A Cop 27 diary- with a seven year old, November 2022

“Will there be slides?” My seven-year-old daughter asked me about the Green Zone at COP27. She wasn’t too enthused by the Conference Centre or the people milling around in front of it. Luckily the desert sun was dry, which relieves you of discomfort, joint pain or circulatory issues.  An important detail on the negotiation table. Optimum health and wellbeing and pleasant working conditions can only be positive for anyone attending the event.

After getting a free electric bus to the sprawling conference centre, we met was  Irishman Conor Mairtin from Newry- he was adamant I used the Irish version of his name.

He said we need ‘draconian’ measures in place to fight the climate disaster. “I just had to come,” he said carrying a banner with “Climate Change Denial deserves the death penalty.” I asked him about how Egyptians are treating activities- in my mind jailed British-Egyptian pro democracy activist Alaa Abdel Fattah, who is currently on hunger strike. Mairtin said activists were treated fine, but he was the only one protesting at that point. Like any movement climate ‘activism’ attracts a broad spectrum of people, some of whom are just happy to find something to cling onto with great enthusiasm and conviction. Generally I’m not a fan of civil disobedience or this kind of ‘activism’. Climate activism is often tarnished by fanatics, which gives those on the other side of the pendulum endless fodder. It’s a shame as it distracts from issues which affect us all like addressing livestock farming or reducing waste-  how is so much carbon still just being wasted? Food waste alone is a worse emitter than flying.

Planes 

In fact, the constant planes flying into Sharm el Sheikh can also be used against the climate movement and accuse it of hypocrisy, but getting to the tip of the Sinai Peninsula overland is potentially dangerous and time consuming. Also petrol and diesel cars would be required, as there are no trains.

My daughter was the only child outside the conference centre,- for obvious reasons, but also because were there during school term and she should have been in school after school holidays ended. I thought a photo of her- essentially school striking seeing as she is inheriting the planet from us.

Of the 30,000 delegates, we met people from Sudan, Barbados, Zambia, Brazil, all with the intention of ‘saving the world.’ They were positive, which is positive.

Security

Security was tight- I lost a bottle of duty free flying in, during one of the many security checks.  I paid heavily for this error when I left our five star hotel for a compound, with no bar. Five star hotels, usually cheap and filled with Russian tourists were ten times more expensive during COP27, as are taxis. But these can be avoided by using the free bus.

Unlike the ‘family’ today of world leaders, most of whom were men. Interestingly, all staff at hotels and all tours we did- we went diving, snorkelling, camel riding and stargazing, were manned by men.
Though in our compound, a lovely lady called Doha looked after us- we even got to stay in the room till past 6pm on our day of leaving, even though surely the room was in demand.

Back in Ireland, COP27 is fading in the news a little, it seems people get jaded with alarmism and the World Cup is taking over. Like anything else, people’s attention spans are short- even for our apocalyptic planetary demise. Anyone for football?

Part 2:

The World Cup is starting on Sunday as Cop 27 ends. For the general public, their interest in COP27 dwindled as alarmism became background noise just as their interest for the World Cup grew.

The main sticking point was ‘Loss and Damage’, which would see ostensibly richer countries pay a significant share to vulnerable countries to compensate for damage caused. The EU, Chine, India, Indonesia and Brazil and Russia alongside international transport accounted for 55percent of global emissions in 2020- the year of Covid. In total, the worlds biggest economies, are responsible for 75percent, according to the UN. Like many summit’s before, it ran into overtime and the hoped for breakthrough didn’t come on schedule. It’s not unusual for Cop events to go beyond their deadline – only six of the previous have finished on time. 

‘There is a lot of work to be done’ Environment minister Eamon Ryan, who was appointed EU ministerial representative on the loss and damage work said.

But, like all COP27s that came before, ending fossil fuel extraction or even a timeline for it, wasn’t even on the table. It’s like the big elephant is still in the room- which was partially filled with lobbyists from oil companies.

We didn’t hear much about Saudi Arabia, which has an aggressive long-term strategy to keep us all hooked on oil for several decades. Greenwashing and sustainability are a buzzword there, but the Kingdom, which is the world’s biggest supplier of oil, doesn’t seem to care about our collective demise, as long as money is coming in.