In a meeting called to update the presidency on their positions, they rose to offer their reluctant support.

The Maldives environment minister Shauna Aminath shed light on the toll of the compromise.

“Please do us the courtesy of acknowledging that this does not bring hope to our hearts, but serves as another conversation in which we put our homes on the line while those who have other options decide how quickly they want to act to save those who don’t,” she said.

For a time it seemed as though the imperfect deal was done, until India, backed by China, intervened to water down language calling for coal to be phased out, insisting instead that it be changed to “phased down.”

This change in language means there is no deadline to end coal power.

This was a bitter disappointment to those states that had just ceded so much.

“This commitment on coal had been a bright spot in this package,” said Marshall Islands climate envoy Tina Stege.

“It was one of the things we were hoping to carry out of here and back home with pride. And it hurts deeply to see that bright spot dimmed.

“We accept this change with the greatest reluctance. We do so only — and I want to stress, only — because there are critical elements of this package that people in my country need as a lifeline for their future.”

The European Union’s vice president Frans Timmermans was equally scathing.

“It is no secret to this gathering that the European Union would have wanted to go even further than the initial text in the cover agreement on coal,” he said.

“This is a consequence of our own painful experience with coal. We all know that European wealth was built on coal. And if we don’t get rid of coal, European death will also be built on coal.

“We know full well, that coal has no future and this is what we’re working on with our own plans to put an end to coal in Europe in the foreseeable future.”

Despite the compromises and the disappointments, most climate observers did not view the COP as a failure.

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Richie Merzian, energy and climate program director at the Australia Institute and a former climate negotiator said even the battered language on coal is significant.

“After 15 years in the process, it’s exciting to see fossil fuels directly targeted, with significant alliances against coal, oil and gas launched on the margins of COP and language on phasing out traditional coal power debated to the final hours and even supported by Australia,” he says. “Progress has been made, hopes have remained and the process lurches forward to 2022.”

Alden Meyer, a veteran of every COP ever held and senior associate with the think tank e3g said the main goal of the meeting was always a tough ask.

“1.5 is alive, but it is on life support in the ICU.”

But he says that the mechanisms in the agreement to have governments review and improve their reduction goals and strategies annually, and to have their progress monitored by the UN, could have a significant impact on emissions, especially when combined with the COP side-deals many nations signed to reduce methane emissions and abandoned fossil fuels.

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The structure for rapid emissions reductions is there, if nations chose to use it.

“No one is going to make them do it. No one is going to slap sanctions on them or send in the sixth fleet, it is up to them.”

Despite the fact that there is no enforcement mechanism, the agreement carries weight, says Meyer.

This is why COPs are so bitterly contested, and why so many terrible compromises are extracted.

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