- The UN Bonn climate change conference began with a push for a global electrification target of 35% by 2035, signalling a new approach to advancing energy transition discussions.
- Finance concerns echoed across negotiating rooms, from climate finance and adaptation to just transition discussions.
- Trade emerged as another fault line, with developing and developed countries divided over how climate-related trade measures should be discussed under the UNFCCC.
The annual two-week Bonn climate conference ended on June 18, exposing familiar fault lines over climate finance, trade and ambition while also highlighting a new push to accelerate the energy transition through electrification.
The mid-year meeting is an annual affair under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) where parties negotiate the technical and scientific aspects of climate negotiations. It helps shape the agenda of the upcoming Conference of Parties (COP) to the UNFCCC.
At the beginning of the conference, the host of the next climate summit proposed increasing the global electrification target to 35% by 2035, up from the current target of just over 20%. COP31 President-Designate Murat Kurum called it a flagship initiative of the COP31 Presidency’s Action Agenda, “calling for a major acceleration in the shift from direct fossil fuel use to clean electricity across buildings, transport and industry.”
The proposal comes alongside the COP30 Presidency’s work on a roadmap for transitioning away from fossil fuels (TAFF) in energy systems. On June 12, the COP30 Presidency presented progress on the roadmap, which is expected to be shared ahead of COP31 in Antalya, Türkiye.
Together, the electrification initiative and the TAFF roadmap suggest an emerging effort to frame energy transition discussions around deployment of clean energy systems rather than explicit fossil fuel reduction targets.
The proposal has particular significance for India. According to a recent International Energy Agency (IEA) report, the country’s electrification rate stands at around 19%, slightly below the global average of 21%. At the same time, electricity demand in India is projected to grow by 6.4% annually between 2026 and 2030, one of the fastest rates among major economies, making it a key country in efforts to raise the global share of electricity in final energy consumption.
Jan Rosenow, Professor of Energy and Climate Policy at the University of Oxford, however, cautions against reading too much into a single headline number. “India is electrifying fast in some segments and slowly in others, so any single headline rate hides a lot of variation,” he says. He adds that the climate benefits of electrification will also depend on how quickly the power sector itself decarbonises. If electricity demand rises but the grid remains heavily dependent on coal, much of the climate benefit of electrification is lost, he says.
On whether the push for electrification can build a less divisive global consensus than the fossil fuel debate has, Rosenow sees reason for cautious optimism. Phase-out language, he explains, is about what countries must give up, which maps onto existing economic and geopolitical fault lines. Electrification, by contrast, is about what countries stand to gain — cheaper energy, industrial competitiveness, energy security and cleaner air.
However, he cautions against expecting a frictionless consensus. New fault lines are already visible: access to critical minerals, manufacturing dominance (particularly China’s lead in batteries, solar panels and electric vehicles), grid investment in lower-income countries, and who finances the transition. “The framing is more constructive,” Rosenow says, “but the underlying distributional politics don’t disappear.”
Finance cuts across negotiations
Finance, or the means of implementing climate goals, emerged as a recurring issue across several negotiating tracks at Bonn.
The concern was particularly visible in discussions around the Climate Finance Work Programme (CFWP), established at COP30. The CFWP came into existence after developing countries pushed for a dedicated space to discuss developed countries’ finance obligations under Article 9.1 of the Paris Agreement. Many developing countries were dissatisfied with the outcome of the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) agreed at COP29 and argued that there was no dedicated forum under the Paris Agreement to discuss implementation of these obligations. As a result, parties agreed to establish the CFWP as a two-year programme.
However, developing countries have raised concerns over the modalities of the work programme. According to Sehr Raheja from the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), a New Delhi-based think tank, the G77 and China expressed disappointment that the CFWP is not reflected in the agenda of the Paris Agreement negotiations, or CMA 8, a meeting of parties that have ratified the Paris Agreement which is scheduled to take place alongside COP31 in Türkiye. BASIC, which includes Brazil, South Africa, India and China, also called for the work programme to be included in the CMA 8 agenda.
Developing countries argue that without a formal role in the Paris Agreement negotiations, the CFWP risks becoming a series of workshops without a pathway to political decisions, while developed countries have opposed this move.
The debate over finance was also visible in discussions on the Just Transition Work Programme (JTWP) and the Global Goal on Adaptation (GGA).
