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These results represent important steps forward, both in terms of promoting immediate action on the ground and as elements for the future global legal framework for climate action for which the EU has long argued. However, the outcomes of the Copenhagen, Cancún and Durban conferences are not yet sufficient to reduce global emissions to a level that is compatible with holding global warming below 2°C compared to the pre-industrial temperature.

The Durban conference clarified the timetable for the introduction of a global legal framework covering all countries by agreeing that this would be drawn up by 2015 and implemented from 2020. The framework will take the form of a protocol, another legal instrument or an agreed outcome with legal force applicable to all Parties. Through this process, known as the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action, the EU will continue to press for a framework that is ambitious, comprehensive and legally binding.

In Durban it was also decided that a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol will begin in 2013 and run until 2017 or 2020.

International regime until 2020

These decisions mean that, until the future global framework is implemented in 2020, the regime for international climate action will comprise two main elements (in addition to the existing rules of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change):

• The commitments made (on emissions and financing), new institutions created and new rules agreed at the Copenhagen, Cancún, Durban and Qatar (December 2012) conferences. To date some 90 developed and developing countries have made voluntary emission reduction pledges for 2020. Though these pledges cover some 80% of global emissions, it has been acknowledged that they are not ambitious enough to put global emissions on a path that will hold global warming below 2°C. At the initiative of the EU and small island states, a workplan was launched in Durban to explore options for more ambitious action.
• The EU has said it will join a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol, even though Japan and Russia will not take part and Canada intends to withdraw from the Protocol altogether. Some rules for the second Kyoto period were agreed in Durban; the rest, plus the emission targets, are due to be agreed in Qatar. These concern in particular the length of the commitment period and the carry over of surplus emission credits from the first period.

Copenhagen Accord

The Copenhagen Accord is a non-binding document which was negotiated by the leaders of a group of some 30 major developed and developed countries in the final hours of the 2009 Copenhagen climate conference. The Accord was not adopted as a UN decision but was endorsed by 141 UNFCCC Parties.

All key elements of the Copenhagen Accord were subsequently formalised as a UN decision in the 2010 Cancún Agreements, which also further strengthened the international climate regime in terms of institutional governance and action. 

Cancún Agreements

The key points of the Cancún Agreements are as follows:

Objective: hold warming below 2°C

The agreements acknowledged for the first time in a formal UN decision that global warming must be kept below 2°C compared to pre-industrial temperatures. A review will be carried out in 2013-2015 to assess whether the goal should be lowered to 1.5°C, or some other level. A process was also established for defining a date for global emissions to peak and a global goal for substantially reducing emissions by 2050.

The Cancún Agreements anchored in a UN document the national emission reduction commitments for 2020 made so far. Cancún also recognised that these pledges are collectively not sufficient and that overall efforts need to be scaled up in order to stay below 2°C.

Increasing transparency

The transparency of national actions will be increased through stronger rules on monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) of emissions and of climate finance. MRV is important for building trust by showing that Parties are delivering on their commitments.

Developed and developing countries alike will report on their national emission reduction efforts every two years. These reports will be reviewed at international level (through processes of 'international assessment and review' – IAR - for developed countries and 'international consultation and analysis' – ICA - for developing countries). This will help to assure the quality of the information provided, allow open exchanges between Parties and build mutual confidence that all countries are seriously engaging in action to mitigate their emissions.

Mobilising climate finance

In Copenhagen developed countries committed to provide nearly US $30 billion in 'fast start' finance over the years 2010-2012 to help developing countries take immediate action to strengthen their resilience to climate change and reduce their emissions, including those from deforestation. This pledge was formalised in Cancún. Donor countries are required to report annually to the UNFCCC on amounts spent and projects supported.

For the longer term, developed countries have committed to mobilise climate funding for developing countries totalling US $100 billion a year by 2020, in return for meaningful and transparent action by developing countries to tackle their emissions.

A Green Climate Fund has been established to support projects, programmes, policies and other activities in developing countries. The GCF is expected to be one of the major distribution channels for the US$ 100 billion in assistance which developed countries have pledged to mobilise for developing nations annually by 2020 in the context of meaningful mitigation efforts. A Standing Committee has been created to improve the coordination and mobilisation of climate funding.

Strengthening institutions

Further new structures and institutions have been established to enhance the transfer of knowledge, technology and funds to developing countries in various fields:

• The Cancún Adaptation Framework and the Adaptation Committee: these will help to strengthen the capacity of developing countries, in particular the most vulnerable, to prepare for and adapt to the consequences of climate change.
• The Technology Mechanism: this includes a Technology Executive Committee (TEC) and a Climate Technology Centre and Network (CNTC). The mechanism aims to enhance the development and transfer of low-carbon technologies.
• Tropical deforestation:Cancún created a general framework for policy approaches and positive incentives for developing countries to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation and invest in conservation, sustainable forest management and forest carbon stocks (an issue known as 'REDD+').

Durban outcome

Decisions taken in Durban made the Cancún Agreements operational and built on them, for example by:

• establishing a new market-based mechanism to enhance cost-effective action to reduce emissions, and
• launching a process to consider climate issues related to agriculture, with a view to taking a decision at the end of 2012.