More than 190 countries will gather in Antalya, Türkiye, on Monday 9 November for COP31, the United Nations climate summit, at a moment when scientists say the world is on track to exceed the Paris Agreement's 1.5°C warming limit. The talks, which run until 20 November, are being billed by their hosts as a summit about delivery rather than promises — turning a decade of climate pledges into projects, finance and measurable action.
The summit arrives at a difficult point for the climate process. It coincides with the tenth anniversary of the Paris Agreement entering into force, and it will be the first COP held without an official delegation from the United States, the world's second-largest emitter, which formally withdrew from the agreement at the start of this year. Members of Congress and American businesses are still expected to attend, according to the Council on Foreign Relations, but Washington will have no seat at the negotiating table.
Why this COP matters
COP31 is the 31st Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the annual gathering where governments assess progress and negotiate how to tackle a problem no nation can solve alone. The 2015 talks produced the landmark Paris Agreement, in which countries committed to keeping global warming well below 2°C and pursuing efforts to limit it to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.
That stretch goal has now slipped out of reach, at least temporarily. The UN Environment Programme's Emissions Gap Report 2026, published in October, finds that the world is set to temporarily exceed the 1.5°C threshold — a situation known as overshoot. Under current policies, temperatures are expected to rise by around 2.8°C by the end of the century, or around 2.6°C if the most recent climate commitments are fully implemented, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. That is far better than the 3.7°C to 4.8°C projected when the Paris Agreement was negotiated — but still, in the Council's words, "an extremely dangerous level of warming". August 2026 joined July 2023 as the hottest month on record globally, according to Copernicus data cited by the Council.
Context: COP31 also launches the second global stocktake — the Paris Agreement's formal process for assessing collective progress towards its long-term goals. It is the mechanism by which countries are meant to confront, every five years, the gap between what they promised and what they have delivered.
What is on the agenda in Antalya
The formal negotiations will cover familiar ground, with finance expected to be the most contentious issue, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. The presidency, led by Türkiye's environment minister Murat Kurum, has framed the summit as "a COP of implementation and acceleration", with an Action Agenda built around ten themes, including the clean energy transition and electrification, zero waste, methane reduction and climate-resilient cities.
| Issue | What is at stake |
|---|---|
| Climate finance | Developing nations want wealthier countries to deliver on existing commitments, including the COP29 goal of mobilising at least $300 billion a year by 2035 and the COP30 call to at least triple adaptation finance. Developed countries provided and mobilised a record $136.7 billion in 2024, according to the OECD. |
| Fossil fuels | At COP30, parties failed to formalise a roadmap for transitioning away from fossil fuels, even though the measure drew support from more than 80 countries, and the final Belém Political Package omitted the words "fossil fuels" altogether. The COP30 presidency has published elements of a voluntary roadmap ahead of COP31. |
| Adaptation and just transition | Negotiators will keep working on the Global Goal on Adaptation, including how to measure progress, while the just-transition mechanism agreed at COP30 still needs its operating rules decided. |
| Methane | More than 150 countries have signed the Global Methane Pledge since COP26. Methane is responsible for about 30 per cent of global warming, and there are hopes COP31 will accelerate cuts, particularly in the oil and gas sectors. |
Alongside the formal agenda, the presidency has put forward voluntary pledges, including a "35-by-35" pledge aimed at raising electricity's share of total energy consumption to 35 per cent by 2035, up from 23 per cent today, and a commitment encouraging countries, corporations and investors to make artificial intelligence more sustainable.
The numbers framing the talks
The UN News explainer ahead of the summit, based on an interview with Selwin Hart, the UN Special Adviser on Climate Action and Just Transition, sets out how far the clean-energy transition has come — and how unevenly its benefits are shared. A decade ago, fewer than one in 100 new cars sold worldwide was electric; in 2025 it was one in four, and the share is expected to reach 28 per cent in 2026. The world added more than 600 gigawatts of solar power capacity in 2025, over three-quarters of all new renewable capacity, and battery storage capacity is now 11 times higher than in 2021.
