Where next for the climate COP? Reflections from Bonn
Andrew Prag, Managing Director of Policy and Karl Vella, Director of Climate Policy at We Mean Business Coalition
After years of engagement with UN climate conferences, one lesson stands out: the significance of a meeting is not always reflected in its formal outcomes.
This was clear last November in Belem, where one of the most notable steps forward was not a formal outcome – the launch of a Presidency-led initiative on fossil fuel roadmaps, and a recognition of the role that coalitions of the willing can play alongside the formal multilateral process.
We saw it again in Bonn these past two weeks. The mid-year session is often seen as a technical checkpoint in the climate calendar. It is where negotiators roll up their sleeves – often literally in the June heat – and work through draft texts, preparing the ground for the political decisions that will eventually be taken at COP later in the year. This year’s session certainly included its share of difficult negotiations and familiar debates and divides. Indeed, some important issues, including the adaptation goal and mitigation work programme, remain unresolved and will now carry over to COP31.
Yet some of the most interesting developments took place outside the negotiating rooms. Taken together, they may offer an early glimpse of what the next phase of the COP and Paris Agreement process could look like and how new forms of international climate cooperation could play out.
It is not an easy time for the Paris Agreement process. The shift to an international political landscape less favourable to discussions on climate change has coincided with the natural pivot in the process from negotiations to implementation. Bonn provided a useful reminder of what the UNFCCC system continues to do well. It remains the only forum capable of bringing together governments, businesses, financial institutions, civil society and international organisations around a shared objective and common direction of travel. That role remains as important as ever.
But Bonn also made clear that the central question is no longer simply about securing new commitments and ambition. Increasingly, it is how to implement the commitments that have already been made – and that means involving more closely the private sector and other non-state actors. Signs of this shift could be seen throughout the conference.
The opportunity of the shared COP31 Presidency
COP31 is unusual because of its split presidency. While Türkiye holds the main presidency role – and will host the conference in Antalya – Australia is in charge of the formal negotiation process through its unprecedented role of “President of Negotiations”.
It was clear in Bonn the that the two are working in close cooperation– despite the two countries’ football teams clashing in a heated World Cup tie bang in the middle of the conference! At a moment when climate diplomacy often appears fragmented, there was a clear effort to connect the formal negotiating process with the practical challenges of implementation.
So while the double presidency may at first seem like another level of diplomatic complexity and potential friction, what emerged in Bonn is an exciting opportunity. Without direct responsibility for the negotiations, one of the biggest opportunities Türkiye has to ensure success of their COP is the so-called Action Agenda.
For the past 10 years the Action Agenda and the Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Action have been the main channel through which businesses, cities, regions and other non-state actors can contribute to the UNFCCC process, showcase real-world progress and advocate for the policy frameworks needed to accelerate action.
What became clear in Bonn is that the incoming COP31 Presidency intends to elevate this work further. The COP31 President-Designate, Minister Murat Kurum, used Bonn to signal a strong focus on implementation and delivery through the Action Agenda, building on the foundations laid by the Marrakech Partnership and its long-standing role in mobilising non-state actors in support of the goals of the Paris Agreement.
But for most of that time this was seen by many as being somewhat peripheral to the main event of governments negotiating the rulebook of the Paris Agreement
That changed last year, with key steps taken by the Brazilian COP30 Presidency to recalibrate the Action Agenda and put it closer to the centre of proceedings. This included making it more explicitly focused on the implementation of the outcomes of the first Global Stocktake, marking a shift from identifying priorities to helping mobilise action around them.
Most notably, the COP31 President Designate, Minister Murat Kurum, announced a package of Action Agenda initiatives centred around practical implementation. Strikingly, this included a new ambition to increase the share of electricity in final energy demand to 35% by 2035. This level of ambition matches modelling done by both IEA and IRENA showing the role electrification needs to play in achievable pathways towards achieving goals of the Paris Agreement. This was accompanied by initiatives on waste and methane, resilient cities and buildings, and circularity, signalling a broader effort to focus the Action Agenda on practical solutions and delivery.
