2026 United Nations Climate Change Conference

The 2026 United Nations Climate Change Conference or Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC, more commonly known as COP31, is the upcoming 31st session of the United Nations Climate Change Conference, to be held at the Antalya Expo Center in Antalya, Turkey from 9 to 20 November, 2026.¹

Murat Kurum, Turkey's Minister of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change, will be the Chair of COP31.

Chris Bowen, Australia's Minister for Climate Change and Energy, will preside over negotiations.

Australia and Turkey had both made bids to host COP31. United Nations rules require a global consensus on a host country; if no agreement had been reached, it would have automatically been hosted in Bonn as the headquarters of the agency that oversees the Paris Agreement.²³ Australia's Albanese government had prioritised hosting the conference, which it planned to host in Adelaide, and campaigned for its bid over 3 years.³ Representatives of both countries negotiated during COP30 as neither would withdraw their bid, although neither Recep Tayyip Erdoğan nor Anthony Albanese attended.⁴ After a week of negotiations in November 2025, Turkey and Australia compromised by allowing Turkey to host, while Australian Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen will preside over negotiations.²³

In advance of COP31 in Antalya, there will be a pre-COP meeting in Fiji from 5-8 October including a leaders' event in Tuvalu.^{5 6} During COP31, heads of states will attend a World Leaders' Summit in Antalya on November 11 and 12. The summit will take place on day 3 and 4 for the conference, in contrast to summits at previous COPs held on the first two days or immediately prior to the COP.⁷

Murat Kurum, the Minister of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change will serve as the COP President.⁸ Halil Hasar, the Head of Climate Change at that Ministry and first lady Emine Erdoğan may be prominent.⁹ Minister for Climate Change and Energy for Australia Chris Bowen will be Vice-President and President of Negotiations.⁸¹⁰ Turkey's Chief Climate Negotiator is Fatma Varank.¹¹

Samed Ağırbaş, President of the Zero Waste Foundation, will serve as Climate High-Level Champion for COP31.¹² Working alongside the High-Level Champion for COP30, Ağırbaş' role focuses on mobilizing ambitious climate action from businesses, financial institutions, cities, regions, civil society and communities to support governments in achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement.¹³

Greenpeace said that coal subsidies in Turkey are a waste of money, greenhouse gas emissions by Turkey should be reduced, and called for a just transition to stop burning coal, strong adaptation policies and civil society participation.¹⁴ Academic İbrahim Özdemir has called for universities, civil society organizations, and climate activists to be given a "meeting and contribution platform".¹⁵ The location was agreed a year beforehand, but at that time the UNFCCC secretariat was saying that admitting organizations to observe these climate change conferences would take longer than that due to lack of resources.¹⁶ However some non-governmental organizations in Turkey, such as nature conservation organization Yolda and the Turkish Foundation for Combating Soil Erosion can nominate people to observe as they have been admitted to previous such conferences.¹⁷