Prof. Dan Bodansky - The Rise The Mega-COP's and the gap between expectation and reality

In this ClimateGenn episode, recorded on the last night of the extended COP in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, I am speaking with US COP veteran and legal expert, Professor Dan Bodansky from Arizona State University.

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Dan has extensive experience working with the US negotiating team over the years and shares his insights as to what motivates negotiators and how the nature pot the COP’s themselves are changing from bureaucratic conferences to mega-COP jamborees where the circus atmosphere leeches into the proceedings and influences the outcomes.

However, none of this appears to be stemming the rise of global emissions to below 1.5ºC, the scientific red line that is commonly used to measure the effectiveness of climate policy.

As the breakdown of trust between Global North and South countries continues to haunt the talks, a new think tank appeared at COP27 called The Overshoot Commission tasking itself with looking at navigating a climatically unstable world.

With geoengineering in the form of carbon dioxide removal and solar radiation management firmly back on the table, Dan highlights that these investigations are currently about the exclusion of technologies that will not deliver, rather than the selection of technologies for deployment.

The clock ticks and the world is moving into new territory on multiple fronts.

Thank you for listening to this podcast. Please check the genn.cc website for the full COP27 interview and session list. Patreon backers will have access to extra content collected from the conference.