Ireland will contribute €25 million over the years 2024 and 2025 to the new Loss and Damage Fund, the Taoiseach has told delegates at the COP28 Climate Summit in Dubai.
This is the fund agreed by global leaders earlier this week for poor and vulnerable countries impacted by climate disasters.
Leo Varadkar also committed that Ireland would make further contributions after 2025.
The Taoiseach said Ireland is a wealthy country and is particularly concerned about the great challenges others face, particularly Least Developed Countries and Small Island Developing States.
He also said that overall, Ireland will double its contribution to international climate finance to at least €225m per year by 2025 with almost €150m contributed this year.
In his formal address on behalf of Ireland to COP28 this morning, Mr Varadkar made the point that in mobilising society to address climate change, the concerns of people, including farmers, workers, and enterprises, need to be recognised.
He said people have legitimate concerns how much climate action will cost and what it will mean for their jobs, their incomes and living standards.
They need reassurance, the most vulnerable need to be protected and nobody should be left behind, Mr Varadkar added.
The Taoiseach highlighted the benefits of climate action, including a liveable planet, cleaner air, new jobs and economic opportunities; a more secure world, with less conflict over resources, more reliable energy, and fewer people on the move from homes that can no longer support them.
However, he said politicians need to do a better job explaining these benefits to the public.
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Mr Varadkar outlined that Ireland is committed to cutting Irish greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030 and achieving net zero emissions by 2050.
He also spoke about the new 'Infrastructure, Climate and Nature Fund' and the ‘Future Ireland Fund’ that were announced as part of Budget 2024 in September.
Both of these funds will ensure billions of euro will be put aside and committed to help meet the cost of future climate related-investment and transformation.
The Taoiseach referred to the fact that Ireland has a carbon tax to incentivise a shift away from fossil fuels.
He explained how the revenues raised through carbon taxes support a just transition, retrofitting houses, installing electric vehicle charging points, and sustainable practices in agriculture.
He also outlined how Ireland’s new Maritime Area Regulatory Authority has been set up to oversee a offshore renewable energy revolution off the coasts of Ireland.
Christian Aid Ireland has criticised Ireland's contribution to the Loss and Damage Fund saying it is extremely regrettable to see this money is going to come from existing climate finance commitments.
Policy and Advocacy Officer Ross Fitzpatrick said it is not the new and additional funding urgently needed by countries on the climate crisis frontline to help them recover and rebuild in the aftermath of climate disasters.
He said Ireland must contribute much more over the next year and beyond to help ensure these countries are not left picking up the tab for the unavoidable and irreversible impacts of a climate crisis not of their making for any longer than they already have.
He highlighted that the cost for developing countries of the loss and damage caused by the climate crisis could reach up to half a trillion dollars by 2030 and that Christian Aid's recent research estimates Ireland’s fair share of loss and damage finance to be at least €1.5 billion per year by the end of the decade.
"Ireland and indeed all wealthy, historically high polluting countries, must now urgently provide detailed, timebound plans on how they will raise the revenue needed for the loss and damage fund", he said.
US pledges $3 billion to green climate fund at COP28
US Vice President Kamala Harris told the UN's COP28 conference that the United States will contribute $3 billion to a global climate fund - its first pledge to it since 2014.
"Today, we are demonstrating through action how the world can and must meet this crisis," Ms Harris told the climate summit in Dubai.
The new money, which must be approved by the US Congress, will go into the Green Climate Fund (GCF), which was created in 2010.
The last US contribution to the fund for developing countries was made under then president Barack Obama, who committed $3 billion in 2014.
President Joe Biden sent Ms Harris in his place to COP28.
The world's biggest climate fund funnels grants and loans for adaptation and mitigation projects in developing countries, such as solar panels in Pakistan or flood management in Haiti.
Prior to the US announcement, $13.5 billion had been pledged to the GCF.
The failure of wealthy nations to fulfil financial pledges to help developing nations cope with climate change has fuelled tensions and mistrust at climate negotiations.
Developing countries least responsible for climate change are seeking support from richer polluting nations to adapt to the increasingly ferocious and expensive consequences of extreme weather, and for their transitions to cleaner energy sources.
The GCF plays a part in a separate promise by rich countries to supply $100 billion of climate financing to poorer nations annually. But that pledge was only likely met in 2022, two years late.
'Find a breakthrough' - Pope Francis
Pope Francis, unable to attend the climate summit, called on world leaders to find a breakthrough to tackle global rising temperatures, calling the destruction of the environment "an offence against God".
In a speech read out by Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin due to the pope's ill health, he said: "I am with you because the destruction of the environment is an offence against God."
"Brothers and sisters, it is essential that there be a breakthrough that is not a partial change of course, but rather a new way of making progress together."
Additional reporting AFP, Reuters
