Context
This year marks the 10th anniversary of the Paris Climate Agreement (PA)—a key milestone in the implementation of this international treaty, which IDDRI helped develop back in 2015. The year 2025 will serve as a reality check for progress, with new Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) at the centre of the attention as a core mechanism of the PA. This year also features COP30, an event that carries high expectations. With a skilled Presidency at the helm, there is potential to generate momentum for shifting gears and innovating where necessary to address the needs of this decisive decade in the fight against climate change. However, the geopolitical landscape is averse to cooperation and to climate discussions; the US withdrawal from the PA has sparked fears of a disengagement domino effect. And climate impacts continue their destructive upward trajectory, with rising exposure fuelling frustration and a growing sense of injustice.
Against this backdrop, the 10th anniversary offers a moment of reflection, to take stock of the past, and look ahead. A meaningful reflection requires clarity of purpose, evidence gathering, critical analysis, lessons learned and balanced perspectives. It can serve as a catalyser for a turning point in climate politics. IDDRI is well positioned to contribute to an informed diagnosis, a solutions-oriented debate, and to facilitate the build-up of new coalitions capable of improving the political and economic conditions for countries and organisations to go further.
Objectives and contributions
A diagnosis of the Paris Agreement
There is value in undertaking an evidence-based diagnosis of the implementation of the Paris Agreement based on initial objectives and expectations, understanding of current major risks for obstruction and integration of a broad range of perspectives. Assessing progress on ambition must go beyond the international arena to policies, actions, investments and institutions at national level. This assessment can complete the diagnosis of the PA effectiveness based on changes on the ground.
IDDRI will develop a diagnosis at two levels:
- a diagnosis of the current state of the PA using the expectations outlined in IDDRI’s 2015 publications as a benchmark. This work will map available data to support an evidence-based analysis of the achievements and limitations of the Paris Agreement 10 years after its adoption and guide follow-up analysis with key partners around the world on selected areas, ultimately generating joint recommendations for necessary improvements.
- a stock take of where countries stand in mitigation ambition and climate policy governance, based on the Deep Decarbonisation Pathways (DDP) initiative, a network of national decarbonisation experts. The annual DDP report will undertake an analysis of the progress of climate action in about 20 key countries a decade after the PA.
The diffusion of PA objectives across non-state actors and its orchestration
The climate objectives have percolated across non-state actors (NSAs) and through the multiplicity of international fora that support the international rule-based system. It illustrates the mainstreaming of the climate considerations and the implementation of the objectives of the PA in different sectors and policy areas. But while there is ad hoc evidence of this percolation across various sectors, including the financial sector, there is limited structured data on how the global goals of the PA have diffused across the work programmes, activities and practices of international organisations (IOs) and businesses. The orchestration of climate action, spread across numerous siloed IOs, and credibility of green claims is a critical challenge to inform progress and guide future action.
In this context, IDDRI will partner with international organizatons and business associations to support and assess this mainstreaming of the PA's goals.
Strengthening the implementation of the Global Stocktake signals, with a focus on energy
The Global Stocktake (GST), a core mechanism established by the PA, concluded at COP28 with several recommendations to get on track to the long-term temperature and adaptation goals, including specific new granular global goals. Two prominent ones are tripling REs by 2030 and transitioning away from fossil fuels in a just, orderly and equitable manner. However, collective goals face challenges. To address this, strategic forums will be needed throughout 2025 to support cooperative action and tackle the challenges hindering progress—for instance, as part of the Roadmap to Mission 1.5 and via themed-based bilateral and mini-lateral dialogues. The energy agenda must provide means to keep countries that must take the lead accountable and understand the positions of major southern countries on just transition away from fossil fuels. It is also essential to identify next steps for ensuring a steady RE expansion that minimizes trade frictions, while fostering development and resilience across the board.
IDDRI will work with big emerging countries on this workstream.
Better integration of equity and justice considerations
Equity and fairness are central to climate negotiations. They are well anchored in the principles and goals of the PA and essential to leverage political will and action. Challenges persist in their operationalization, and across time, geographies and scales. At UNFCCC level, this is evidenced by poor outcome landed at COP29 on the Just Transition Work Programme. In the real economy, this is shown by the tensions about national industrial policies and the absence of common visions for economic cooperation around the goal of transition. As mitigation efforts deepen and climate impacts accelerate, a re-focus on how to effectively consider equity and fairness is needed.
In this context, IDDRI is organizing dialogues with emerging countries to support local just transitions and to guide the international cooperation ecosystem to better integrate equity and fairness considerations in the race to meet the PA goals.
