Insight
Climate change: Is COP26 doomed to fail without China's Xi Jinping?
If the ambition of COP26 is to consign coal to history then it stands to reason that China, the world’s biggest emitter of coal-power pollution, is crucial to making that happen.
But President Xi Jinping will not be there in Glasgow. He won’t even be given the opportunity to deliver a video address. A statement from him will merely be uploaded to the COP website.
It is true that Xi has not left China since the beginning of the pandemic. To travel to the UK would be to potentially expose him to Covid-19, and it seems it would be a worse prospect for the President to get the virus, than for him to be painted as the pariah of COP26.
There will be a Chinese delegation in Glasgow, and lead negotiator Xie Zhenhua was brought out of retirement to lead the charge on climate change.
What is China's position on COP26?
He is viewed as an able and experienced negotiator.
But he will not have the power to act without the President's say so.
He and his team will have been given a strict brief and that will likely include an order not to deviate from the country’s NDC pledges. They will have pre-determined points of discussion and will be largely there to listen and make sure China's view is heard.
The Nationally Determined Commitments (NDCs) the Chinese Government submitted ahead of the meeting have disappointed many for not going any further than previously determined targets.
The country doubled down on renewables targets and its commitments to reach peak emissions by 2030 and carbon neutrality by 2060.
It is clear from the President’s decision not to go to Glasgow, from those NDCs and from what we are being told here in Beijing that China considers its current targets ambitious enough.
There is unlikely to be any shift on that 2030 target, despite the country being on track to meet it ahead of schedule.
The COP27 climate conference - what you need to know
What is COP27? When and where will it be?
What is COP27? When and where will it be?
Each year, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) meets at what is called the Conference of the Parties (abbreviated as COP) to discuss the world's progress on climate change and how to tackle it.
COP27 is the 27th United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties summit which will be held in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt from November 6-18.
Who is going?
Who is going?
Leaders of the 197 countries that signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) - a treaty that came into force in 1994 - are invited to the summit.
These are some of the world leaders that will be attending COP27:
UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is attending the conference, after initially saying he wouldn't as he was too busy focusing on the economy within his first weeks in office.
US President Joe Biden and his experienced climate envoy, John Kerry, will appear at the talks.
France President Emmanuel Macron will also be among the heads of state from around the world staying in Egypt.
King Charles III will not be attending COP27, despite being a staunch advocate for the environment. The decision was made jointly by Buckingham Palace and former prime minister Liz Truss.
Elsewhere, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping will not attend the talks just as they decided to do for COP26.
What is it hoping to achieve?
What is it hoping to achieve?
1. Ensure full implementation of the Paris Agreement and putting negotiations into concrete actions - included within this is the target of limiting global warming to well below 2C.
2. Cementing progress on the critical workstreams of mitigation, adaptation, finance and loss and damage, while stepping up finance notably to tackle the impacts of climate change.
3. Enhancing the delivery of the principles of transparency and accountability throughout the UN Climate Change process.
Nor does there appear any willingness to entertain a pact on curbing rising temperatures. A subject the Chinese have been particularly cautious on.
China has a zero or hero record when it comes to COP meetings. Its delegation was accused of derailing the climate talks in Copenhagen in 2009, but in 2015 President Xi took a lead role in the breakthrough Paris Climate Agreement, committing his country to the emission targets.
In 2021, when even Her Majesty the Queen is fed up of leaders saying not doing, there will be many in Glasgow questioning why Xi didn’t deem it important to even turn up. Perhaps he wanted to spare the planet the carbon footprint of his journey.