UPSC Current Affairs for 10ᵗʰ November 2026

2. At COP31, ‘Overshoot’ Narrative Cannot Replace Climate Action

The 31st Conference of the Parties (COP31) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, beginning in Antalya, Türkiye, takes place amid extreme weather events, human tragedies and an energy crisis. The growing emphasis on climate ‘overshoot’ risks diverting attention from immediate emission reductions, historical responsibility and fulfilment of climate finance commitments.

Climate Overshoot and the Limits of Carbon Removal

1. The 1.5°C Imperative: Countries must urgently limit global warming to 1.5°C and, if this threshold is temporarily exceeded, pursue a return below it as soon as possible. This requires immediate emission reductions and a scientific assessment of available mitigation and carbon-removal options rather than relying on overshoot pathways.
2. Meaning of Climate Overshoot: Overshooting 1.5°C means temporarily exceeding the temperature threshold in the near term and returning below it by the end of this century. This narrative risks shifting attention away from immediate emission reductions.
3. Continued Fossil Fuel Expansion: Despite climate commitments, fossil fuels accounted for about 83% and 73% of primary energy use in the U.S. and European Union respectively in 2025. The U.S. proposed opening nearly 1.3 billion acres of waters for offshore drilling; Norway offered 70 new oil and gas exploration blocks, including in the Arctic; the U.K. approved 31 new oil and gas fields; and Australia approved 37 fossil fuel projects since 2022.
4. Scale of Carbon Removal: The UNEP report Limiting Overshoot: Navigating Exceedance of 1.5 degrees Celsius and Pathways towards Return highlights that reversing just 0.1°C of warming would require removing 220 billion tonnes of CO₂, equivalent to five years of current global emissions.
5. Technological and Financial Constraints: The world currently removes about 2.2 billion tonnes of CO₂ annually, mainly through forests and soils, while direct air capture removes barely 2 million tonnes. Scaling it up could cost around $600 per tonne of CO₂ removed, and the warming caused by emitting a tonne of CO₂ may not be reversed at the same rate through its removal.
6. Carbon Removal and Fossil Fuel Continuity: An oil company selected for a federal direct-air-capture hub argued that the technology could give the industry a licence to continue operating for another 60, 70 or 80 years, raising concerns that carbon removal could prolong fossil fuel dependence.

Climate Finance, Historical Responsibility and Global Inequity

1. Unfulfilled Climate Finance Commitments: Developed countries reported mobilising around $137 billion in climate finance in 2024, but its actual value was estimated at only $33–45 billion, with 65% of public finance provided as loans. The U.S. rescinded $4 billion in Green Climate Fund pledges, while the U.K. almost halved its contribution.
2. Adaptation Finance Deficit: According to UNEP’s 2026 Adaptation Gap Report, international public adaptation finance from developed to developing countries reached approximately $28.2–31.7 billion in 2024, while developing countries require around $305 billion annually by 2035. Even a substantial increase in international public finance would cover only a fraction of these requirements, highlighting the widening adaptation-finance gap.
3. Trade Measures and Industrialisation: The EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), covering selected goods in iron and steel, cement, aluminium, fertilisers, electricity and hydrogen, may impose additional carbon-related costs on industrial exports from developing countries and create challenges for their industrial development.
4. Unequal Land-use Burden: National pledges already envisage using nearly 1.2 billion hectares of land for CO₂ removal, most of it in the Global South. This risks turning land and natural resources needed for food, livelihoods and development into carbon sinks for excess emissions of the Global North.
5. Outsourcing Mitigation Obligations: Switzerland plans to meet up to one-third of its 2030 emissions-reduction target through international mitigation measures, including carbon-credit projects abroad. Its national target is to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by at least 50% below 1990 levels by 2030. Such arrangements raise concerns about the transfer of mitigation responsibilities to developing countries and the need to ensure the environmental integrity of international carbon credits.
6. Unclear Responsibility: The UNEP report does not clearly establish who will undertake and finance carbon removal or whose land will be used. Overshoot pathways therefore risk transferring the burden of historical emissions to developing countries.

COP31: Accountability and Return to Climate Action

1. Immediate Emission Reductions: Developed countries must undertake deep, immediate and sustained mitigation, achieve net-zero well before 2050 and reach net-negative emissions within their own borders, rather than relying on forests and land in developing countries.
2. Predictable Climate Finance: Developing countries need predictable, grant-based public finance rather than loans or private investments. The Climate Finance Work Programme agreed at Belém must take shape at Antalya and provide clear guidance on implementing Article 9.1 of the Paris Agreement.
3. Technology Transfer: Climate negotiations must address intellectual property and other barriers that result in climate technologies being sold at premium prices rather than transferred to developing countries.
4. Scientific and Social Assessment: Overshoot pathways must account for carbon budgets, historical emissions, scientific uncertainties and feasibility constraints, alongside their implications for livelihoods, food security, biodiversity and indigenous communities.
5. Carbon Budget Accountability: No COP decision has referred to the quantitative value of the total or remaining carbon budget or discussed which countries have spent the most. COP31 must focus on accountability for emissions and fulfilment of climate finance commitments rather than allowing the overshoot narrative to replace concrete climate action.