Cop31: Australia and Turkey share climate summit presidency in Antalya
UN climate talks in Antalya bring coal exporter Australia and coal consumer Turkey together under one presidency, with electrification targets and coal phase-out demands in the balance.
At a glance
- Cop31 is being held in Antalya, Turkey, under a joint presidency with Australia, which chairs the formal negotiations.
- Australia is a coal exporter and Turkey a coal consumer; both face calls to commit to phasing out coal.
- A target on the table would meet 35% of final energy demand from electricity by 2035, as Turkey's climate plan allows emissions to rise.
Cop31, the UN climate summit, is taking place in Antalya, Turkey, under a joint presidency with Australia — an arrangement that puts a coal exporter and a coal consumer in charge of global climate negotiations. Australia will chair the formal talks, while Turkey leads the parallel “action agenda”. A target to meet 35% of final energy demand from electricity by 2035 is on the table.
How the two hosts ended up sharing the role
The pairing is the product of a last-minute compromise struck at Cop30 in Belém last year. Australia had wanted to host a Cop since 2021, when Anthony Albanese made it a key promise before the election he won the following year. Turkey had also wanted to host and said it had agreed with the UK, which hosted the Glasgow summit Cop26 in 2021, that 2026 would be its year.
Both countries fall in the same UNFCCC regional group as western Europe for bidding purposes, a quirk dating back to the 1992 signing of the treaty. There is no mechanism in the treaty for settling a dispute between two countries over a bid, and no provision for a majority vote.
Who does what
Australia chairs the negotiations, covering the “just transition” for fossil fuel workers, the loss and damage fund — back in focus after the catastrophic glacier collapse in Nepal — other climate finance and progress on emissions cuts. Turkey runs the action agenda of voluntary commitments, where electrifying the global economy is the central plank, alongside initiatives on cutting waste and methane, two subjects championed by Turkey’s first lady, Emine Erdoğan.
A difficult backdrop
Conflicts in Ukraine, Iran and Gaza are destabilising alliances, an unpredictable White House is sowing economic uncertainty and AI threatens new disruption. An El Niño system supercharged by fossil fuels is already causing damage. The summit is the first big international meeting since US midterms that delivered a heavy blow to Donald Trump and the Republicans, and since Brazil’s presidential election, won by Lula da Silva — a result seen as a relief for the Amazon. It is also the last such gathering for António Guterres, who has used his two terms as UN secretary-general to speak out on the climate.
Fossil fuels under scrutiny
The hosts’ fossil fuel records will be examined. Chris Bowen, Australia’s Cop31 president of negotiations, told The Guardian that Australia could start to shift away from fossil fuel exports towards clean electricity, but he refused to set any end date for coal. Coal remains Turkey’s biggest source of power despite a renewables push, and its national climate plan allows greenhouse gas emissions to increase rather than fall.
Fifty frontline organisations from Turkey, Australia and other coal regions wrote to the Cop presidents this week calling for an end to coal mining and use. Mehmet Dalkanat, of the Afşin-Elbistan Platform for the Protection of Life and Nature in Turkey, said local people had lived with coal for 40 years and had already paid a heavy price in pollution and its impacts. He called the July cancellation of plans to expand Turkey’s largest coal-fired power plant “a major victory for local communities” and “a powerful source of hope for a coal-free future”, and said the presidencies must build on it to accelerate the coal phaseout and deliver a just transition.
UN reports indicate that preventing temperatures from rising beyond 1.8C will require massive and urgent cuts to greenhouse gas emissions, while global carbon emissions have yet to peak.
Source: The Guardian Business.
Questions and answers
- Where is Cop31 being held and who is presiding?
- Cop31 is taking place in Antalya, Turkey, under a joint presidency with Australia. Australia chairs the formal negotiations, while Turkey leads the voluntary action agenda.
- Why does Cop31 have two host countries?
- The shared presidency follows a last-minute compromise at Cop30 in Belém last year. Australia and Turkey both wanted to host, and because they sit in the same UNFCCC regional group there is no treaty mechanism to resolve competing bids.
- What is the Cop31 electrification target?
- A target on the table would meet 35% of final energy demand from electricity by 2035, as part of a push to electrify the global economy alongside initiatives on waste and methane.
