Petersberg Climate Dialogue 2023

Tags: Environment International News

The Petersberg Dialogue on Climate Change was held in Berlin from May 2-3, 2023. 

An overview of the news

• The Petersberg Climate Dialogue (PCD) was hosted by Germany and the United Arab Emirates, which is hosting the 28th Conference of the Parties (COP28) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

• Ministers from 40 countries attended the conference to discuss the way forward towards COP28.

• The main topics of discussion at the event were renewable targets, climate finance and global stocktake.

Key points of the summit

• To limit global warming to 1.5°C, the world needs to cut its greenhouse gas emissions at a rapid pace.

• The conference agreed to focus on phasing out fossil fuel emissions while phasing out viable, affordable zero-carbon alternatives.

• It calls for tripling renewable energy capacity by 2030 and then doubling it by 2040.

• 2023 is the year of Global Stocktech. The Global Stocktake is essentially a periodic review of global climate action aimed at assessing whether current efforts will enable us to reach the objectives set out in the Paris Agreement.

Conference of Parties(COP)

• Every year, the United Nations organizes a climate summit where the main agenda of the parties is to limit global temperature rise.

• These summits are called Conference of the Parties (COPs).

• Participants come from 197 countries that have signed the 1992 United Nations Climate Accord.

• Its purpose is to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere to prevent dangerous interference from human activity on the climate system.

• The agreement seeks to limit global warming to well below 2 °C, preferably 1.5 °C, compared to pre-industrial levels.

• It was signed in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Since 1994, COPs have been organised every year. Year 2023 marks the 28th  summit, called the COP28 summit.

• The COP28 conference will be held in Dubai from 30 November to 12 December 2023.