From Baku to Belém: where COP29 left us and what COP30 now must deliver
As the world heads towards COP30 in Belém, the climate negotiation process stands at a critical juncture. Science is now unequivocal, and we are already in the final years of the remaining carbon budget for 1.5°C, with every fraction of a degree of additional warming translating directly into higher physical risks, and higher adaptation costs.
COP29 in Baku established a new, higher finance target — but did not define the instruments and rules for delivering it. The central questions are increasingly operational – how fast emissions fall, how climate finance is structured, and how the transition is governed in a way that is economically and socially workable. COP30 will therefore be a critical moment to convert scale into structure, and to turn general agreement on direction into actionable systems.
After Baku: unresolved structural gaps
COP29 in Baku will be remembered primarily for agreeing a new and higher climate finance target of 300 to 400 billion dollars per year by 2030. This is structurally significant because it acknowledges the scale of capital required for transition in emerging markets. However, it stopped there. No burden sharing model was agreed. No definition of what counts as climate finance was settled. There is no clarity on the balance between public and private flows, nor any safeguards to prevent the transition from being financed through additional debt for already highly indebted countries.
In parallel, negotiations on carbon markets (Article 6) again failed to close key technical gaps. Verification, integrity standards, and double counting rules remain unfinished. The global fossil fuel phase out language agreed at COP28 was not operationalized into sectoral or national pathways. Adaptation finance and Loss and Damage finance remain underdeveloped in terms of predictable annual replenishment and access modalities.
In Belém: from ambition to operating system
COP30 in Belém is positioned as the moment where climate diplomacy needs to convert strategic direction into practical systems. The finance architecture is the most central task, and agreement is needed on who pays how much, what instruments are used, how money is deployed (grants, concessional capital, guarantee structures) and how delivery is monitored with transparency and accountability.
The fact that Brazil is hosting in the Amazon brings an additional layer of relevance and urgency. COP30 is expected to elevate forests, land use, biodiversity and food systems from side streams into a main pillar of climate action and finance. COP30 is also the formal deadline for countries to submit their next round of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement’s ratchet-up mechanism, making Belém the decisive moment to secure economy-wide commitments that go beyond mitigation and also integrate adaptation, finance and loss-and-damage. And there will be renewed pressure to take the “transition away from fossil fuels” language and translate it into actual phase out trajectories aligned with 1.5°C.
At the same time, the 2025 US decision to withdraw again from the Paris Agreement has introduced additional geopolitical uncertainty that will inevitably shape how robust and enforceable any finance system can become in Belém.
As the world marks 10 years since the Paris Agreement, credibility now depends less on new targets and more on the construction of rules, traceability and enforcement. COP30 will not be assessed by its declarations, but by whether it produces systems that actually drive measurable implementation, closing what COP29 could not.
Nvalue will continue to closely monitor the developments and outcomes of COP30. Stay tuned for our full wrap-up article coming soon.