COP25 in Search of Lost Time for Action

Last year's conference of the global climate change regime (Conference of the Parties, COP25) took place from 2 until 15 December 2019 in Madrid, Spain. Researchers from the Wuppertal Institute attended the conference and have now published the in-depth analysis "COP25 in Search of Lost Time for Action" of its key results.

The conference presidency had run the conference on the theme "time for action" with two main objectives: finalising the implementation rules for the Paris Agreement and starting the process of strengthening Parties' climate protection contributions. The report of the Wuppertal Institute covers the negotiations on these two sets of issues and also includes a discussion of other recent climate activities by Parties and non-Party actors.

Despite marking a new record for overtime in the history of the climate negotiations, the conference did not only fail to meet the increasing public demand for swift and strong climate action. It also failed on its formal mandate to finalise the Paris rulebook. A record number of issues were left unresolved and shelved for the next session. COP25 thereby highlighted how much work still lies ahead both domestically and internationally if 2020 is to see a step-up in climate action that is consistent with the long-term goal of the Paris Agreement.

The detailed analysis report "COP25 in Search of Lost Time for Action" is available free of charge under the following download link.