Dr. Hilda C. Heine, President of the Republic of the Marshall Islands and incoming Chair of the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF), recently announced the first ever carbon-free online Summit of world leaders on 22nd of November 2018.
This announcement gives new hope that we will attain a critical decision by all countries to step up ambition at the next climate talks in Katowice, Poland this coming December.
This decision is a critical outcome that the Climate Action Network (CAN) and its partners have been working towards as 2018 is a key year and dubbed as the “Step Up year” or “trigger year”.
It is the first important test of the Paris Agreement and the ratchet up mechanism constituting its core.
For the Paris Agreement to reach its goal of keeping warming below 1.5C, countries must revise, update and enhance their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) every five years.
The next round is 2020. But for countries to come prepared to submit new NDCs in 2020 they need to start the process with national consultations as early as January 2019.
