Backtracking coal targets a COP26 failure, but summit still brings hope

What two weeks together arguing about climate issues did for the key delegates at Glasgow was to create a pressure-cooker atmosphere in which hard positions softened and movement finally became possible.

Alok Sharma, the British MP and president of the UN Climate Change Conference, came close to tears during closing remarks on Nov. 13. Sharma was upset because a last-minute assault by the world’s coal, oil, and gas superpowers nearly brought the meeting to a halt, writes Gwynne Dyer. Photograph courtesy of Flickr/Tim Hammond

Opinion

BY GWYNNE DYER

November 16, 2021

LONDON, U.K.—Closing the two-week COP26 climate summit in Glasgow on Nov. 13, Alok Sharma, the British president of the 197-country conference, declared “We've kept 1.5 [degrees Celsius] within reach, but its pulse is weak.” But he was close to tears several time...

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