COP26 live updates: World leaders debate latest proposed deal at U.N. climate summit

India’s climate negotiator Bhupender Yadav attacked the Glasgow conference and its focus on reducing the size of coal sectors. He said that “targeting any particular sector is uncalled for.”

Reducing public support for coal-fired power plants has been a focus of efforts during COP26 to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but Yadav said that “developing countries have a right to their fair share of the global carbon budget.”

He said that India had created an ambitious solar program and pointed to efforts to build an electricity grid for solar. Yadav also said that “there is a lack of balance in the text.”

Representatives from China and South Africa indicated they backed India’s suggestions, and would like to see the paragraph around coal and fossil fuel subsidies changed.

“We don’t believe that one size fits all is a good approach when it comes to this issue,” said the South African negotiator, but he said that South Africa would not seek to reopen the text.

“I wonder if we’re not at risk of stumbling in this marathon a couple of meters before reaching the finish line,” E.U. climate policy chief Frans Timmermans said after having heard the first proposed interventions at the plenary.

He asked everyone in the room to “think of one person in your life, one person only, that will still be around in 2030 — and how that person will live if we don’t stick to the 1.5 degrees here today.”

Timmermans, who has supported keeping language on phasing out fossil fuel subsidies in the COP26 deal, said that he understands the limitations of the current deal.

“Of course we all have our national interests, and of course there are many issues that have to be looked at later,” he said. “I fully understand when developing nations say there should be more finances on the table.”

We’re only at the beginning, he said, of what is needed on adaptation finance, as well as loss and damage — referring to calls to stronger compensation to vulnerable countries for climate change-related destruction.

“But for heaven’s sake, don’t kill this moment by asking for more text, different text, deleting this, deleting that,” he said.

He stressed that everyone’s been heard by the COP26 presidency. “A lot of respect to every single country in this room was given by the presidency over the last couple of months. It is my firm belief that the text that is on the table now reflects perfectly well this respect shown by the presidency, and at the same time allows us to act with the urgency that is essential for our survival.”

“So I please implore you, please embrace this text so we can bring hope to the hearts of our children and grandchildren. They’re waiting for us. They will not forgive us if we fail them today.”

Alok Sharma pushed to bring two weeks of intense international climate negotiations to a close Saturday, acknowledging that the proposed deal at the COP26 summit does not do enough to solve global warming but insisting it will enshrine meaningful progress toward that goal.

“This is the moment of truth for our planet. And it’s a moment of truth for our children and grandchildren,” Sharma said in a session that was delayed for hours after delegates hustled to iron out remaining divisions.

“The world is willing us on to be bold, to be ambitious,” he added. “So much rests on the decisions that we collectively take today.”

Those decisions remained in flux on a sunny Scottish afternoon in which disagreements remained over two key areas of the proposed agreement: the arcane but important rules governing global carbon markets and details over how wealthy nations will help vulnerable countries shoulder the rising costs of climate-fueled disasters and help them build more sustainable economies.

Sharma recognized that many delegates were unsatisfied by parts of the proposed deal, but he implored negotiators not to hold out for additional leverage or push for one more chance to promote their national interests over those of others.

“Ask instead, ‘What is enough?’” Sharma said. “Does it provide enough for all of us?’”

“Ask yourself,” he continued, “if these texts represent a fair balance for your parties, for your countries. … And most importantly, please ask yourselves whether these texts deliver for all our people and our planet.”

Sharma reiterated that he hopes to seal a final agreement later Saturday. But that outcome remained uncertain as representatives from some nations rose to air remaining grievances with the potential agreement.

While many nations came together in Glasgow to discuss how to combat climate change, extreme weather didn’t stop back in their homelands. Each day, leaders spoke about the impact that rising global temperatures is having on their constituents — all while residents were often experiencing effects firsthand.

Here are some key conference and weather highlights day-by-day.

These terms are key to today’s debate among delegations at COP26. Here’s what they mean.

Mitigation: This is what countries need to do to reduce climate change, particularly by minimizing greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere. Getting countries to curb emissions is a central aim of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change — but even the United Nations acknowledges that current pledges are far too meager.

Adaptation: This about making life adjustments as the climate changes. It includes modifying behaviors or systems in the face of shifting temperatures, sea levels, precipitation and other weather and climate patterns. A recent study found that at least 85 percent of the world’s population has been affected by climate change.

