Cop26 live third draft text published after climate talks overrun

One key area is paragraph 36, which refers to fossil fuels. Here’s the old version:

36. Calls upon Parties to accelerate the development, deployment and dissemination of technologies and the adoption of policies for the transition towards low-emission energy systems, including by rapidly scaling up clean power generation and accelerating the phaseout of unabated coal power and of inefficient subsidies for fossil fuels;

and here’s the new version:

36. Calls upon Parties to accelerate the development, deployment and dissemination of technologies, and the adoption of policies, to transition towards low emission energy systems, including by rapidly scaling up the deployment of clean power generation and energy efficiency measures, including accelerating efforts towards the phase-out of unabated coal power and inefficient fossil fuel subsidies, recognizing the need for support towards a just transition;

The first draft was the first UN document since the Kyoto Protocol in 1997 to mention fossil fuels, which was seen as a major step, so environmentalists will be pleased to see the language made it through the night.

However, the qualifier “inefficient”, which was added for the second draft, remains. In yesterday’s stocktaking plenary many poor countries objected to this language as they said it could be used as a loophole to continue fossil fuel subsidies. However, others defended the language saying it was essential for governments to be able to alleviate high fuel prices for citizens, such as with winter fuel allowances.

The mention of support for a just transition is also a positive step.

The key areas people will be examining the language of will be to do with climate finance for poor countries, the “ratchet” mechanism by which countries return with improved pledges, and money for loss and damage - the impacts of climate breakdown that can’t be avoided.

Yesterday’s text is here and today’s is here, for those of you who want to examine them.

The text has just appeared on the UN website. Analysts will immediately start poring through it to see what has changed overnight - we’ll bring you the reaction here as it happens.

Welcome to the Guardian’s coverage of day 13 of the Cop26 climate summit.

Negotiations were supposed to end at 6pm local time last night, but to nobody’s surprise they have overrun into Saturday. You can read our latest news story on the state of play here:

Yesterday evening Cop26 president Alok Sharma put a pause on negotiations overnight so delegates could get some rest, before an new draft text is expected to be revealed this morning. Previous Cops have often been marked by delegates negotiating late into the night; it remains to be seen whether Sharma’s decision to let people rest signals a confidence things can be wrapped up today or a recognition that the talks are not close to agreement.

We’ll bring you all the latest news and analysis as it happens. You can email me at alan.evans@theguardian.com or find me on Twitter at @itsalanevans

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