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The policy brief introduces the Greenhouse Development Rights (GDRs) framework to resolve the impasse between climate mitigation and the right to development. It proposes a system where climate obligations are based on a 'Responsibility and Capacity Indicator' (RCI), which excludes income below a development threshold of USD 20 per day. The analysis suggests that to keep warming below 2°C, Annex 1 countries must take responsibility for emission cuts exceeding 100% by 2025, combining deep domestic reductions with financial and technological support for the South. The brief recommends that Annex 1 countries lead the transition and fulfill unmet financing commitments before expecting legally binding commitments from non-Annex 1 countries.

The report investigates the ambiguity surrounding the terms 'climate finance' and 'fair share,' concluding that there is no objective way to calculate a country's fair contribution. It finds that Sweden's reported climate finance is largely integrated into its Official Development Assistance (ODA), meaning it provides very little that is 'new and additional' by international standards. The document suggests Sweden could lead by improving reporting transparency and defining its own ambitious fair share target.

The document serves as a technical support guide for the LEAP software, offering instructions on optimizing calculation speeds, troubleshooting electricity generation modules, and clarifying the software's capabilities regarding GHG inventories and life cycle analysis. It also explains specific data entry functions, such as the distinction between exogenous and endogenous capacity and the use of share versus saturation units in demand analysis.

The document outlines the process for non-Annex I Parties to assess and report greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation measures. It defines mitigation as interventions that reduce emission sources or enhance sinks and provides a structured approach to creating baseline and mitigation scenarios. The guide reviews sectoral options across energy, transport, buildings, industry, agriculture, forestry, and waste, while identifying technical, economic, and institutional barriers. It further evaluates bottom-up modeling tools such as LEAP, MARKAL/TIMES, and ENPEP to help countries quantify mitigation potentials and report results using standardized formats like 'jaws' charts.

The We Mean Business coalition outlines eight key policy asks for the COP21 Paris Agreement to ensure the transition to a low carbon economy is "inevitable, irreversible and irresistible." The brief argues that a clear, ambitious legal framework is essential to provide the policy certainty businesses and investors need to allocate capital toward decarbonization. Key recommendations include a long-term goal of net zero emissions well before the end of the century, five-year cycles for strengthening national commitments, the adoption of meaningful carbon pricing, and the scaling of climate finance beyond the USD$100 billion annual pledge. The document also emphasizes the need for transparency, high-ambition national commitments, political parity between mitigation and adaptation, and enhanced private sector engagement in pre-2020 ambition through Workstream 2.

The paper examines the use of trade measures in U.S. and EU climate policies, identifying objectives such as preventing carbon leakage and incentivizing global action. It argues that while protecting domestic industry is not a legitimate use of such measures under WTO and UNFCCC principles, properly designed measures to prevent emissions leakage may be permissible. The author highlights the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACESA) as a proposal that could allow the U.S. to unilaterally determine the equity of other countries' emissions commitments, potentially conflicting with the UNFCCC principle of common but differentiated responsibilities. Given the high risk of WTO disputes, the paper recommends that the UNFCCC COP establish principles and procedures to limit the use of trade measures.

The document argues that the existing UNFCCC monitoring system requires a significant retrofit and new processes to meet the more specific MRV obligations envisioned in the Bali Action Plan for a post-2012 agreement. It highlights that MRV is essential for the credibility and effectiveness of commitments regarding mitigation actions by developed and developing countries, as well as the associated technology, finance, and capacity-building support.

The document examines the use of a "Compendium of Commitments" at the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio +20) to ensure accountability for voluntary, time-bound pledges. It notes that previous "bottom up" initiatives, such as the 300+ partnerships from the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development, largely failed due to a lack of monitoring and review. The paper highlights the tension between top-down binding treaties and voluntary pledges, arguing that for the Rio +20 compendium to be effective, it must establish robust frameworks to ensure commitments are specific, measurable, and ambitious enough to address global commons and fundamental human rights.

The document examines the role of technology as a pillar of the Bali Action Plan (BAP) and analyzes UNFCCC Party submissions to determine how an international agreement can support clean technology through funding, capacity building, and monitoring frameworks.

The document argues that carbon dioxide capture and storage (CCS) may be essential for limiting global temperature rise to 1.5°C by 2050. It identifies key technical and regulatory challenges—such as permanence, MRV, and liability—that UNFCCC Parties must address to ensure safe and transparent CCS deployment.

