Paris UN Climate Conference 2015: What you need to know about the deal

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An historic global climate change deal has been agreed in the early hours of Sunday at the Paris climate summit.

Here is a quick guide to the key elements:

United Nations climate change chief Christiana Figueres, left, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, French Foreign Affairs Minister and UN Climate Change Conference in Paris president Laurent Fabius and French President Franois Hollande celebrate an agreement on climate change. Photo: AP

THE GOAL

• To keep average global warming well below two degrees compared with pre-industrial levels - the level scientists say is needed to give the world the best chance of avoiding the worst of dangerous climate change.
• The deal also commits countries to try to limit warming to below 1.5 degrees - a major demand of vulnerable nations, such as low-lying islands in the Pacific.
• Countries will aim to stop global greenhouse gas emissions rising as soon as possible, and then make rapid reductions so that they effectively reach zero in the second half of the century.

TARGETS

A climate activist holds up a poster during a demonstration near the Arc de Triomphe. Photo: Agung Parameswara

• Nations decide their own targets to cut emissions, rather than have them imposed on them.
• As current goals fall short of what is needed, countries agreed to review their targets every five years starting in 2020.
• Countries will only be allowed to make their targets more ambitious - there should be no backsliding.

MONEY

• Industrialised countries will a deliver a minimum US$100 billion a year in public and private funding to help poorer nations cope with climate change.
• This figure will be reviewed in 2025 - developing countries wanted it scaled-up over time.
• Other countries - particularly big emerging economies traditionally considered developing, such as China - can make voluntary contributions to helping poorer nations. This was an important to developed countries, which want to expand the number of countries that donate.

REVIEWS

• Reviews and monitoring may sound boring, but they are critical to the deal. Climate change will not be solved if countries do not fulfil their commitments.
• There will be a common approach to how countries report on their national emissions and provide information on how they are going in meeting their targets. But the hard details of how this will be done are yet to be worked out.

HELPING THE WORST-OFF

• The deal includes recognition that vulnerable countries will suffer unavoidable damage from events driven by climate change, and should be helped.
• They will get help - with, for example, aid and assistance to respond to climate events that cause permanent loss, getting the insurance they need and warning systems for disasters.
• But the US insisted - and won - agreement that this could not be considered the basis for liability and compensation claims.

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