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dubai
What's at Stake Is Our Survival
We are signing a death sentence if we continue to rely on fossil fuels.
Dec 12, 2023
Pacific nations have a reputation for being climate champions.
The resilience and commitment of Pacific negotiators and communities are to thank for the many landmark outcomes from previous UN climate talks, known as the Convention of the Parties or COP, including the Paris Agreement commitment to stay below 1.5 degrees of global heating, as well as the Loss and Damage fund.
COP28 in Dubai was no different: the Pacific showed up, as always, fighting for solutions. Now, a few hours until the close of the summit, the big questions still remain, but not on our shoulders: are we going back home to our communities feeling supported by world leaders and with hope that our heritage and land will survive the climate crisis?
Once again, the rich in the Global North have callously undermined the momentum in the Global South.
This was the largest COP in history, with record numbers of delegates and the largest presence of fossil fuel lobbyists on record: 2,456 industry lobbyists in all which is more than the total delegates from the 10 most climate-vulnerable countries combined. It's not a surprise that private interests have influenced decision-makers. Conference negotiators have allowed the perpetrators of the crisis to rewrite the rules by allowing them to sit at the negotiating table. How could this not have a catastrophic outcome?
Yesterday, a disappointing draft of this year's Global Stocktake review and agreement for the years to come failed to mention the phase-out of fossil energy sources. The science is clear, no matter how much the fossil fuel industry pushes for unproven technologies, like Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS), they are still very far from real scalability and economic feasibility. We are signing a death sentence if we continue to rely on fossil fuels.
Actually, let me rephrase it: countries like mine will be signing a death sentence, as we are often the ones at the forefront of climate chaos, while those that have the biggest responsibilities in polluting the world hide behind their profits. And when I say hide behind their profits, I mean it. It is not news that the global energy and financial systems carry a heritage of colonialism, extractivism, and bias against the world's poorest communities. Not only did the draft text fail to demand a fossil fuel phaseout, it also made virtually no commitments on mitigation, adaptation, and financial support for renewable energy in the Global South.
Facing the catastrophic effects of extreme weather at home and watching the slow progress of the negotiations, it was hard not to be pessimistic before we even arrived at COP28.
Once again, the rich in the Global North have callously undermined the momentum in the Global South.
Every year, we travel across oceans to come to these negotiations and we continue to get only drops of ambition. Facing the catastrophic effects of extreme weather at home and watching the slow progress of the negotiations, it was hard not to be pessimistic before we even arrived at COP28. But the point is that we can't afford not to be here, we can't afford to stop fighting because what's at stake is our very survival.
So we will return home, and continue to build up resilience in our communities, adapt and transition our energy systems, and rely on the strength of the people at the forefront of climate change. But it is now evident that we will do so without the support of global political leaders.
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Biden to Skip COP28 as He Faces Calls to Back Fossil Fuel Phaseout
The U.S. president has come under heavy criticism for approving oil and gas projects in the face of global climate breakdown.
Nov 27, 2023
U.S. President Joe Biden is reportedly planning to skip the United Nations climate summit that kicks off later this week in Dubai, a decision sure to anger climate advocates and scientists who have pushed him to back a speedy fossil fuel phaseout at the talks.
The New York Times was first to report the president's plans on Sunday, citing an unnamed White House official who did not provide a specific reason why Biden intends to skip COP28, which comes at the tail end of what's almost certain to be the hottest year on record. The U.S. is the largest historical emitter of planet-warning greenhouse gases, and the country is on pace to extract more oil and gas than ever this year.
Biden attended the previous two U.N. climate summits, neither of which yielded concrete agreements from world leaders to drastically curb oil, gas, and coal production and use in line with the latest scientific evidence indicating that nations are acting far too slowly to prevent catastrophic warming.
The U.S. president has himself faced significant backlash for approving massive fossil fuel projects such as the Willow drilling venture on Alaska's North Slope, which—if completed—is expected to result in more than 9 million metric tons of carbon dioxide pollution each year. And Biden's fossil fuel approvals go well beyond Willow: During his first two years in office, the president's administration greenlit more than 6,400 permits for oil and gas drilling, outpacing the Trump administration.
According toThe Washington Post, "there are no public events" on Biden's schedule for Friday, the first day of COP28's world leaders' summit. On Thursday, the opening day of COP28, Biden "is set to meet with Angolan President João Manuel Gonçalves Lourenço and participate in the White House Christmas tree lighting," the Post reported.
John Kerry, Biden's climate envoy, will be in attendance at COP28.
News that the U.S. president will be skipping COP28 came as the BBC reported that the summit's host, the United Arab Emirates, "planned to use its role... as an opportunity to strike oil and gas deals."
"The UAE team did not deny using COP28 meetings for business talks," the outlet added, "and said 'private meetings are private.'"
