Trudeau in Rome for G20 summit as prospects for a deal on climate emissions remain uncertain

After a whirlwind one-day trip to the Netherlands to meet a long-time ally and friend, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau travels to Rome today for a G20 summit that may prove to be a more fractious event.

While it's usually a consequential annual gathering of world leaders, this year's G20 is widely seen as uniquely important because it comes only a day before the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow.

That's where countries are expected to reaffirm past emissions reduction targets or — in the case of the developed world — top what was promised six years ago at the Paris talks while presenting concrete plans to make it happen. Some countries may turn out to be laggards.

The meeting is also a chance for world leaders to address the continuing COVID-19 health crisis — developing countries remain largely unvaccinated — and the resulting economic fallout from pandemic-fuelled inflation and supply chain disruptions.

The success of COP26 — billed by some climate activists as "the last best chance" to set the world on a path to a lower-emissions future — may very well depend on what comes out of the G20, since member countries represent more than 80 per cent of the global economy.

As of Friday, there is no consensus among the G20 nations on two climate-related agenda items: an agreement to hold global temperature increases to 1.5 C (climate scientists working for the UN have said current global reduction commitments will result in a 2.7 C temperature spike, a catastrophic increase) and a complete phaseout of coal by mid-century.

At an earlier G20 summit with environment ministers in Naples, Italy, representatives of countries like China, India, Russia and Saudi Arabia balked at these proposals. That suggests the final leaders' communique may be a watered-down version of what climate activists have been demanding. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison also said this week he will not support a push to set an end date for coal mining and coal-fired power stations.

"I'm fairly optimistic that we can still achieve a good outcome. But, if we don't work hard, it could be in trouble," Dutch Prime Mark Rutte said Friday at a press conference when asked about the prospect of climate success at the G20.

"The two of us will work very hard to do whatever we can to bring our colleagues along in the G20," Rutte said, pointing to Trudeau. "There's still a gap and a lot we need to do."

"There is much, much more to do," Trudeau added. Trudeau and Rutte have become close friends and allies; they pledged Friday after their bilateral meeting in the Hague to meet face-to-face every two years to address shared priorities, such as progress on climate issues.

U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the host of COP26, was also pessimistic about the chances of success earlier this week. Speaking to schoolchildren in London, Johnson said he was "very worried" about the success of COP26.

"It's gonna be very, very tough this summit. It might go, it might go wrong. And we might not get the agreements that we need. It's touch and go, it's very very difficult," Johnson said.

Independent Ontario Sen. Peter Boehm, who served as Canada's G7 emissary or "sherpa" at six summits before being named to the Red Chamber, said the Rome meeting will be "a bit of a fulcrum or a lever moving forward to the COP."

"If the G20 can more or less agree in their communique to give this all a push, then they will arrive in Glasgow with a good part of the work done," he told CBC News. "On climate change, there's a lot of impetus to do things."