COP words, in plain English

A COP, and the climate world in general, is full of words everyone uses as if they were obvious. Most of them are not, and nobody is born knowing what an NDC is. So we have gathered the ones you are most likely to run into, each explained in a sentence or two, to make the COP a little easier to follow.

You will also find them around the site: a word with a dotted underline has its short explanation waiting. Hover over it, or tap it on your phone.

How the conference works

Blue Zone: The UN-managed part of the venue: negotiations, delegation offices and most pavilions. You need a UN badge to get in. Read more →
Green Zone: The host government’s own venue, open to the public after a free online registration. No UN badge needed. Read more →
Side event: An official session that the UN approves and schedules in the Blue Zone, run by an observer organisation. Separate from the pavilions’ own programmes. Read more →
Observer: An admitted organisation, such as an NGO, university or business group, that can send delegates without being a government. Observers cannot vote. Read more →
Leaders’ Summit: The two days when heads of state and government speak. At COP31 it is 11 and 12 November, and the Green Zone closes to visitors. Read more →
Action Agenda: The part of a COP that is not a negotiation, where companies, cities, regions and investors bring commitments. Read more →
High-Level Champion: A person appointed by a COP presidency to mobilise companies, cities, regions and investors. For COP31 it is Samed Ağırbaş. Read more →

The negotiations

UNFCCC: UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. The climate treaty signed in Rio in 1992, and its secretariat in Bonn. Every COP happens under it. Read more →
Party: A country that has signed and ratified the treaty. There are 198, counting the European Union. Only Parties negotiate and vote. Read more →
NDC: Nationally Determined Contribution. The climate plan each country writes for itself under the Paris Agreement, renewed every five years. Read more →
Article 6: The part of the Paris Agreement that lets countries trade emission cuts, so one country can pay for cuts made in another and count them towards its own target. Read more →
ITMO: Internationally Transferred Mitigation Outcome. A unit of emission cuts that one country sells to another under Article 6.
Global Stocktake: A review, every five years, of how far the world has got against the goals of the Paris Agreement. The second one concludes in 2028. Read more →
Loss and damage: Harm from climate change that can no longer be avoided or adapted to, such as homes lost to the sea. A UN fund now pays towards it. Read more →
CMA and CMP: The meetings of the countries in the Paris Agreement (CMA) and in the older Kyoto Protocol (CMP). Both sit inside the same two weeks as the COP. Read more →
SB, SBSTA and SBI: The Subsidiary Bodies: the treaty’s two standing technical committees, one for scientific advice (SBSTA) and one for implementation (SBI). They meet mid-year in Bonn and again at the COP. Read more →
Cover decision: A headline political text agreed at the end of some COPs, summing up what the conference means. It sits on top of the technical decisions. Read more →
GGA: Global Goal on Adaptation. A shared target under the Paris Agreement for making the world more resilient to climate change, now tracked with a set of indicators.
MRV: Measurement, reporting and verification. How emissions, or cuts to them, are counted, written up and checked by someone else.
IPCC: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The UN body of scientists that reviews climate research and reports on it for governments.

Topics in the programme

Adaptation: Preparing for the climate change already under way, such as flood defences, cooler buildings or crops that survive drought.
Mitigation: Cutting the emissions that cause climate change, or taking carbon back out of the air.
Just transition: Moving away from fossil fuels in a way that is fair to the workers and communities whose jobs and income depend on them.
Rio Synergy: Making the three UN treaties born at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, on climate, biodiversity and desertification, work together instead of separately.
EPR: Extended producer responsibility. Rules that make the companies selling a product pay for collecting and recycling it once it is thrown away.

Looking for something else? The questions and the field guide go into more depth.