Nearly 200 countries have made an unprecedented and historic pledge at the COP26 climate summit to speed up the end of fossil fuel subsidies and reduce the use of coal. Until COP26, coal and fossil fuel subsidies have never been explicitly mentioned in 26 years of treaties and decisions at UN climate talks, despite fossil fuels being one of the key drivers of global warming and $5.9 trillion of subsidies being given annually to coal, oil and gas.