2023-12-12 20:26:21
Extension of the Climate Summit
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Updated Tuesday, December 12, 2023 – 19:26
Although the Dubi Climate Summit was due to end this Tuesday, throughout the day we waited for a second draft that could be ratified, after the widespread rejection of the document that did not mention the elimination of fossil fuels.
Two participants in COP28 talk on Tuesday afternoon in the plenary room.EFE
The tensions created by Saudi Arabia and other petrostates, contrary to any reference to the “elimination” of fossil fuels, marked the final stretch of COP28 on Tuesday. The Dubi summit was marked by total uncertainty in the “time of injury”, increased by the information vacuum of the presidency for more than 24 hours, while the last draft was being finalized.
The possibility of a failed summit, like Copenhagen in 2009 or The Hague in 2000, even led to plans for the conclave. which brought together more than 80,000 delegates from 198 countries plus the EU, also marked by the record of up to 2,456 oil industry lobbyists.
The president of COP28, the sultan Ahmed Al Yaber, played hide and seek with the media after the barrage of criticism for the draft presented on MondayYes, which proposed “reducing the production and consumption” of fossil fuels “in a fair, orderly and equitable manner.” The text avoided at all costs using the word “elimination” (phase out, in English), the workhorse of the European Union and at least 130 countries.
The frontal opposition of Saudi Arabia stopped any possible advance in the hour H. Several countries in the Organization of Petroleum Producers and Exporters (OPEC), which had urged its members to reject any mention of ending fossil fuels, made common cause with the country considered the usual suspect at climate summits. .
Division between petrostates
Saudi Arabia’s position in fact caused a division between the petrostates, with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) trying to find a conciliatory formula to save its reputation as a host country. The dual role of Sultan Al Yaber, as executive director of the state oil company Adnoc, ended up taking its toll on him at the moment, despite his insistence on the importance of bringing large producers to the negotiating table.
According to a Global Witness analysis using data from Rystad Energy, representatives of companies that plan to produce more than 25 billion barrels of oil by the end of the decade converged in Dubi. Since the start of the summit on November 30, Al Jaber was forced to respond to successive information about his conflict of interest, including his intervention in a forum online in which he went so far as to say that the elimination of fossil fuels, in order not to exceed the limit of 1.5 degrees of temperature increase, had no scientific basis.
While the delegates debate behind closed doors, dozens of civil organizations represented at COP28 held a collective sit-in demanding the end of the fossil fuel era and demanding radical changes in climate summits, to enable majority agreements and avoid obstructionist maneuvers by a minority of nations.
Al Yaber gave the spotlight on Tuesday to the director general of COP28, Majid Al Suwaidi, who strove to project an image of apparent normality amid the total suspense: “We knew that there were going to be polarized opinions, especially about the language used about the fossil fuels. This was something necessary to know where the “red lines” of the countries are and it is a normal process to reach consensus.”
“All COPs have their challenges, but this one has been especially demanding,” added Al Suwaidi. “We are trying to do something historic, something that has not been done before. “And it is closing the gap between where the world is and the goal of keeping the goal of a maximum temperature rise of 1.5 degrees within reach.”
Danish Climate Minister Dan Jorgensen, co-facilitator of the Global Stocktake (the first inventory of climate action since the Paris Agreement) that serves as a guideline for the final agreement, was one of the few to show signs of life on Tuesday before the media: “I am worried, but it is very obvious that we need more ambition. “I have not given up because I think it is still possible.”
“Who is hijacking COP28?” was the question posed insistently by journalists to the delegates. Fingers pointed unmistakably toward Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil exporter. “What we are seeing at COP28 is a division between the United Arab Emirates and the petrostates aligned with Saudi Arabia,” warned Jim Krane, an energy and geopolitics specialist at Rice University in Texas. According to Krane, Saudi Arabia has had the support of at least four of the 22 Arab countries: Kuwait, Algeria, Libya and Iraq.
The fifth “rider” is Qatar, which has made large investments in liquefied natural gas, and which apparently also aligns itself with the “hard” group in the negotiations, as does Iran. Bolivia, also part of the Group of Like-Minded Developing Countries, even objected to the use of the word “reduce” (the South American country has started eleven new hydrocarbon exploration projects this year to try to stop the decline in its exports). .
China and India, first and third countries in the ranking of CO2 emissions, objected to specific elements as the recognition of the cumulative and historical role of developed countries. Pakistan, one of the countries most vulnerable to flooding, stressed the need for greater emphasis on “implementation” and billions of dollars in financing.
The European Union was the first to call for a more ambitious text that included the word “elimination” and recognized the urgency of action between now and 2030. “We started this conference with good news on the financing of losses and damages and we need to end it with what that the world needs in this critical decade,” warned the third vice president and Minister of the Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, who has formed a tandem with the EU climate commissioner Wopke Hoekstra.
The Alliance of Small Island States, which often voices conscience in the COPS, compared the first draft to “a death sentence.” Australia’s climate minister, Chris Bowen, made common cause with his Pacific neighbors, demanding “a clearer signal” about the future of fossil fuels (despite its triple status as an exporter of coal, gas and oil). The United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Norway also asked for a stronger text.
The biggest “scare” of COP28 was carried out byl British climate minister Graham Stuart, who decided to return to London at critical moments of the negotiation to take part in a vote at Westminster. The Labor opposition harshly criticized the rudeness of the head of the British delegation, as another demonstration of the lack of leadership in the United Kingdom after the recent “reversal” of its climate objectives by Rishi Sunak’s Government.
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