COP28:a critical balance between progress made and opportunities lost

COP, the United Nations Climate Conference, is probably the only place where, not at all delighted – given that everything could have been different and everything could have been done more courageously and better, but above all earlier – I will stand up and applaud an oilman, almost in tears I will embrace Ferdinand, he is truly in tears while hiding his face in his hands, and speaking in the plural I will ask the friends I will say goodbye to and see each other again in a year according to this timetable of our own:what do you think?What do we think?What do we do now?

If there is one thing that this COP has demonstrated, the Spanish Minister for the Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, told me, it is the power of consensus.What's more, he did it when there was no one left to believe it.Not even we, the press, the so-called guardians of democracy.Because on the penultimate day, a reporter asked whether the rules should be changed for the sake of negotiations.At the moment they require that only an agreement accepted by all 200 countries in the world pass.The response was a diplomatic, convoluted, moderately convinced:No.

So we went on for another night of discussions in Dubai.Until the morning of Wednesday 13 December, President Sultan Al Jaber lowered his gavel, thanked his family and those who have always believed in him, as if he were at an Oscar awards ceremony, and it closed the 28th United Nations climate conference.

The agreement reached at COP28 and our future

Yet it should at least be remembered and put on record that the representatives of the small island states (AOSIS) were not in the plenary room at that moment.They were still trying to get a result they could be very happy with.

The High Ambition Coalition (HAC) of more than 130 countries – around two-thirds of the parties to COP28 – had prepared an alternative text to present to the presidency, but ultimately failed to gain the necessary consensus.

Over there, however, they were in a hurry, like those who find themselves "embarrassingly" late by 28 years (the adjective comes from the Danish Minister for Development, Cooperation and Climate Policies, Dan Jorgensen).

Samoan negotiator and AOSIS representative, Anne Rasmussen, said she was "a little confused" by the speed with which Al Jaber closed the summit and added that members of her group could not afford to return to their islands "with the message that the trial has failed us."

“We have made incremental progress since business as usual, when what we really needed is an exponential change in our actions and our support,” Rasmussen said, echoing the widespread sense of exclusion expressed by those who wanted more.

The reason for the standing ovation one valid one remains:for the first time in history, the text approved (not surprisingly, called “UAE Consensus”) declares fossil fuels guilty of global warming.It had never been done on a UN document.By naming them, he recognizes that we need to move away from this source of energy and this type of economy.

The language with which it does so is not one that the members of AOSIS would have wanted, but one to which they contributed with all their might.Only future analyzes will be able to tell us whether the compromise adopted was a flash of genius or yet another overly prudent solution.

John Silk, the Minister of Natural Resources and Trade for the Marshall Islands, had this to say for now:

“I came here to build a canoe together for my country.Instead we built a canoe with a weak, pitted hull full of holes.Yet we have to throw it into the water because we have no other choice.”

What was achieved and what was sacrificed in the final COP28 agreement

The UAE Consensus inaugurates a new expression, “moving away from” (transition away), but avoid the stronger term "elimination" (phaseout) seen in other previous drafts.

This part is included in the Global Stocktake (GST) of theParis Agreement, a mandatory audit of global action taken every five years starting in 2023, designed to guide the next round of climate commitments.

Let's make a summary of the 21 pages of the GST, where it is "asked" (call on) to the parties to contribute to:

• Triple renewable energy capacity globally and double the global average annual rate of energy efficiency by 2030;
• Accelerate efforts towards phasing out (phasedown) of the energy produced with highly emissive coal (unabated);
• Accelerate global efforts towards net-zero emissions energy systems, using zero- and low-carbon fuels well before mid-century;
• “Move away” from fossil fuels in energy systems, “in a fair, orderly and equitable manner,” accelerating action in this critical decade to reach net zero by 2050;
• Accelerate the use of zero- and low-emission technologies, including renewable energy, nuclear, low-carbon hydrogen production and techniques such as carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCS), in particular in sectors that are difficult to decarbonise (hard-to-abate);
• Accelerate and substantially reduce non-CO2 emissions globally, including in particular methane emissions by 2030;
• Accelerate the reduction of emissions from road transport through a range of pathways, including through infrastructure development and the rapid deployment of zero- and low-emission vehicles;
• Eliminate as soon as possible inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that do not address energy poverty or the just transition.

The list of actions still resembles that which appeared in previous drafts of the negotiating text.In particular, in the penultimate version, which appeared towards the end of the negotiations, and is particularly controversial.Critics had labeled it a "shopping list" and a "disaster."The Emirati presidency then claimed to have presented it in a provocative manner "knowing it would spark a debate".

Which happened.In fact, in the next and final version of the GST, fossil fuels are at least black and white.

“I think everyone here should be happy, in a world with wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and all the other challenges of a sinking planet.At this time, multilateralism worked and people used individual interests to try to define the common good.It's difficult.It's the hardest thing and diplomacy is the hardest thing in politics,” said US climate envoy John Kerry.“The decision, supported by all nations around the world, is aimed at moving away from fossil fuels in energy systems, so as to reach net zero by 2050.This is clear."

Not everyone is so convinced.Some observers have noted that terms such as call on they are among the weakest used in official texts.

"We don't see any commitment or even an invitation from the parties to reach peak emissions by 2025", Anne Rasmussen also observed, adding:

“We refer to the science throughout the text and also in this paragraph, but then we refrain from an agreement to take the relevant actions to act in line with what the science says we need to do.It is not enough for us to refer to the science and then make agreements that ignore what the science tells us."

Some NGOs, who also supported the agreed text on the GST, have recognized that it is not in line with the Paris Agreement, the heart of everything we are doing.