Last week, research by the Kick Big Polluters Out coalition showed that oil and gas industry lobbyists have attended United Nations-led climate talks more than 7,000 times over the past 20 years in an attempt to prevent action to rein in fossil fuels.
Like previous U.N. climate summits, COP28 is expected to be inundated with fossil fuel representatives, particularly given the UAE's status as one of the world's leading oil producers. Sultan al-Jaber, president of COP28, is the CEO of Abu Dhabi National Oil Company.
Kaisa Kosonen, policy coordinator at Greenpeace International, said in response to the BBC report that "the climate summit leader should be focused on advancing climate solutions impartially, not backroom deals that are fueling the crisis."
"We have all the solutions we need to transition to renewable energy, but it won't happen fast enough if governments fail to regulate fossil fuels out of the way," said Kosonen. "COP is an opportunity to secure our survival, not to strike business deals that fuel the crisis."
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Former UN Climate Chief Rips Oil-Friendly COP28 President's 'Very Dangerous' Carbon Capture Push
"This is what happens when a petrostate and an oil executive lead global climate talks," said one critic.
May 16, 2023
With six months to go until the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP28, is set to take place in Dubai, comments by the designated president of the summit about his approach to mitigating the climate crisis are already setting off alarm bells with critics including former United Nations climate chief Christiana Figueres.
As The Guardian reported Tuesday, Figueres addressed in a recent episode of her podcast, "Outrage and Optimism," a speech given earlier this month by Sultan al-Jaber, the CEO of Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), whose appointment as president of COP28 sparked outrage among climate campaigners in January.
In comments Figueres described as "very worrisome," al-Jaber said at the Petersburg Climate Dialogue in Berlin that policymakers should focus on drawing down "fossil fuel emissions"—but not the extraction of fossil fuels themselves.
"We must be laser focused on phasing out fossil fuel emissions, while phasing up viable, affordable zero carbon alternatives," said al-Jaber, adding that "smart government regulation to... make carbon capture commercially viable" is needed.
Figueres, former executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, said al-Jaber was suggesting COP28 will support carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology—an unproven method of removing carbon emissions from smokestacks at power plants, which has failed in at least two high-profile projects in the United States and which climate campaigners say only serves as a distraction from genuine solutions to the climate emergency–eliminating the extraction of fossil fuels and transitioning to renewable energy.
"He is trying to say: 'Look, those of us who are producers of fossil fuels will be responsible for our emissions through enhanced carbon capture and storage. And we, or the COP presidency, will also support the zero carbon alternatives,'" said Figueres.
She added that dozens of countries have pushed for far-reaching commitments at previous global climate summits, with small island nations on the frontlines of the climate crisis joined by several countries in the Global North at last year's COP27 in unsuccessfully pushing for an agreement that called for a "phase-out" of fossil fuels instead of a "phase-down."
Al-Jaber's endorsement of a position embraced by fossil fuel companies like the one he heads is "very dangerous," said Figueres. "I just don't see most countries, and certainly not the vulnerable countries, being willing to support the COP president on this because it is a direct threat to their survival."
Instead of investing in CCS—which companies have poured billions of dollars into over the last several years with no success stories to show for it, as U.S. watchdog Food & Water Watch said this week—scientists have warned that policymakers must slash carbon emissions by 45% by 2030 in order to limit global heating to 1.5°C.
"We do not have CCS commercially available and viable over the next five to seven years," Figueres said. "It's just not going to happen."
While CCS costs an estimated $50 to $200 per tonne of carbon dioxide, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, energy experts agreed in a U.N. report released in 2021 that investing in renewable energy sources would save $55 billion in a year.
As one European official toldClimate Home News this month, CCS is currently a "luxury technology" that is currently being promoted mainly by "fossil exporting countries," while renewable energy sources "are the most affordable and readily available mitigation technologies."
Al-Jaber has been joined by United Arab Emirates Environment Minister Mariam bint Mohammed Almheiriin attempting to tamp down expectations that COP28 will yield far-reaching action to draw down the use of fossil fuels, as scientists have demanded.
In February, Almheiri said at the Munich Security Conference that "we need the oil and gas sector to be with us," while saying the industry should "phase out oil and gas in a just way."
Journalist Khaled Diab said after al-Jaber's comments this month that "this is what happens when a petrostate and an oil executive lead global climate talks."
\u201c"We must be laser focused on phasing out fossil fuel emissions,\u201d said COP28 President Sultan Al Jaber.\n\nBut carbon capture and storage cannot phase out emissions.\n\nThis is what happens when a petrostate and an oil executive lead global climate talks.\nhttps://t.co/bgY93ujxHO\u201d— Khaled Diab (@Khaled Diab) 1683194129
"When you are the president of the COP," said Figueres, "you cannot put forward the position of the country that you're coming from."
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