News

ESA will participate to the 14th Conference of the Parties (COP14) of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) in Poznań, Poland, from 1 to 12 December 2008.

The COP14 will be held in conjunction with the 4th session of the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol (CMP 4). It will also include the 29th session of two subsidiary bodies of the Convention, respectively the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) and the Subsidiary Body for Implementation (SBI).

ESA will contribute to the COP14 with an exhibition booth and a participation to dedicated side events where ESA initiatives related to climate change will be presented. The ESA exhibition booth and side events will inform the COP14 participants on the efforts done by ESA and other space agencies to provide adequate observations from Space, in particular to respond to the observational needs for Climate Change monitoring, which have been compiled by the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS) initiative, and summarised in a list of 44 Essential Climate Variables (ECV). The objective is to inform policy makers about the important role that Space Agencies can play in monitoring the Convention implementation and in providing systematic observations of essential climate variables.

The Poznań Climate Change Conference will provide the opportunity for the UNFCC Parties to draw the advances made in 2008 and to build momentum towards a global climate agreement that should be reached at the 2010 COP-15 in Copenhagen. The COP-15 global climate agreement should cover the period from 2012 when the first commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol will expire.

At the COP 14 in Poznań, the Parties are expected to:

• Agree on a plan of action and programmes of work for the final year of negotiations after a year of extensive discussions on crucial issues relating to future commitments,
• Make significant progress on a number of on-going issues required to enhance further the implementation of the Convention and the Kyoto Protocol,
• Make significant advances in the understanding and commonality of views on a "shared vision" for a new climate change regime,
• Strengthen momentum and commitment to the process and to the agreed timeline

Important issues that will be adressed during the COP are capacity-building for developing countries, reducing emissions from deforestation (REDD), technology transfer and adaptation.

Provisional agendas and further information can be found on the COP 14 Website.

The agenda for the ESA/WMO side event can be downoloaded as pdf here.