Ad-hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action

Submission by the Republic of Nauru on behalf of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS)

Plan of Work for the Ad-hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action

1 May 2012

1. The work of the Ad-hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action (ADP) toward the development of a new protocol under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (the Convention) should be conducted in a transparent, inclusive, efficient and effective manner.

2. The latest understanding of the science should guide the work of the ADP. The ADP should provide regular opportunities for input from relevant scientific and technical bodies, both inside and outside the formal negotiating process.

3. The ADP should incorporate lessons from the design and working methods of previous negotiating processes, including other working groups and subsidiary bodies, both within the UNFCCC and elsewhere.
Governance and methods of work

4. The ADP should avoid the mistakes made in the AWG-LCA, in particular its pattern of considering all issues at all sessions.

5. The ADP should utilize the positive elements of the governance of the Ad Hoc Group on the Berlin Mandate (AGBM), in particular its time-bound deadline on producing and circulating a negotiating text, and its model of working groups with a continuous existence convened as the need arose.

6. The ADP should have a Chair and a Vice Chair, with one coming from a developing country and the other from a developed country.

7. The ADP should employ a variety of working methods, including negotiating sessions, workshops, and regular high-level events as appropriate.

8. The ADP should have strong links and exchange information with external actors, including international forums capable of delivering mitigation action outside the UNFCCC process (e.g., IMO, ICAO, Montreal Protocol, etc.), and other stakeholders, in particular civil society and the private sector.

9. The ADP Chair and Vice Chair should create ‘workstreams’ on various subject matters, and then consult on activating and deactivating these workstreams to take account of, and respond to, progress in the negotiations.

Work in 2012

10. The work of the ADP should initially be divided into two workstreams:
• Enhancing action on mitigation pre-2020 to close the ambition gap; and
• Organization of other work.

11. At its first meeting, the ADP should urgently begin its work on enhancing pre-2020 mitigation action to close the ambition gap under the workplan on enhancing mitigation ambition described in paragraph 7 of decision 1/CP.17. AOSIS provided its views on how the workplan should be conducted in a submission dated 28 February 2012.

12. A separate workstream should be activated to discuss the organization of other work of the ADP, including setting deadlines and milestones to ensure the adoption of a new protocol by no later than 2015.

13. No other workstream or substantive discussions should be initiated until the workplan on enhancing mitigation ambition is well underway and significant progress towards closing the ambition gap has been made.

Elements of a new protocol

14. The new protocol should give balanced treatment to the areas identified in decision 1/CP.17, namely mitigation, adaptation, finance, technology development and transfer, transparency of action and support, and capacity-building.

15. Enhancing action on post-2020 mitigation should be considered in the context of the global temperature goal and the scale of action required to achieve it. Initial discussions on post-2020 mitigation should focus on:
• Post-2020 scenarios for stabilizing atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases at levels consistent with what is required for having a likely chance of limiting the rise in average global temperature of below 2°C and well below 1.5°C;
• A fair and equitable approach for sharing the mitigation effort necessary to achieve these goals taking into the account the principles and provisions of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change; and
• The scale of the means of implementation required to achieve post-2020 mitigation commitments, including financial resources, technology transfer and development, and capacity building.
16. Enhancing action on adaptation should also be considered in the context of the global temperature goal. Initial discussions on adaptation should focus on:
• The climate change impacts at various temperature rise scenarios;
• The economic and social costs of those impacts;
• The scale of the means of implementation required to adapt to those impacts, including the scale of financial resources, technology transfer and development, and capacity building; and
• Transparency of action, particularly the provision of the means of implementation.

17. Enhancing action on finance is necessary for developing countries to achieve post- 2020 mitigation obligations, as well as to adapt to the negative impacts of climate change. Discussions should focus on ways to dramatically scale up the provision of new and additional financial resources to ensure adequate and predictable flows of climate finance to enable the implementation of mitigation and adaptation actions in developing countries. This should include the identification of sources of climate finance.

18. Transparency of action is a vital element of the future protocol and should include MRV of mitigation action, MRV of the delivery of the means of implementation for both mitigation and adaptation actions, common accounting rules and a common reporting format for both mitigation action and the provision of the means of implementation, and a robust compliance system.

19. The new protocol should also include an international mechanism on loss and damage, which builds on the work programme on loss and damage under the SBI. The international mechanism should include a risk management facility, an insurance facility, and a “solidarity fund” to address slow onset and unavoidable impacts of climate change.

Schedule of work

20. The ADP should agree to a timeline as soon as possible, specifying dates by which key milestones should be achieved and various stages of negotiating texts must be produced. In particular, this schedule should stress that the text of a proposed protocol must be circulated to Parties by the Chair at least six months before COP20.