JTWP, an initiative under the UNFCCC to ensure the shift to a low-carbon economy happens equitably, remained one of the most politically charged agenda items at Bonn this year, with parties meeting at least eight times to narrow differences. Developing countries argued that the JTWP should move beyond discussions on labour dimensions of the transition and establish a dedicated mechanism which catalyses finance, technology transfer and capacity building. Developed countries opposed the proposal, says Rudrath Avinashi from CSE.
Negotiations on the Global Goal on Adaptation (GGA), a commitment under the Paris Agreement to increase climate adaptation efforts, also exposed divisions over finance. In the second week of the meeting, the African Group refused to engage with the draft text because it lacked references to tripling adaptation finance, a demand backed by several developing-country groups.
The demand stems from a decision adopted at COP30, which called for efforts to at least triple adaptation finance by 2035 and urged developed countries to scale up support. At Bonn, developing countries sought to reflect this language in the GGA discussions and proposed additional provisions on transparency, accountability and predictable grant-based finance.
Emilie Beauchamp of the think tank International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) says that developing countries were seeking stronger language on adaptation finance in the GGA text, while developed countries argued that finance discussions fall outside the process’s mandate, creating a long-standing deadlock.
The demand comes amid growing concerns over the availability of adaptation finance. Harjeet Singh, climate activist and founding director of Satat Sampada Climate Foundation, says resistance to scaling up adaptation funding was undermining commitments made to vulnerable countries. “These communities are already bearing the devastating costs of a crisis they did not create,” he says.
These concerns are unfolding against a backdrop of shrinking resources in major climate funds. In a submission on June 8, the G77 and China noted that the ninth replenishment of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) represented a 27% decline from the previous cycle and the lowest level in 16 years, while one developed country had decided to halve its contribution to the Green Climate Fund for 2024-2027. In another submission on June 10, the group expressed concern over a projected 23.1% decline in official development assistance (ODA) in 2025, the largest fall on record, and a 24% decline in the core funding of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
According to Raheja, these concerns were echoed across negotiating rooms. “Discussions on examples/case studies on article 2.1c (of the Paris Agreement) seemed almost like abstractions when the core financial mechanisms themselves are struggling,” she says. Article 2.1(c) calls for making financial flows consistent with low-emission and climate-resilient development pathways, a goal that extends beyond climate finance and involves actors such as multilateral development banks, central banks and the wider financial sector.
Trade and climate
Trade-related climate measures emerged as another area of disagreement at Bonn, reflecting a long-running debate over whether climate policies can become barriers to international trade.
Article 3.5 of the UNFCCC states, “Measures taken to combat climate change, including unilateral ones, should not constitute a means of arbitrary or unjustifiable discrimination or a disguised restriction on international trade.”
The issue has gained prominence in recent years following the introduction of measures such as the European Union’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM). Developing countries, including the Like-Minded Developing Countries (LMDCs), Arab Group, China and India, have argued that unilateral trade measures should be discussed within the climate negotiations. Developed countries, particularly the European Union, have maintained that trade-related issues are better addressed in other forums.
Following pressure from developing countries, including disputes over agenda items at previous COPs, parties agreed in Belém to organise three dialogues on trade and climate.
The first dialogue was held on June 13 during the Bonn conference, where international organisations, including the World Trade Organization (WTO), outlined their ongoing work on trade and climate issues. While developing countries raised concerns about the impact of unilateral trade measures, several developed countries described trade as an enabler of climate action.
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A second meeting was held on June 16 to discuss the future direction of the dialogue process. One of the main points of disagreement was whether the discussions should produce a synthesis or outcome report. Developing countries argued that documenting the discussions would help carry forward the lessons and recommendations emerging from the dialogues. Developed countries opposed the proposal, arguing that the mandate agreed in Belém does not require any formal outcome document.
However, the G77 and China argued that “the dialogue should not be a talkshop” and called for a concrete process that builds from one dialogue to the next.
Ieva Baršauskaitė from IISD says that the creation of a dedicated space to discuss trade and climate under the UNFCCC was itself a significant development, given the tensions around trade issues at recent COPs. However, the first dialogue in Bonn also showed that “creating the space for discussions does not yet dissolve the main sticking points of the conversation.”
Banner image: A woman operates an electrical control box that powers irrigation pumps for agricultural fields. Image by Vraj Acharya, WELL Labs via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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