The UN Climate Change Conference COP30 officially opens on Monday in Belém, Brazil, running from Monday, 10 November 2025, to Friday,21 November 2025.
With climate impacts inflicting growing human and economic costs in every country, it is expected that world leaders will make commitments to lower global temperatures and curb the global warming crisis. Ahead of the conference, the United Nations said it will not give up on the 1.5°C goal.
The UN Secretary-General António Guterres continued his campaign to accelerate the global switch from fossil fuels to clean energy – “the cheapest source of new electricity in nearly every country.
“The 1.5°C limit is a red line for humanity. It must be kept within reach,” he said. Countries need to urgently act and scale up solutions that transform economies and protect people, igniting a decade of acceleration and delivery.
He said more temperature rises could drive ecosystems toward irreversible tipping points, expose billions to unlivable conditions, and amplify threats to peace and security.
“Every fraction of a degree means more hunger, displacement, and loss, especially for those least responsible. This is moral failure and deadly negligence,” he warned.
Negotiators, scientists, and civil society are gathering in Belém, Brazil, are expected to discuss priority actions to tackle climate change. COP30 will focus on the efforts needed to limit the global temperature increase to 1.5°C, the presentation of new national action plans (NDCs), and the progress on the finance pledges made at COP29.
Guterres said the newly presented National action plans (NDCs,) including that from Uganda, represent progress, but they are still far short of what is needed.
“Even is fully implemented, they will put us on a pathway well above two degrees of global warming. Meanwhile, the climate crisis is accelerating,” he said.
The UN climate conference takes place every year. This year, the negotiations are expected to revolve around reducing greenhouse gas emissions, adaptation to climate change, climate finance for developing countries, renewable energy technologies and low-carbon solutions, preserving forests and biodiversity, climate justice, and the social impacts of climate change.
According to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the 30th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP30) is taking place after two consecutive years of record-high global temperatures and continued increases in greenhouse gas emissions.
At the same time, international relationships – so key to climate diplomacy – are being strained by wars, trade disputes, and differing views of the future of the global energy system.
“This has the potential to be one of the most consequential climate COPs of the last decade,” said Ruth Do Coutto, the Deputy Director of the Climate Change Division of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). “But there is no doubt: we are facing some serious headwinds.”
From cutting emissions to protecting forests, and strengthening adaptation finance and early warning systems, UNEP says the delegates are expected to grapple with in order to prevent runaway global warming. It said that despite some progress, the latest round of national climate plans still fall well short of what’s necessary to keep the worst effects of climate change at bay.
UNEP’s Emissions Gap Report 2025, released on the eve of COP30, shows current commitments put the world on a path of 2.3–2.5°C of warming by the end of the century. We are very likely to overshoot 1.5°C within the next decade — the priority now is to keep that overshoot as small and short as possible.
As such, COP30 countries will be under pressure to show how they will limit that overshoot and deliver deeper emissions cuts, especially in high-emitting sectors like energy, industry, and transport.
Other issues are how to protect communities from climate impacts. Like previous COPs, Belém will focus on how countries can brace themselves for the extreme weather and rising seas expected to accompany climate change.
Developing nations will need more than US$310 billion every year by 2035 to adapt to this climactic fallout. They now have access to just a tiny fraction of that total.
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