The document examines a subset of mitigation actions submitted by developing countries to the UNFCCC under the 2010 Cancun agreements. While 41 developing countries submitted actions, the analysis focuses specifically on 16 countries that framed their actions in terms of expected GHG impact. These 16 countries accounted for approximately 60 percent of all developing country GHG emissions in the year 2000. The paper aims to determine the resulting GHG impacts and identify accounting and performance-tracking issues common to GHG-framed actions, without assessing the ambition or adequacy of the pledges.

The briefing outlines four essential institutional pillars for a Copenhagen climate agreement: a formal registry for commitments and support, common international accounting and reporting standards to ensure comparability and enable carbon markets, a robust measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV) system with an Implementation Committee to ensure compliance, and a periodic review mechanism aligned with IPCC science to adjust collective commitments.

The document outlines a framework for developing an international climate change regime, defined as the collective of international, national, and sub-national institutions and actors. It analyzes various proposals based on five key design issues: increasing ambition both within and outside the UNFCCC, sharing mitigation efforts, tracking country performance, and the legal form of future agreements. Each approach is evaluated against the criteria of adequacy, equity, and implementation, with the authors noting that these approaches are intended to be complementary.

The document outlines a descriptive narrative framework for Parties to the UNFCCC to communicate the fairness and ambition of their intended nationally determined contributions (INDCs) ahead of COP21. It suggests that countries use a combination of quantitative and qualitative indicators to explain their contributions relative to their emissions responsibility, capabilities, and development needs. The proposed framework consists of five components: an initial framing statement, a description of pre-2020 undertakings, an explanation of fairness and ambition based on national circumstances, an assessment of the contribution toward the Convention's objectives, and additional considerations. The goal is to enhance international transparency, enable peer comparison, and build trust among Parties to motivate collective climate action.

The document examines the difficulties of ensuring adaptation finance reaches the local level and the most vulnerable people. It introduces a framework for assessing finance delivery and notes that the Adaptation Finance Accountability Initiative (AFAI) analyzes specific finance flows in Nepal, the Philippines, Uganda, and Zambia to determine how funds are used and who receives them.

The document evaluates the current state of independent climate policy tracking, noting a diverse range of methodologies but highlighting significant gaps in the monitoring of policy implementation and uneven geographic coverage. It argues that while technical abatement potential is a useful metric, it lacks necessary political context. The paper recommends strengthening country-level tracking, deepening the evaluation of policies under development, and increasing coordination among practitioners to support the achievement of gigatonne-scale greenhouse gas reductions.

The paper examines how the U.S. and EU are considering trade measures to address industrial competitiveness, carbon leakage, and free-riding in their post-2012 greenhouse gas emissions legislation. It highlights a potential conflict between these unilateral measures and the principles of the WTO and UNFCCC, noting that U.S. proposals could penalize developing countries even if they comply with international agreements. The author argues that the UNFCCC Conference of the Parties should establish guiding principles for trade measures to prevent legal disputes and protect the UNFCCC's legitimacy as a global standard-setter.

The document provides recommendations for the US House Committee on Financial Services regarding a proposed $400 million annual investment in the Clean Technology Fund (CTF). It argues that the fund should prioritize 'zero carbon' outcomes and energy efficiency over marginally cleaner fossil fuel technologies like supercritical coal. The author emphasizes that the CTF should be used as a lever to force the World Bank and other Multilateral Development Banks to integrate climate change considerations into their core energy portfolios, noting that as of 2007, over 50% of Bank energy financing ignored climate change. Finally, it asserts that the CTF must align with UNFCCC principles, ensuring transparency, balanced representation between donor and developing nations, and that funding is additional to poverty alleviation aid.

The paper examines the operationalization of the Paris Agreement by exploring options for aligning the duration of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) into a common time frame. It argues that a five-year time frame, with the option to indicate a ten-year time frame, would best enhance climate ambition and predictability.

The document analyzes 26 submissions from 14 Parties and 12 Observers to the SBSTA concerning the design and implementation of a safeguard information system (SIS) for REDD+. To clarify the diverse inputs, the World Resources Institute and ClientEarth categorized the submissions into four areas: the role of the SIS, the type of information required, methods for collecting and providing information, and other elements of the international safeguard system.