With one day to go until climate meeting chief Sultan al-Jaber wants to end the UN climate meeting in Dubai, the spotlight is on the future of oil, coal and natural gas. The pressure is heavy on the world’s countries to agree for the first time on a phase-out of the climate-damaging fossil fuels. Meeting veterans and negotiators alike believe that the world has never been so close to such a historic decision.
But there is a bad atmosphere in the negotiation rooms where oil producer Saudi Arabia seems to be doing everything to sabotage an agreement, according to information to TT. The country’s best friend is time because the clock is ticking fast now.
– We don’t have a minute to lose, UN climate chief Simon Stiell told journalists in Dubai on Monday morning.
Even Iraq has said that it opposes writings about phasing out.
According to Simon Stiell, the conflict has boiled down to two things: fossil fuels and rich countries’ economic contributions to developing countries.
New draft
Anticipation is in the air over the meeting area – where there is tense anticipation for a new draft of the agreement expected on Monday. The wording will be nailed down to the last comma.
After that, the countries will once again have the chance to have their say on the text. The pressure is increasing on al-Jaber to put together a strong and ambitious deal.
The Climate Summit’s decision must be taken by consensus among the nearly 200 countries. It therefore applies to fossil giants, rich emission criminals and vulnerable developing countries to succeed in finding common ground for the good of the planet. This usually means that the decisions will only be as strong as the least ambitious countries can accept.
UN Secretary General António Guterres has returned to Dubai to try to whip countries to phase out fossil fuels.
– Now is the time for maximum ambition and maximum flexibility, he tells journalists in Dubai.
Global inventory
The focus of this year’s climate meeting is the global review, which could perhaps have a more salable name because the process is central to the Paris Agreement. Some have described it as a health check on how the deal is doing.
The world’s collective climate work must be analyzed every five years. Based on that, the countries must agree on how to close the gap between what is being done and what is required to limit warming in accordance with the goals of the Paris Agreement.
It is not news that the countries are doing far too little, far too slowly, and now they have until 2025 to tell us how exactly they are going to tighten up. At COP28, they must agree on what is required for the ambitions to be raised. Phasing out fossil fuels can be a piece of the puzzle in that work.