The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 29th Conference of the Parties (COP 29) brings together governments and experts from around the world to develop renewed plans to tackle climate challenges.
This year, Loughborough's delegation includes experts from Climate Compatible Growth (CCG) – a UK Aid-funded initiative led by the University’s Centre for Sustainable Transitions: Energy, Environment and Resilience (STEER).
CCG supports developing countries to design investment-ready proposals that attract vital climate finance and funding for clean energy infrastructure plans. Earlier this year, the programme was given a £57 million boost from the UK Government to continue their transformative work until 2030.
Professor Mark Howells, an expert in Systems Analysis for Sustainable Development in Loughborough’s department of Geography and Environment and co-director of STEER, is leading the CCG delegation at COP 29.
A regular advisor to the United Nations, Professor Howells has been instrumental in building partnerships to make the world’s foremost open-source energy modelling and planning tools available to countries implementing their transition to clean energy. At COP 29, he will be a featured speaker at an International Atomic Energy Agency event in the UNFCCC Blue Zone, where he will discuss integrating water resources into climate mitigation strategies.
The session is part of a series of activities CCG are participating in at COP 29. CCG experts will also lead and participate in events covering topics including climate finance, capacity building, transport decarbonisation and global green grids.
Also representing Loughborough is the University’s Modern Energy Cooking Services (MECS) programme, a UK Aid-funded initiative aimed at accelerating the global shift from biomass to clean cooking solutions.
Activities at COP 29 include a high-level side event in the Blue Zone’s Africa Pavilion to launch a major new publication on ‘clean cooking’ in Africa, led by the African Energy Commission of the African Union in collaboration with MECS.
Experts, including Dr. Simon Batchelor, will take part in sessions focused renewable-based clean cooking and scaling electric cooking, showcasing progress from the Global Electric Cooking Coalition (GeCCo) which was launched at COP 28.
GeCCo brings together experts and advocates from across the world – including MECS - to address the need to reduce carbon outputs generated by traditional cooking methods.
Learn more about CCG’s activities and MECS initiatives at COP29.