Clare Shakya's report notes:

"Just because the annual COP talks don't magically fix the climate crisis doesn't mean the system is broken.

"As the United Nations climate talks roll around each year, so too does a familiar refrain: 'The COP is broken!'

"Having attended the past nine COPs, I see something different.

"Sure, these gargantuan events are messy, frustrating and slow - but this is what consensus-building looks like."

Nothing better epitomizes the difference between a political consensus and a scientific consensus. In prior years it was common for denialists to argue that the consensus on climate meant nothing because it was just a bunch of people agreeing on a position to achieve some goal (and the goal was often held to be getting rich.) This is how a political consensus operates, and it it telling that the Denialists assumed consensus in science is the same -- that the consensus humans were warming the planet, however widely held, was just another opinion.

If thzt had been the case two facts would have emerged sooner or later.

1. 1) Someone, given the large number of scientists and organizations backing the mainstream consensus, would have broken ranks and "spilled the beans.'
2. 2) Valid evidence that the mainstream consensus was wrong would have emerged. And the Denialists would have published it far and wide, becoming heroes in the process. No one wants the world climate change is bringing us.

I appreciacte the optimistic tone of this article. However, it shows us that the COP process is still mostly aspirational. It "is pushing for more implementation." It "builds confidence in carbon markets." It "calls on all countries to put ocean-based climate action at the heart of their national plans." Its Mangrove Breakthrough is "aiming to mobilize $4 billion." Its Intergovernmental Land Tenure Commitment "aims to secure legal recognition" for indigenous lands.

Consider paragraph 31:

"Yet this year 80 countries have taken it upon themselves to organise a statement - external to official texts from the U.N. climate agency UNFCCC - outlining plans to collectively phase out fossil fuels."

The most significant action is happening outside the United Nations COP framework.

I've been following progress on climate change for a long time. I remember the persistance of the controversy sparked by "Climategate" (2009), which cherry-picked a few emails and issued misleading interpretations of them to putrport that climate scientists were lying. (The emails, by the way, were hacked, not leaked. Thus a more fitting name for this episode is "Swifthack.")

As the harmful effects of climate change transition from being imminent to immanent, the claim that climate change is not a problem has lost whatever credibility it had. The tactic now is to argue that it's too late to stave off these effects by phasing out fossil fuels, and so adaptation is what's needed now. And the methods of adaptation the developed countries are or soon will be pushing hardest fall under the heading of geoengineering. These methods are fraught with risk, the main one being that they don't reduce the amount of CO₂ in the atmosphere and hence do nothing to stop ocean acidification.

It remains true that the most cost-effective way to deal with climate change is to phase out fossil fuels. We could have begun doing this thirty years or more ago, but all such proposals were ignored in the major countries.

I've read Overshoot: How the World Surrendered To Climate Breakdown, which documents that the fossil fuel companies not only continue to expand the use of their products, but are expanding their distribution facilitiews and locking in greater reserves around the world. It is clear they have no intention of leaving any oil in the ground. I've also read On the Move: The Overheating Earth and the Uprooting of America, which looks at weather disruptions happening today in the United States and how they are driving internal migration and making homeowners' insurance prohibitively expensive or impossible to get.

Hope is important. It is not to late to limit the harm climate change is causing to the world. But we must also recognize the power of the people demaning business as usual. Note what Senator Whitehouse says at 18:15 about systemic risk. I'll summarize: the effects of climate change are going to hit everybody. Some may be able to avoid major trouble for a while, but not indefinitely. Climate change is not something that will hit, and then go away. It means harm today, greater harm tomorrow, and immense harm in the future. So I'll leave you with the perennial question: What will it take to get the world's major powers to understand that phasing out fossil fuels is the only true solution to the climate change they have imposed on the planet?