A 29-page text, that lost 14 pages, still has multiple brackets and options. First and foremost, there is still no consensus on the target temperature — the parties have not yet decided on their pledge and suggest holding the increase in the global average temperature either "below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels", or "well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels" or "below 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels."
The issue of targeted temperature has been high on the talks agenda as the small island nations insisted on the 1.5 degrees target as they are the ones seeing the climate change effect right now. At the same time, the Intended Nationally Determined Contributions representing emission cuts targets submitted by the countries-participants of the conference reportedly fail to meet even a 2 degrees target.
According to parisagreement.org, covering the negotiations, the text now has 367 open brackets and 47 options remaining which represents a significant progress comparing to the version from December 5 that contained 916 brackets and 91 options.
High level segments of the major Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change kicked off on Monday. At the moment, officials from almost 200 states are reviewing the draft text of the final agreement that has been prepared at the Paris conference over the past week.
The Paris Climate Change Conference, running November 30 — December 11, is expected to result in the signing of a global agreement on the measures necessary to prevent global warming from exceeding 1.5 degrees Celsius, as an increase of average global temperatures of 2 degrees or more has been scientifically proven to have disastrous consequences for the planet.