The announcement of the electrification target builds on growing momentum around electrification across governments, businesses and international organisations, and comes as a growing number of companies view electrification not only as a decarbonisation strategy, but also as a source of competitiveness, resilience and economic opportunity.
Recent analysis by We Mean Business Coalition and partners supports this shift. New global polling of nearly 2,000 business leaders across 18 markets found overwhelming support for electrification, with companies increasingly seeing it as a pathway to stronger competitiveness, energy security and growth. The We Mean Business Coalition Electric Advantage program aims to capitalise on this momentum by providing a platform for collective business and government leadership to accelerate electrification. The program’s ten policy principles are aimed at helping governments create the enabling conditions needed to accelerate electrification and seize the economic opportunities that come with it. In the coming days We Mean Business Coalition will co-host the Global Energy Transition and Electrification Summit in London, and will launch a new business statement in support of electrification.
Electrification emerged as one of the clearest examples of this changing landscape.
Aside from the Action Agenda announcement, discussions on electrification were happening throughout Bonn, bringing together governments, businesses, financial institutions, technical experts and other stakeholders around a shared challenge: how to accelerate implementation in ways that support climate goals while also strengthening competitiveness, energy security and economic development.
What was striking was not just the level of support for electrification itself. Very few participants questioned its importance. It was also the solution-oriented tone of the conversation, focusing on the practical barriers that continue to slow progress. This was reflected in a roundtable We Mean Business Coalition co-hosted in Bonn with the Türkiye COP31 Presidency, the Australian Presidency of Negotiations, and the Global Renewables Alliance. Bringing together governments, businesses and international organizations from a diverse range of countries and sectors, the discussion focused on how to accelerate deployment of clean electrification by addressing barriers around investment needs, grid infrastructure, permitting, workforce development, regulatory frameworks and access to affordable finance.
In many ways, this demonstrates a broader shift taking place across the climate agenda. Increasingly, progress is being driven through collaboration between governments, businesses and other stakeholders working together around specific implementation challenges. Whether on electrification, industrial decarbonization, methane reduction, adaptation or the transition away from fossil fuels, practical delivery often depends on partnerships capable of mobilizing investment, expertise and political support, and bringing together those willing and able to move faster.
This should not be seen as a departure from multilateralism. It is a means of using the system in a way that fits the needs of the moment – similar to how COP30 formalized the “two-speed” multilateralism that recognizes coalitions of the willing in parallel to the formal negotiations.
Paris was largely about establishing direction. The coming years will be judged on delivery.
Governments spent a decade building the implementation framework for Paris and then setting the parameters for action via the Global Stocktake. Despite the clear direction, the latest round of NDC submissions has not yet matched the scale or urgency of the challenge. This reinforces the importance of focusing not only on new commitments, but on the practical implementation pathways, investment frameworks and partnerships needed to translate agreed goals into real-world outcomes.
This is where closer integration of business and other non-state actors becomes increasingly important. The Action Agenda has the potential to become a central part of the story. At its best, it can help connect governments, business, finance and other stakeholders around practical implementation priorities. It can provide a platform for businesses leading the transition to not only showcase solutions but also to more directly highlight where policy barriers remain and where international collaboration and learning can help governments to overcome those barriers. This would help to accelerate implementation, while remaining firmly anchored within the broader objectives of the UNFCCC process.
For business, this evolution matters. One example discussed in Bonn was the opportunity of green freight corridors and low-emission heavy-duty transport, where the COP process provides a platform to coalesce around visionary projects, to share learning across countries and to show industry and international partners are working together to coordinate infrastructure, finance and policy frameworks to accelerate deployment.
Bonn did not provide all the answers. But it did offer a glimpse of what a more implementation-focused phase of climate cooperation could look like. If COP31 can build on that momentum by strengthening collaboration between governments, business, finance and other stakeholders around practical solutions such as electrification, it may help demonstrate what the next chapter of climate action and collaboration looks like in practice.