Understanding the first week of COP30 in 5 points

• What is a formal agenda? And what about action? Understanding the structure of COP30 and the impasse with four agenda items
• Interview: CEO of start-up company that wins Prince William award and defeats Lula government says ‘doors will open’

Check out this week’s main events:

Protesters’ invasion of the COP30 Blue Zone in Belen, Pennsylvania, on Tuesday ended with the injury of a security guard and the temporary closure of exits from the space where climate change negotiations are taking place. The incident is being investigated by federal police.

The disturbance broke out in the accreditation section of the conference and began after a group of demonstrators from the Global Health and Climate Change March forced their way into the venue. The event brought together doctors, nurses, students, indigenous leaders, and representatives from social movements to advocate for public health policies.

United Nations (UN) security personnel attempted to block the group’s advance and removed participants who insisted on remaining there. One of the access doors to the scene remained closed after the confusion.

In a memo sent to GLOBO, march organizers claimed that “the actions that took place after the march were not part of the organization of an event dealing with health and climate.”

This Friday, around 90 Munduruku indigenous people organized by the Ipeleg Ayu Movement staged a peaceful protest in front of the Blue Zone. The action began around 5:40 a.m., and the Army increased security at the entrance to the main conference pavilion, which was temporarily sealed off.

The protesters demanded urgent talks with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and accused the federal government of pursuing infrastructure projects that threaten Munduruku territory and other peoples in the Tapajos and Xingu river basins.

They were sent for a meeting with the president of the conference, Andre Correa do Lago, and the minister of indigenous peoples, Sonia Guajajara. Correa do Lago was holding a baby Munduruku in her lap at the entrance to the Blue Zone.

In a further stress for COP30 after the hosting crisis that preceded the meeting, the United Nations, in a letter to the Brazilian government, called for a plan to address security and infrastructure issues at facilities hosting the conference. The charges were filed on Wednesday, a day after the unrest in the Blue Zone.

Simon Steele, executive director of the United Nations Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC), said the incursion by protesters, which damaged the tournament’s entrance structures, was caused by the failure of promised protection plans.

Stiel also noted that President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s office had earlier in the day instructed federal police not to intervene to disperse some demonstrators. The issues mentioned in the letter range from a lack of security personnel at incident sites to non-compliance with exclusion zones that are not in place for the movement of protesters.

The UN chief also highlighted the failure of air conditioning equipment at some COP30 venues. While attendees complained about the heat on the first day of the conference, the high temperatures are also causing concern outside the pavilion.

In a statement, the House of Citizens said it was “not involved in the decision-making of the public security forces regarding the November 11 protests” and stressed that “all UN demands have been met.” Prime Minister Andre Correa do Lago on Thursday minimized friction with the United Nations Climate Change Convention, saying it had already been resolved.

As COP30 opened on Monday, the conference presidency promised to define the four points within two days, but it was unclear at the time whether they would become the formal agenda of the conference. However, even after the deadline passed, not only were these issues not resolved, but further impasses arose.

Despite the obstacles, the mood among Brazilian negotiators is one of “cautious optimism,” defined by Tulio Andrade, the delegation’s head of strategy and coordination. The president of the conference, Ambassador Andrés Correa de Lago, promised to present new developments in the conversation by Saturday.

4 items ended without agreement

• Deficiency of NDC: The climate targets achieved in this round are insufficient to stop global warming by up to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Some countries would like to discuss solutions to this issue at this COP.
• Climate finance: Funding from rich countries to poor countries has only entered Baku Belen’s “roadmap,” a parallel negotiation track, but some want to add it to the formal agenda.
• unilateral trade measures: Some countries want to use CO₂ emissions and deforestation to impose non-tariff trade barriers, while others are concerned about the impact this will have on exports.
• Transparency report: These are biannual documents on the implementation of mitigation and adaptation plans by countries. The COP30 Presidency did not elaborate on disagreements on this point.

The current goal is to reach agreement on 100 global indicators of how countries are doing in their adaptation and resilience efforts.

The discussion on adaptation is stuck

Negotiations on the Global Adaptation Goals (GGA) are also facing an impasse at this stage of the conference. Two meetings were held on Tuesday, but ended without agreement on whether the adoption of the indicators would be finalized at this COP30. The group of African countries is pushing for an extension of the technical work for another two years.

A new meeting held on Wednesday also failed to set a direction to follow. A meeting is scheduled for this Friday. The position of African countries, which have delayed discussions, has worried some countries and observers who fear weakening ambition and delays in developing more concrete adaptation goals.

— Acting to adapt means saving lives and resources. We must make the Global Adaptation Goals a priority and present indicators here at COP30 so that we can provide the tools as soon as possible to monitor countries’ adaptation progress. Delaying the decision for another year only shows that countries do not attach as much importance to adaptation as they say in their speeches, said Flavia Martinelli, a climate change expert at WWF-Brazil.

Behind the scenes of the roadmap discussion

Led by Brazil’s Environment Minister Marina Silva, countries including the UK, Germany, France, Denmark, Colombia and Kenya have already expressed support for an agreement on guidelines for an energy transition roadmap. A deal related to overcoming fossil fuels is one of the Lula government’s bets ahead of COP30 in Belem.

A roadmap is a political and technical roadmap that includes who will do what, by when, and with what resources. In other words, it is an attempt to impose a written commitment to reduce the use of fossil fuels, the main cause of global warming.

According to Bloomberg, the idea of ​​a roadmap to implement this measure has been discussed extensively outside of formal summit negotiations. One possibility being discussed is to include this plan in the final decision or main document of COP30, allowing countries to work on it over the next year. A similar plan was adopted last year to expand climate finance.

The request for a roadmap on this topic was made by Mr Lula at the opening of the summit last week. The President championed the need to overcome fossil fuels and accelerate the energy transition. The call came 16 days after the government granted Petrobras permission to explore for oil in the equatorial Foz do Amazonas region, following criticism from environmentalists.