Over the course of a century, how did the world fight for 1.5 degrees Celsius?

This year’s United Nations Climate Change Conference takes place in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, and this will be the 27th session since 1995 in which world leaders have gathered to confront global warming.

But the world has known for much longer that climate change is a threat, and that the main cause is the use of fossil fuels and other industrial activities.

The global climate debate witnessed several major milestones:

• 19th Century: Throughout the century, European scientists studied how various gases and vapors could trap heat in the Earth’s atmosphere.
• 1938: By compiling historical weather data, British engineer Jay Callendar demonstrates for the first time that the planet’s temperatures are rising in the modern era, correlates temperature trends with measured rises in atmospheric carbon dioxide and suggests a correlation.
• 1958: The American scientist Charles David Keeling begins a systematic measurement of carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere above the Mauna Loa observatory in Hawaii, and the results he collected resulted in the development of the Keeling curve, a graph showing a steady increase in carbon dioxide concentrations.
• 1988: American climate scientist James Hansen testifies before Congress that the planet’s temperature is rising due to the accumulation of human-caused greenhouse gases, and that this is already starting to change the climate and weather.
• 1990: At the so-called Second United Nations Conference on Climate Change, scientists highlight the dangers of global warming to both nature and society.
• 1992: Countries signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change at the (Earth Summit) in Rio, and the goal of the agreement was to control emissions to prevent severe climate change, and enshrined the idea of ​​”common but differentiated responsibilities”, which means that developed countries must Do more because they account for most historical emissions, and the agreement did not include binding emissions targets.
• 1995: FCTC members convene their first Conference of the Parties in Berlin, and the final document from the meeting calls for legally binding emissions targets.
• 1997: At COP3 in Kyoto, Japan, the parties agree to the first treaty that requires specific emissions cuts. Under the Kyoto Protocol, developed countries commit to reducing emissions between 2008 and 2012 from 1990 levels, with differentiated limits for different countries.
• 2001: US President George W. Bush takes office and describes the Kyoto Protocol as “fatally flawed”, a refusal that effectively means his country’s exit from the agreement.
• 2005: The Kyoto Protocol enters into force after Russia ratifies it, fulfilling a requirement that at least 55 countries that also account for at least 55 percent of emissions have ratified the agreement.
• 2007: COP13 participants in Bali agree to work on a new binding agreement that includes both developed and developing countries.
• 2009: The COP15 talks in Copenhagen nearly collapsed amid disagreements over binding targets As the Kyoto Protocol expired, and instead of creating a new framework, as suggested by the Bali Roadmap, countries voted to “take into account” a non-binding political statement.
• 2010: (COP16) in Cancun, Mexico, again failed to set new binding targets for emissions, but the Cancun Accords established a Green Climate Fund to help developing countries adapt and mitigate the impact of measures on them, and set a target to limit global warming to two degrees Celsius above the pre-epoch average. Industry.
• 2011: COP17 talks in Durban, South Africa, faltered after China, the United States and India refused to sign binding emission cuts before 2015, and instead, the states parties to the framework agreement agreed to extend the Kyoto Protocol until 2017.
• 2012: After Russia, Japan and New Zealand resist new emissions targets that do not include developing countries, countries at COP18 in Doha agree to extend the Kyoto Protocol until 2020.
• 2013 – At COP19 in Warsaw, representatives of the poorest countries withdrew for several hours due to a lack of agreement on how to deal with climate-related loss and damage, and eventually a mitigating agreement was reached.
• 2015: Global warming exceeds 1 degree Celsius, and extreme weather events, including floods, droughts and wildfires, are occurring more frequently and with greater intensity around the world, and countries are increasingly facing these direct threats from climate change.
• The Paris Agreement was the first global pact to call for emissions pledges from both developed and developing countries, which were required to pledge nationally determined contributions, with targets increased every five years, and signatories pledged to try to keep global temperature rise at 1.5°C above an average. before the age of industry.
• 2017: US President Donald Trump described the Paris Agreement as hitting the economy and said that his country would withdraw from it, and that became official in 2020.
• 2019 : UN Secretary-General António Guterres described the lack of ambition demonstrated during the COP25 in Madrid as a missed opportunity world.
• 2020: The annual Cope conference has been postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
• 2021: One of the first measures taken by Emiri President Gobaiden after taking office was to rejoin the Paris Agreement.
• 2021: COP26 was held from October 31 to November 12 in Glasgow, Scotland, and the final “Glasgow Charter” sets a goal of using less coal, calls on governments to increase their climate ambition, and resolves the rules for trading carbon credits to offset emissions.