The investment gap is the summit's central tension. Emerging and developing economies outside China — home to nearly two-thirds of the world's people — received just 18 per cent of global clean-energy investment in 2025, according to UN News. Africa, despite enormous renewable potential, attracts only a small share of global investment, while around 600 million people on the continent still lack access to electricity. Financing renewable projects in developing countries can cost several times more than in wealthier nations, even when the technology is identical — and for countries already carrying heavy debt burdens, Mr Hart stressed that "we need solutions on finance that will not increase debt". To keep warming well below 2°C, UNEP says emissions must fall 18 per cent by 2030, 45 per cent by 2035 and 69 per cent by 2040, compared with 2025 levels — cuts that current national commitments will not deliver.
The US absence and the split presidency
COP31 is unusual in one structural respect: it is the first COP in which the hosting and negotiating roles are formally split. Türkiye will host the conference and lead the presidency's Action Agenda, while Australia holds the Presidency of Negotiations, giving it authority over the negotiating texts and the formal decisions reached by the parties, according to Linklaters. Australia's climate minister, Chris Bowen, is the President of Negotiations, working closely with Pacific Island countries, which the summit is placing in particular focus. China's Vice-President Han Zheng is due to attend the leaders' summit in Antalya as President Xi Jinping's special representative, according to Reuters' diary of scheduled events.
The American absence also raises a question about the science underpinning the next round of national climate plans. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the UN-backed body that assesses climate science, failed at a meeting in October to agree on when it will finalise its next set of working-group reports, having proposed 2028. Some scientists warn that without updated, comprehensive reporting, climate ambition could wane.
"There's sometimes this expectation that COPs will always have this big grand deal that will solve the climate crisis. That is not realistic." — Selwin Hart, UN Special Adviser on Climate Action and Just Transition, speaking to UN News
What to be cautious about: major concrete outcomes are not expected from COP31, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. The summit's value, its analysts argue, will lie in incremental progress on methane, adaptation and finance — and in keeping the issue on the global agenda — rather than in a single breakthrough deal.
Frequently asked questions
When and where is COP31?
COP31 runs from 9 to 20 November 2026 in Antalya, Türkiye. It is the 31st Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, bringing together representatives of more than 190 countries.
Why is there no official US delegation?
The United States formally withdrew from the Paris Agreement at the start of 2026, so it is sending no official delegation. Members of Congress and American businesses are still expected to attend, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.
What is the 35-by-35 pledge?
It is a voluntary COP31 presidency pledge to raise electricity's share of total energy consumption to 35 per cent by 2035, up from 23 per cent today, as part of a push to accelerate electrification as a key way of cutting emissions.
Will COP31 produce a big deal?
Probably not a single breakthrough. Analysts expect incremental progress on climate finance, adaptation, methane cuts and implementation of existing agreements, with the summit judged on whether it turns pledges into bankable projects rather than on one headline outcome.
Key takeaways
- COP31 opens in Antalya on 9 November and runs to 20 November, with more than 190 countries attending — but no official US delegation after Washington's withdrawal from the Paris Agreement.
- The presidency's theme is implementation: turning climate pledges into projects, with a voluntary 35-by-35 electrification pledge and an Action Agenda spanning ten themes.
- UNEP's Emissions Gap Report 2026 says the world is set to temporarily exceed 1.5°C; under current policies, warming reaches around 2.8°C, or 2.6°C if the latest commitments are fully delivered.
- Finance is expected to be the most contentious issue, with developing nations pressing for the $300-billion-a-year goal by 2035 and a tripling of adaptation finance.
- Clean-energy technology has never been cheaper or more widespread — but emerging economies outside China received just 18 per cent of global clean-energy investment in 2025.
COP31 will not solve the climate crisis in two weeks. But as the UN's Selwin Hart put it, it could help remove some of the barriers standing between the solutions already available and the people who need them. "Overshoot is not surrender," he told UN News. "Overshoot should really lead to a much greater degree of urgency." Watch for the leaders' summit in the opening days, the launch of the second global stocktake, and — in the final days — whether negotiators can agree language on finance, adaptation and the fossil-fuel transition that eluded them in Belém.
