Category: UN/National Updates

The climate negotiations get complicated

By Regina Banks

This post was originally published with the Austin Chronicle on November 20, 2025.

Before COP30 even began – and throughout most of the first week – the halls of Belém echoed with the familiar chorus of pre-negotiated talking points. Parties, from national delegations to civil society observers, dutifully recited the lines they arrived with:

• “We support the UNFCCC process.”
• “We must act in a way that every decision contributes to life on Earth.”
• “We must ensure climate, gender, and migration justice, and justice between generations.”
• “Our commitment is to chart the pathways to a just transition.”

And of course, the ontological claim from the COP Presidency, declared during the opening plenary of the high-level forum:

“It is possible to grow, produce, and preserve at the same time.”

These lofty claims float easily through plenary sessions and press briefings. But once the text appears in print – once there are brackets, sub-paragraphs, and actual obligations on the table – negotiators get down to brass tacks. And that’s when the truth of those claims begins to be tested.

My focus for the past several COPs has been the Loss and Damage track, and in the past few days the tone inside informal consultations has shifted dramatically. Gone is the soft diplomatic language. In its place? Raised voices. Delegates openly threatening to invoke Rule 16 – the procedural equivalent of slamming the brakes, forcing the issue into a “no-decision” outcome and punting it to next year.

The flashpoint: direct access to funds.

The Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage (FRLD) – now an operating entity under the UNFCCC’s Financial Mechanism – is designed to meet the rapidly growing needs of communities on the frontlines of the climate crisis, particularly in vulnerable developing countries. Its mandate is clear:

• finance recovery efforts from climate-related losses and damages
• empower communities not only to rebuild, but to rebuild with dignity
• support country-led, locally driven solutions
• ensure interventions align with real needs, real contexts, and real priorities

In other words: the people living the losses should have a say in shaping the responses.

Direct access is not a procedural detail. It is a justice issue.

For decades, vulnerable communities have had to navigate intermediaries – international institutions, multilateral development banks, layers of bureaucracy – just to receive resources that are rightfully theirs. Direct access shifts that dynamic. It puts agency where it belongs: with those experiencing the irreversible impacts of climate change.

This is why negotiations over this point have become so charged. Direct access threatens old power structures. It demands trust in frontline communities. And it makes the promises of “country-led, locally driven solutions” real rather than rhetorical.

The U.S. faith community and civil society played a crucial role in securing the very existence of the Loss and Damage fund. (It’s one of the proudest accomplishments of my climate justice career.) Our commitments were shaped by solidarity with displaced, marginalized, and climate-impacted communities at home and around the world.

That commitment continues now. We remain steadfast in advocating for direct access to FRLD resources so that rebuilding and recovery are not dictated from afar but arise from within affected communities themselves.

Because at the end of the day, commitments to “grow, produce, and preserve at the same time” mean very little if the people who are losing their homes, histories, and futures don’t have access to the tools they need to survive, thrive, and build something new.

giving thanks for that which sustains life

By Regina Banks

This post was first featured in fellow State Public Policy Office Texas Impact’s newsletter.

I’ve been thinking a lot about water lately.

I’m in Belém, Brazil for COP30, the UN’s annual climate summit, where the world has gathered in the Amazon rainforest to push for climate adaptation, renewed Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), and plans to unlock $1.3 trillion in climate finance. Being that Belém is in the Amazonian region, it rains nearly every day. Sometimes inside the venue! Water drips through the temporary structures, runs down makeshift walls, and settles into every corner of the halls where we’re trying to talk about the future of the planet.

The rain is annoying. It’s loud falling against the metal roof. Truly. It’s making for 90% humidity, the kind that pulls the starch out of your clothes. My hair is presently… unimpressive.

And yet, every day at COP30 I’m surrounded by an ecumenical delegation from the United States and around the world. Churches and religious organizations have come to COP with a shared commitment to creation care. We advocate together inside the venue, and we worship together outside. On Thursday evening we held an interfaith vigil at Praça Batista Campos. It was a thanksgiving for water. Muslims, Christians, Hindus, Jews, Indigenous leaders from across the Amazon basin, all praying with and for one another in Portuguese and local indigenous languages. All giving thanks for the waters that sustain life.

Even the waters that inconvenience us.

Even the waters that interrupt us.

Even the waters that get in the way of our carefully-planned schedules and turn our hair into something we’d rather not photograph.

During the vigil, my colleague Tracey from Pennsylvania was chosen to be a waterbearer. She was handed a glass pitcher filled with water drawn from the Guamá River and the Guajará Bay—waters that flow into the greater Pará and Amazon River systems, the same waters the torrential rains of Belém ultimately return to. She carried that pitcher from the crowd with reverence, a quiet reminder that water is never just water. It is story, history, prayer, memory, and future. In her hands, the rivers became liturgy.

At the same time I am here in Belém surrounded by more water than I know what to do with, I’m in contact with my family back home in Sacramento, California. They are presently under a flood watch. It’s been raining there for the past several days. It is reportedly a steady rain that’s threatening the gutters, pooling in the streets, and stressing the levee systems that protect our neighborhood.

Two places. Two very different contexts. And still: water everywhere.

Water as abundance.

Water as danger.

Water as blessing.

Water as burden.

Nevertheless, I give thanks for the waters, especially the waters of baptism.