Loss and damage: Even if the world stops burning fossil fuels tomorrow, even if countries spend trillions of dollars adapting, the catastrophic consequences of warming are already here. Homes will be lost. Farmland will be damaged. Lives and livelihoods will be destroyed. The countries that contributed the least to climate change will suffer the most. For decades, the world has paid mostly lip service to these unavoidable and unequal impacts, collectively known as “loss and damage.” But improvements in climate science have increasingly made it possible to pinpoint the role of climate change in disasters. At COP26, representatives of hard-hit areas are demanding compensation for harms they can now directly link to wealthy countries’ emissions.

Climate activists from Extinction Rebellion staged a funeral Saturday to highlight what they said was a “failure” of the COP26 summit after it went into overtime.

The demonstration was led by a subgroup, the “Red Rebel Brigade,” which has been wandering the streets of Glasgow during the summit, with faces painted white and wearing crimson-colored cloaks and headdresses. On Saturday, that group led a procession from Glasgow Cathedral to a local cemetery and posed with headstones. A Scottish piper played Scottish folk tunes.

Extinction Rebellion, a climate activist group founded in Britain, is known for its theatrical — and controversial — tactics. On Friday, a topless activist was arrested in Glasgow for protesting outside the investment bank JPMorgan, a group spray-painted “Blood Money” on a Barclays bank, and activists outside the COP26 venue doused themselves with fake blood. Two people were arrested for attempting to scale the fence that surrounds the summit venue.

Extinction Rebellion said in a statement that COP26 was “yet another mark of failure.” It cited an analysis of national climate pledges by Climate Action Tracker showing that on the basis of short-term goals that countries have laid out at COP26, global temperature increases will exceed 2.4 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels.

This would have “catastrophic consequences,” the statement said.

Even as windstorms became more powerful, wildfires grew more deadly and rising seas made damaging floods more frequent, Americans’ views about the threat of global warming over the past few years remain largely unchanged, a Washington Post-ABC News poll found.

A clear majority of adults said warming is a serious problem, but the share — 67 percent — is about the same as it was seven years ago, when alarms raised by climate scientists were less pronounced than they are now.

The poll, released Friday, also found that the partisan divide over the issue has widened. The proportion of Democrats who said they see climate change as an existential threat rose by 11 points to 95 percent over seven years. The increase was driven partly by Black Americans, who are now more likely to say the issue is very serious.

“I guess I worry about the future, and I worry about the effects that climate change will have on the planet overall. I’m confused as to why most people aren’t worried,” said Dorothy Gustave, 39, who is Black and lives in Brooklyn. “Mother Nature doesn’t care about your excuses. Mother Nature will kill you. We need to start thinking about ways to fix that.”

Meanwhile, the share of Republicans who say climate change is a serious problem fell by 10 points, to 39 percent, over the same period. The Republican decline in Post-ABC polls tracks with the findings of annual Gallup polls in which Republican concerns dropped after 2017, when Donald Trump took office as president.

Trump doubted the existence of climate change and pulled the United States out of a global agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that are causing the atmosphere to warm. In 2017, 41 percent of Republicans told Gallup they believed warming had already begun. But this year, 29 percent expressed that belief.

Environmental groups reviewing draft text of the climate deal said Saturday that they were heartened to see the words “fossil fuels” remain.

“The key line about fossil fuels is still in the text. It’s weak and compromised, but it’s a breakthrough, it’s a bridgehead and we have to fight like hell to keep it in there and have it strengthened,” said Greenpeace International Executive Director Jennifer Morgan.

She and others said the day would provide “a defining moment” but warned that a small number of countries are seeking to dilute any language that directly addresses the need to stop using fossil fuels.

“Fossil fuel interests should be put on notice. The deal on the table is weak, but if they gut it they’ll have to answer to the young, to people on the front line of climate impacts and ultimately to history,” Morgan said.

Tracy Carty, head of Oxfam’s COP26 delegation, said: “The world’s poorest countries are in danger of being lost from view, but the next few hours can and must change the course we are on. What’s on the table is still not good enough.”

Carty said governments should agree “to come back next year with strengthened emission reduction targets that will keep 1.5 degrees alive.”

That’s a reference to keeping the average global temperature from increasing more than 1.5 degrees Celsius compared with the preindustrial level — a threshold scientists say is important for keeping the world habitable.

“Negotiators should come back to the table armed with cans of Irn-Bru and stop at nothing to get an ambitious deal over the line,” Carty said.