unsuccessfully) on the G7’s commitment for 2100. The cohesion of the Umbrella Group has frayed since 2009. Both Australia and Canada have new and more climate-friendly prime ministers, and Obama has made climate a priority in his second term.

G77 and China

Confusingly, it represents 134 developing countries (the name dates back to 1964, when 77 countries founded the grouping). The group has so far rallied behind its strong and vocal chairwoman, South African Ambassador Nozipho Mxakato-Diseko, largely on the issue of securing firm commitments for financial and technological support from the wealthy world.

Still, the G77 and China is a more diverse bunch now than it was in 2009. Members range from increasingly wealthy economies like South Korea, Brazil and South Africa, to the world’s poorest countries, like Malawi and Burundi, to island nations like Kiribati and Vanuatu that are slowly sinking into the Pacific.

China and Brazil, for instance, are more willing and able to offer financial aid to fellow G77 members or make more significant emissions reduction pledges. Others, like Sudan, stress that they need billions of dollars in aid before they can take any action of their own. These differences could flare as negotiations move to trickier questions about financial aid.

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If the G77 and China starts to crumble into factions at the COP21, watch for these groups to emerge as important players. South American countries are split in two — the Independent Alliance of Latin America and the Caribbean (AILAC) and the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA) The former is keener on a more ambitious deal than the latter.

Then there’s the Alliance of Small Island States, the Least Developed Countries, and the Like-Minded Group of Developing Countries.

Who are the wild cards?

The problem with a global agreement is that it needs global agreement. That means any one country can intervene and derail the entire thing, even at the last minute. Veteran COP-watchers have warned to be on the lookout for procedural delay tactics, like Diseko’s successful push to postpone the Bonn plenary because it started without her.

Russia, Ukraine and former Soviet republics: They may not like each other much, but when it comes to concrete emissions reduction requirements, they tend to be in agreement — they’re not for ambitious cuts.

Saudi Arabia and its OPEC colleagues: The world’s largest oil producers, they’ll likely be among the biggest losers in any climate agreement. Riyadh was the last of the G20 capitals to submit a climate pledge, and did so under pressure.

Venezuela, Nicaragua and other ALBAs: Decidedly more obstructionist than the AILAC. These countries have a socialist bent and they’re resistant to moves asking poorer countries to bear a larger burden in any climate deal.

India: A heavyweight in these talks, India is in a tricky situation: Its economy is growing fast, with coal playing a vital role, but poverty remains a problem. New Delhi has promised to go big on renewables and other green technology, but wants a commitment for technological support from developed countries. Its domestic development agenda also means it may be less keen on making sizeable emissions cuts.

Authors: Sara Stefanini and Kalina Oroschakoff