It has been a tumultuous time for the UN climate talks. The mass protests against social inequality in Chile prompted the country to give up its plan to host COP25 just a month before the annual talks were scheduled to begin in December.
But within a week, Spain offered to organise the event in Madrid on the same dates, an offer which the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) quickly endorsed — the fastest decision made about a venue in UNFCCC history.
This sudden solution to an unprecedented challenge was an inspiring display of friendship and recognition that climate change is an urgent priority. The recent reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) delivered a stark and powerful warning: our lands, our ocean and all of humanity are at grave risk if we don’t rapidly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The world must continue to build momentum ahead of 2020 so that all countries offer more ambitious national climate commitments next year. Spain and Chile have demonstrated a “can-do” approach to the climate challenge that should inspire the world and shape what is accomplished at COP25.
Here are the key tasks for countries at COP25:

Step up ambition.
The Chilean presidency defined COP25 as an Ambition COP. At COP21 in Paris in 2015, countries were asked to bring forward updated national climate commitments by 2020 (known in the UN as nationally determined contributions, or NDCs). And at the September 2019 UN Climate Action Summit in New York, many small and medium-sized countries sent a clear signal that they will strengthen their commitments next year. As of now, 68 countries have indicated that they intend to enhance their NDCs. As we move toward 2020, the world will be watching to see whether large emitters will follow that example. COP25 will be a moment to highlight those who are clearly ready to enhance their commitments and shine a spotlight on what’s needed from others next year.
While the Trump administration has rejected the Paris Agreement and established the United States as a climate loner, this is no excuse for other countries to dial back their climate efforts. The U.S. states, cities and businesses that remain committed to the Paris Agreement now represent nearly 70 per cent of U.S. GDP and nearly two-thirds of the country’s population; if they were a country, they’d be the second-largest economy in the world, second only to the full United States and larger than China.
Make progress on outstanding rules.
While the big deliverable of last year’s COP in Katowice, Poland was the adoption of a 300-page set of guidelines to facilitate the implementation of the Paris Agreement, two issues could not be resolved: the use of international carbon markets — covered in Article 6 of the climate accord — and the length of the implementing period for countries’ NDCs, also referred to as the common time frame.

Carbon Markets
Establishing rules for carbon markets will be a priority for COP25. Fifty-one percent of all NDCs include markets as one of the means to achieve countries’ emissions-reduction goals. These approaches have the potential to drive cheaper emissions reductions while generating financing to transition to renewable energy and bolster resilience to climate impacts. But those rules must be designed so that they protect the environmental integrity of countries’ national climate commitments.
Without proper oversight and robust rules, Article 6 could severely undercut climate action. One way this could happen is through double counting, in which both the buyer and seller of carbon credits would claim the same emissions reduction in their national emissions records, and thus paint a false picture of overall carbon cuts. Another concern is that pre-2020 emissions reductions under the Kyoto Protocol could be allowed to be carried forward and counted toward countries’ climate commitments after 2020, weakening efforts to reduce emissions further.

Assess loss and damage.
Another sensitive issue that negotiators will grapple with in Madrid is the review of the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage (WIM), which was established in 2013 to address loss and damage associated with impacts of climate change in developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change. This includes losses and damages that go beyond what countries and communities can adapt to or recover from, such as loss of cultural heritage, land, lives and livelihoods.  
At COP25, Parties will review the WIM’s performance: what lessons have been learned, what are the gaps and opportunities, is the WIM effective and efficient, is it useful and responsive to developing countries, is it catalysing collaboration and partnership, and is it properly resourced? They will also review the long-term vision for the WIM, which has implications for ways in which it may be enhanced and strengthened. Parties will no doubt pay particular attention to how the WIM has, over the past six years, enhanced action and support for averting, reducing and addressing loss and damage associated with the impacts of climate change — and what can be done to strengthen this particular function of the WIM, including through the possible establishment of a taskforce on loss and damage finance.

Advance finance and capacity-building.
Developing countries — particularly those most vulnerable to climate change — cannot step up climate action without financial support from developed ones. So far, 28 countries have confirmed $9.7 billion in pledges to the Green Climate Fund’s replenishment; 12 of those countries have at least doubled their contributions compared to 2014. This is a positive step, but many more countries should contribute, including Australia, the United States and wealthy oil-producing states. Developed countries that have not yet doubled their contributions should do so. Additional financial commitments at COP25 would build trust and empower more countries to strengthen their climate commitments in 2020.
Addressing the intersection of climate action and social equity may draw much greater attention at these UN climate talks than in the past. This is partly the result of the social unrest in Chile (and increasingly many other countries, too), but also an outgrowth of rising attention to these issues more broadly in climate discussions, including the focus on just transitions, health impacts and gender at the recent UN Climate Action Summit.