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This study offers an analysis of Germany’s relatively new efforts to integrate climate change into its foreign policy agenda, with a focus on its government players at a national level. It is an initial step towards filling in gaps in understanding and deepening the discussion about Germany’s unique climate diplomacy experience. The author concludes that in some areas, such as the G7, German climate diplomacy has been surprisingly effective, while in other areas it has made less progress, including fostering EU level climate diplomacy and engaging with foreign non-governmental players.

This report provides an analysis of REDD+ project standards against expectations and principles set by the BMUB/IKI and Germanwatch. atmosfair contributed to this report with its experience in the field of MRV and climate integrity of offset projects. The goal of the report is to provide a clear underlying guidance for the use of one or several REDD+ standards for use by the International Climate Initiative (IKI) of the BMUB and beyond.

Over December 5-6 at the Palais du Congress, the 3rd Annual Global Landscapes Forum (#GLFCOP21) was the largest other meeting in Paris during COP21, attracting close to 3,500 participants, exhibitors and speakers from across disciplines and sectors. Instead of focusing on national climate commitments, the GLF explored alternative ‘un-siloed’ approaches to land use in a warming world, and perhaps equally important, how to finance them.

[Unauthorised translation of the German original: http://germanwatch.org/de/11433] The conference in Paris has impressively confirmed the growing international consensus that was last demonstrated at the 2015 G7 summit in Germany. Governments around the world are now serious about taking decisive action well before the end of the century to phase out fossil fuels in accordance with the findings of climate science. We welcome the clear commitment made by large industrial countries to undertake the necessary transformation of their energy systems by the middle of the century. This undertaking is now more feasible than ever thanks to declining costs for renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies.

The Climate Change Performance Index is an instrument supposed to enhance transparency in international climate politics. Its aim is to encourage political and social pressure on those countries which have, up to now, failed to take ambitious actions on climate protection as well as to highlight countries with best-practice climate policies. On the basis of standardised criteria, the index evaluates and compares the climate protection performance of 58 countries that are, together, responsible for more than 90 percent of global energy-related CO2 emissions.

The millennium started with a lost decade in terms of climate protection and, as indicated in the eleventh edition of the Climate Change Performance Index (CCPI), global emissions were still growing in 2013. For 2014, there are signs of a slowdown or even a halt of this trend.

Serbia, Afghanistan and Bosnia and Herzegovina were the countries most impacted by climatic events in 2014. This is the result of this year’s Global Climate Risk Index, launched today by Germanwatch at the climate summit in Paris. "Heavy rains, flooding and landslides have been the defining hazards of the new Global Climate Risk Index", said Sönke Kreft, author of the study and Team Leader for International Climate Policy at Germanwatch. "Patterns of extreme precipitation is what people and countries will likely face in a warming climate."

The G20 make up two thirds of the world population, produce four fifth of the global economic output, and account for three quarters of global Greenhouse gas emissions. The average G20 per capita emissions are nearly 11 tons of CO2e. To keep global warming below 2°C, global per capita emissions need to be reduced to 1-3 tCO2e by 2050. The study "20 Climate Action – a turning point?" gives an overview on the current situation of the G20, as well as looking for trends and future plans.

Laut des Beschlusses der UN-Klimakonferenz in Lima im Dezember 2014 sollen alle Staaten ihre nationalen Klimaschutzpläne im Laufe des Jahres 2015 vorlegen. Diese selbst gesteckten, nationalen Minderungsbeiträge, sogenannte INDCs (intended nationally determined contributions), stellen eine wichtige Grundlage für ein neues globales Klimaabkommen dar, welches in Paris im Dezember 2015 geschlossen werden soll. Kurz nach Ende der Frist am 1. Oktober, bis zu der die Staaten ihre INDCs vorlegen sollten, fand das INDC Forum in Rabat vom 12.-13. Oktober 2015 statt.

In August 2015 an unusually intense monsoon caused devastating floods and landslides leading to the death of many people across Asia. Particularly in Myanmar, the rain destroyed hundreds of thousands of homes and streets and flooded rice paddies. In its most recent report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warns that climate change will increase the duration and intensity of such and similar extreme weather events (IPCC 2014b). This will also lead to an increase in climate- related loss and damage (L&D), either as a result of extreme weather events or associated with slow-onset climate change, when glaciers melt, permafrost thaws and sea levels rise.