For me, baptismal water is not tidy water. It is not safe water. It is not the kind of water we control. It is the kind of water that shows up in wrong places, at wrong times, insisting that new life is possible whether we are ready or not. It is the kind of water that interrupts, disrupts, and dislodges. The kind of water that gets under the door and won’t be shut out.

So here, at the midpoint of COP30, the pace is shifting. Negotiators are preparing for the long nights and high-pressure sessions that mark the final push toward a decision by the scheduled end of the conference. Delegations are refining language, trading proposals, and navigating the delicate balance between ambition and political reality. The stakes grow sharper each day. I’m especially concerned about loss and damage funding that hangs in the balance. Faith communities are discerning how best to show up. We are discerning where to pray, where to pressure, where to simply be present. And through it all, the rain keeps falling, a constant reminder of why we are here and what is at risk if we fail.

I give thanks for water.

What do we do when climate advocacy can end up feeling like joining in an unending hymn, not of praise for God, but of lamentation? How do we proceed in building economies of care for creation instead of extraction and environmental destruction? With the president of the United States signing us out of our responsibility to the world by dropping out of the Paris Agreement, how are we to move forward as people of faith? These are the questions left on my mind now that I virtually attended the 30^th Conference of Parties (COP). 

Scripture states that the earth belongs to us all, as mentioned in Psalm 24:1-2: “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it; the world, and those who live in it, for he has founded it on the seas and established it in the rivers.” Because the earth is everyone’s, it is not up to me, Laura, to singlehandedly solve each and every problem that the climate crisis creates for all living creatures. Rather, God has given us each other. We are to act in communion with saints, those living and whose legacies we carry with us.  

Pauli Murray is one saint whose legacy I carry with me in my advocacy work. Pauli was a 20th-century Black saint who advocated for justice in both the legal and church spheres as an Episcopal priest. Rev. Murray proclaimed our need for acting in communion with one another years before I am now. “True community is based on upon equality, mutuality, and reciprocity. It affirms the richness of individual diversity as well as the common human ties that bind us together.” Our country is reluctant to see our reciprocity among the UN’s Conference of Parties. We do not want to accept our shortcomings in the Paris Agreement’s plan to reduce emissions for the sake of the world’s wellbeing, and on a national level, there is a lack of political will to do better.  

The extent to which local and state governments in the USA are reckoning and responding to this varies. California is attempting to lead the charge, but despite the accomplishments that representatives of our state listed off, I was left wondering what was left out. What of our shortcomings on climate justice that they did not want to broadcast due to being a government representative. Going forward from this COP, I am glad to know that despite my home country’s federal government throwing in the towel and attempting to derail climate action, other countries, cities, and states are still looking to move forward in climate action.   

Time and time again across COP sessions, funding was marked as a major need. The $1.3 Trillion roadmap of financing remained unfulfilled by the end of the conference. Communities most impacted by climate change are the ones least responsible for their own destruction, as they have much lower emissions compared to countries like the United States of America. In addition, as stated continuously during the conference, financing needs to come in the form of grants rather than on loans that place a financial burden on countries who need assistance to fight climate change.  

God has already given us a way. We have the technology needed to minimize further damage due to climate change. It is a matter of sharing these resources, specifically grant-based funding. It is up to us to let those in power know that we are depending on them to reduce human suffering. Finally, it is up to us to choose to follow the Lord and the saints before us, even when it feels like the long arc of justice is taking its sweet time to be present in this world.  

 
“We are not asking for favors. We are demanding our rights.”  

A youth on a panel from the Young Leaders in Energy and Sustainability shared this to those participating in person and online, such as myself.  This sentiment rang true across the second week of COP 30 sessions I watched. Choices were made during the conference not only on agenda items but also on the kinds of economies that are being created and supported throughout the world. 

This year’s conference had several nicknames: the COP of truth, the COP of implementation, and the Indigenous COP, along with a focus on just transition. Despite having one of the largest presences of Indigenous people in attendance, Indigenous people were not given the power to negotiate on behalf of themselves.  

Learning about the lack of sufficient action for climate change at COP 30 felt like reading Hosea 4 verse 3: “Therefore the land mourns, and all who live in it languish; together with the wild animals and the birds of the air, even the fish of the sea are perishing.” Our ecosystem cannot thrive under the environmental conditions of climate change, and there will continue to be a human cost as well.  

Oftentimes, even the green intentions of the Global North result in extraction of people and planet. The Global North is dependent on the Global South for labor and materials to make green technologies. For instance, children as young as 5 years old are currently working in cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo. This mining is going on specifically for electric batteries for electric cars driven in the Global North. Children in the Congo and worldwide deserve a future better than that, and they deserve access to education that is not interrupted by climate change.  

 
The economy of creation care often sits in contrast to the economy of extraction. This is most evident in the Global North’s treatment of Indigenous communities. The standard of free and informed consent for mining is often being violated in favor of short-term profit. Stewardship of the earth is at odds with short-term profit of the fossil fuel industries and expansion of drilling for oil, especially as I learned about fossil fuel drilling expansion in the very region of the Amazon rainforest in Brazil, where the conference took place. 

God has put us in the midst of these two economies, and calls us to both advocate for and act in solidarity with God’s children, especially those who are most impacted by oppression and the material effects of climate change. Amidst these troubles, we are called as children of God to not only to hope, but also to advocate for a better world, and to act as though one is possible.