Signed in 2015 by 195 countries including the European Union, it aims to limit global warming to below 2°C and to continue efforts to limit it to 1.5°C.All to "avoid the catastrophic consequences of climate change".

What does the Paris climate agreement include?

The problem with the Paris Agreement, which was in all respects miraculous at the time, is naturally not having been able to give the details.This is why diplomatic terminology has been crucial for all these years.

And here is something as obvious as the phaseout [ed, the phase-out] of fossil fuels has fallen victim to the planetary consensus.

Wanted bluntly by the most ambitious countries (especially those of HAC, AOSIS and South America), or accompanied by some concessions according to the more realistic proposal of the European Union, finally opposed by Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq and Russia.

The concessions signed by the EU would have concerned the deadline “culling” (abatement), defined by the IPCC for the first time last year with a tiny footnote.

“In this context, 'fuels unabated' refers to fossil fuels produced and used without interventions that substantially reduce the amount of greenhouse gases emitted throughout their life cycle;for example, capture 90% or more of CO2 from power plants, or 50-80% of fugitive methane emissions from energy supply,” the statement reads.

Here we get technical, but it is useful to give the measure of the difficulties.

Observers have noted that the use of the word “or” is problematic, because the part about CO2 capture appears as an alternative to that of methane.One of the authors of the IPCC definition, Chris Bataille, later explained that this "or" should not have been there at all:

“It was a clerical error, which is a problem,” he said.“It was very, very late at night.People had been awake for 24 hours."

Due to the perceived ambiguity in this definition, countries that wanted to have a strict definition struggled to find the same concept expressed using "and" instead.

It would also mean avoiding methane leaks from coal mines, oil wells, and a capture rate of at least 90% in downstream carbon capture or combustion emissions.A value lower than 90% would be difficult to reconcile with the objectives of the Paris Agreement.

“The current language on phasing out fossil fuels is unacceptable, especially in its ambiguous nature,” said Mark Preston, of the NGO Bellona EU.

To cut the corner, the UAE Consensus directly removed the phaseout, and don't talk about it anymore.

But the final text still leaves room for loopholes for fossils.For example, while it does not include any explicit reference to liquefied natural gas (LNG), it talks about "transitional fuels".

According to Bill Hare, CEO of Climate Analytics, it is "a code for gas and has been promoted by LNG and gas exporters" such as Russia.

Overall, Hare called the GST "a big win for oil and gas producing countries and fossil fuel exporters."He also criticized the lack of commitment to peak emissions by 2025 and a “very weak” text on energy, “without commitments strong enough to have 1.5°C within reach this decade”.

On the other hand, the reference to energy systems in the context of net zero seems designed to exclude the non-energy use of fossil fuels, such as steel, chemicals, fertilizers and plastics.

Anchun Jean Su, co-president of the Climate Action Network (CAN) International, said something that I think is very correct, if only because it expresses the paradox of this COP with blatant revenge:

“The fact that we had a record number of fossil fuel lobbyists actually worked in favor of global civil society, because it finally dragged fossil fuels to center stage and forced politicians to confront them.”

The letter with which the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) attempted to hinder the negotiations by showing concern over the potential exclusion of fossils is an example of how fierce the fight has become, but in some ways easier to manage, in the sunlight.

Progress and missed opportunities

The new GST really takes a step forward therefore.“He makes a clarion call for the world to move away from fossil fuels and accelerate action this decade, which would dramatically shift the needle in the fight against climate change and enormous pressure from oil and gas interests.” , explains Melanie Robinson, director of the global climate program at the World Resources Institute.

Another very important aspect is that of money.Jean Su said that although "right now we're talking about finance in this text, and we've seen movement from the EU and the US on that," overall:"The text is weak."

Sources in the negotiating room noted that finance was at the center of many COP28 standoffs, from GST to adaptation.

The repeated failure of countries to reach the annual international climate finance target of $100 billion, promised in 2009 and which was to be reached by 2020, has not helped the cause of phaseout.

Developing country opposition to “unilateral measures” such as the EU's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) to tax polluting imports has also threatened to stymie consensus.

Then there was the approval of the Global Adaptation Goal (GGA), however criticized because the financial language appears only weakly in the latest draft text and without specific provisions.

According to Madeleine Diouf Sarr, president of the Least Developed Countries Negotiating Group, “today's outcome is full of eloquent language but sadly lacking in implementable commitments.”

“Our communities deserve more than ambitious goals;they need real, immediate and impactful support to adapt to the reality of climate change,” Sarr said.

“The adoption of the GGA framework at COP28 is a historic achievement, however, our work is far from over.We must now focus on the crucial next steps, which include the development of indicators, to ensure that the framework's progress is accurately monitored and measured."

Finally, an agreement on infamous Article 6 for the trade of carbon credit credits has once again been postponed, throwing into despair the future of the markets as a climate solution envisaged by the Paris Agreement.

Article 6 has a huge impact, including on the human rights of the communities living where the projects take place.It's about reforestation, renewables, efficiency gains, everything that can offset the harmful emissions produced elsewhere.Since it is international, it establishes a market with very complicated rules.

In recent days, the presidency of the United Arab Emirates had published a take-it-or-leave-it text, with ambiguous and controversial language on the authorization of credits and their revocation.

On this point, negotiations will have to start all over again in 11 months at COP29 which will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan.

For Article 6, for climate finance that really goes from A to B, to realize that it makes no sense to invest in false solutions like gas, for Europe to set itself objectives between now and 2040, for all these and many other things to do.The next few months will be the time for implementation.

The executive director of the think-tank Strategic Perspectives, Linda Kalcher, whom I have heard and met at every hour of the day and night in recent weeks, returned home saying:“Today we celebrate, tomorrow we go back to work”.

Preview image:Emanuela Barbiroglio