• In the 70s/80s, scientific evidence at an early/undeveloped stage was taking place at an individual state. Further investigations needed funding and knowledge to be pooled and therefore maximized.

• Identify and agree on the problem and the need for collective action (Stockholm 1972 and Rio 1992) supported by international frameworks (UNFCCC and IPCC).

• The first example of a global environmental governance treaty.
• The precautionary principle: agree to take action even if science is unclear.
• Non-CO2 emissions - banning of carbon fibre composites.
• Five to six times the impact of the Kyoto Protocol.
• Measures were far less costly to states' economic interests - felt as though they were sharing the equal burden of climate change.
• 197 states ratified the protocol.

• A 2-week meeting where 172 states were represented.
• They agreed to look at a future framework of action - founded the UNFCC.
• Locked states into progress for annual negotiations.
• The international community mutually agreed that this problem requires collective action. Although no specific ideas/policies were created, this was still a success.

• It put key focus on specific actions rather than principles or frameworks.
• It created legally binding targets to reduce emissions but only for developed states.
• The protocol would come into force when at least 55% of the world's carbon emissions and 55 states had ratified - needed this critical mass.
• Introduced a carbon credit scheme which came into force in 2005 with an expiry date of 2012.
• Brazil, China, India, and South America were all exempt, although this did not resolve the developed/developing world clash.
• Industrialized states were committed to reducing emissions of greenhouse gases by around 5% between 2008 - 2012.
• President Bush withdrew from the protocol in 2001. Russia and China also did not collaborate, making the protocol ineffective as the US, Russia, and China are the world's largest polluters. In the treaty's lifetime, China's fossil fuel emissions have increased by 300%, showing their dismissal.

• With Kyoto expiring and incomplete, there was considerable pressure on the parties to reach a climate change agreement.
• Obama had been recently elected so there were high hopes - there was a hope for collective action, particularly from the US but also from Russia and China.
• The conference agreed to limit temperature rises to 2°C.
• There was a method agreed upon for verifying emission reductions.
• No legally binding targets were agreed and not even the agreement was legally binding - a key fault as it doesn't carry the weight of international law.
• One of the largest successes was getting China and India to agree on reducing carbon emissions for the first time (even if not legally binding).
• There was the emergence of the negotiating blocs - G7 and BASIC (Brazil, South Africa, India, and China) groups. BASIC states reached the initial agreement, including the 2-degree temperature rise limit.
• Divisions between the developed and developing world remained.

Arguably the most effective and influential of all.

• A key objective was to create legally binding targets and they achieved it in ALL states.
• States set their domestic targets (intended nationally determined contributions).
• An agreement to keep global temperature increase 'well below' 2°C and to pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5°C and to collectively review progress every 5 years.
• $100 billion fund to help developing states respond to climate change.
• Ambitious targets set by individual states:
• India - 35% reduction by 2030.
• US - 28% reduction by 2025 (Trump withdrew in 2017).
• China - 60-65% by 2030.
• The protocol came into force in Nov 2016.

• Agreed on a common rule book to make the Paris agreement operational in 2020.
• The rules and means of monitoring are by INDC's - submissions of research.
• 196 states agreed.
• The US, Russia, and Saudi Arabia blocked a resolution which welcomed the IPCC's most recent report.

The UN chief pointed out that despite accomplishments at UK COP, the world is still far off meeting the goal of 1.5°C stable temperature rise and urged further and immediate international collaboration to get the world back on track to achieving this goal.