The fight over fossil fuels is going into overtime
It’s well past midnight in Dubai and negotiations are still underway on the final day of the United Nations climate summit known as COP28.
Representatives from more than 170 countries are working overtime to reach a unanimous agreement that charts a path forward after the hottest year on record.
We don’t know yet what will be in the final text and you will receive a special edition of the newsletter as soon as it arrives. But it is clear that countries around the world remain deeply divided over the future of fossil fuels, even after two weeks of talks that promised to bring more stakeholders to the negotiating table.
Many countries, including vulnerable island states and some prosperous European countries, are calling for a rapid phase-out of coal, oil and natural gas.
But many major companies and fossil fuel producing countries – including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, where COP28 is taking place – are unwilling to give up the golden goose. Some developing countries are also against a complete phase-out because they believe it will limit their economic growth.
“Telling us to stop using fossil fuels is an insult. It is like telling Uganda to stay in poverty.” Ruth Nankabirwa, Ugandan Minister of Energy and Mineral Development, said on X. She added that Uganda is open to “a long-term phase-out” but only if “developing countries can exploit their resources in the short term, while rich, old producers exit first.”
The UAE was hoping for a breakthrough COP28 deal that would satisfy all parties. That was always going to be quite a task.
An early version this weekend was seen as a softening of calls for a phase-out. It said countries “can” take actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including “reducing both consumption and production of fossil fuels” by 2050. But nothing was said about deeply reducing the use of fossil fuels this decade, and the use of “would” makes the action optional.
That caused outrage among many COP28 delegates.
“The Republic of the Marshall Islands did not come here to sign our death warrant,” said John Silk, the Pacific Atolls’ minister of natural resources. “We will not go quietly to our watery graves.”
Sultan Al Jaber, the man charged with leading the proceedings (who is also head of the UAE’s state oil company), managed to keep the fossil fuel debate at bay in the first few days of the event with a series of smaller agreements, including funding for a loss and damage fund and commitments to reduce methane.
But it didn’t take long for the debate over the future of fossil fuels to explode. A video of Al Jaber saying there was “no science” to support a phase-out sparked an uproar. The head of OPEC told members to block any deal that calls for curbs on fossil fuels. And Azerbaijan, another oil state with a troubling human rights record, was chosen to host next year’s COP.
Talks are still ongoing and there could yet be a breakthrough that delivers on Al Jaber’s promise a “high ambition” COP28. But for now, the divide between those who want to create a future without fossil fuels and those determined to maintain it seems as wide as ever.
We’ll be back soon with a final analysis of COP28.
Even more COP28 news
The small electric vehicle revolution
Big Oil is taking on a small enemy in the streets of Asia and Africa. The noisy, noxious two- and three-wheeled vehicles that transport billions of people every day are quietly going electric.
In Kenya and Rwanda, dozens of start-ups are competing to replace oil-guzzling motorcycle taxis with battery-powered ones. In India this year, more than half of all new three-wheeled vehicles sold and registered were battery powered. Indonesia and Thailand are also encouraging the electrification of motorcycle taxis.
According to BloombergNEF, the shift to electric vehicles in general has reduced global oil demand by 1.8 million barrels per day. Two- and three-wheelers are responsible for 60 percent of that decline.
All told, cars and smaller electric vehicles are expected to displace just 4 percent of total oil demand this year. Yet their growth is crucial for the energy transition, as transport is responsible for about 20 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.
The major shift to small electric vehicles is underappreciated in the United States and Europe, where, despite the popularity of electric bicycles and scooters, the focus has been mainly on cars.
But most of the world doesn’t roll on four wheels.
“Electric bikes are quieter, much more efficient and good for the environment,” says Jesse Forrester, the founder of Mazi Mobility, which has 60 electric motorcycle taxis on the roads in Nairobi. “There is now a silent revolution underway in Kenya that is driving this transformation for the future.”
— Somini Sengupta, Abdi Latif Dahir, Alex Travelli and Clifford Krauss
Read the full article here.