UN climate summit starts week two with uphill battle

• It could also call into question the utility of the UN climate process.

Zoom in: Also deadlocked are talks to move forward from the historic agreement at COP28 in Dubai, when countries committed to transition "away from fossil fuels in energy systems."

• Negotiators from many nations, including the U.S., are seeking to at the very least repeat that language, if not state more specific steps.
• However, some countries are opposing this.

The big picture: It is typical for the toughest issues to be left for higher-level decision-makers who arrive during the second week of COPs.

• On climate finance, developing countries are seeking about $1 trillion in climate finance per year to gird their nations against climate disasters and move toward renewable energy sources.
• A panel of big-name economists agreed with that target in a report released last week, noting that it would increase to $1.3 trillion by 2035.
• Not all of this money would come from industrialized nations' coffers, however.

Yes, but: It's not as common to have so many outstanding matters confronting negotiators. That includes not just the central climate finance goal, but also more ancillary issues that were expected to see progress during week one.

What they're saying: According to Kaveh Guilanpour, vice president for international strategies at the nonprofit Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, COP29 will be judged mainly by the finance commitments, which were always likely to get pushed well into the second week.

• About this target, he said: "I never thought that we would make much progress in the first week, because it's the main deliverable, which traditionally doesn't conclude until the last moment."
• "And it's also highly political, so it will need political guidance. So I'm actually not that concerned about the state of play on that," he told Axios via WhatsApp from Baku.
• Guilanpour said a final agreement at COP29 is likely to contain about a doubling of the current $100 billion annual funding target from industrialized nations, plus the possibility of an aspirational goal of eventually increasing it toward the $1 trillion target.

Zoom out: Negotiators are hoping to get a boost from talks going on simultaneously at the G20 summit in Brazil. On Sunday, outgoing President Biden became the first sitting U.S. president to visit the Amazon rainforest.

• Signals from G20 leaders in favor of strong climate action could grease the wheels for a smoother second week at COP29.
• The G20 nations are responsible for the vast majority of global greenhouse gas emissions and have the greatest capacity to raise money for climate resilience and mitigation for developing nations.
• But the G20 summit, like COP29, is taking place amid a turbulent geopolitical environment that will make even the richest nations stingy.
• "I am concerned about the pace of the negotiations at COP29 in Baku," UN Secretary-General António Guterres told the media Sunday at the G20.

"A successful outcome at COP29 is still within reach, but it will require leadership and compromise, namely from the G20 countries."

The bottom line: COPs have a rhythm that typically goes from hope to guarded optimism, followed by worry and occasionally even despair, before breakthroughs are made after consecutive all-night negotiating sessions toward the end.

• Yet COP29 so far stands out as being in a deeper state of despair than usual, with a fuzzier path out of it than at many previous meetings.