Countries most at risk call proposed climate deal a ‘death sentence’

Environmental groups and negotiators from countries most vulnerable to climate disasters have attacked a draft final agreement, made public at United Nations climate talks on Monday, that fell short of calls for a phase-out of fossil fuels.

The long-awaited draft says countries “can” take action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including “reducing both consumption and production of fossil fuels” by 2050, in line with what science says needs to be done done to avert the worst effects of global warming. .

But there was no mention of drastically cutting fossil fuel use this decade, which scientists say is necessary to keep global warming at relatively safe levels. And the use of “may” makes action optional, analysts say.

A spokesman for Sultan Al Jaber, the Emirati oil executive leading the talks in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, said in a statement that the draft was “a huge step forward.” It would be the first time a United Nations climate agreement has even referred to fossil fuels if those words remain in the final version.

But diplomats who have campaigned for a United Nations commitment to stop burning the fossil fuels that are dangerously warming the planet said their countries would oppose the deal as written. The deadline for an agreement is Tuesday, and talks are now expected to go into overtime as negotiators must negotiate language. Under UN rules, all 198 countries must reach consensus on an agreement; any country can break a deal.

The combustion of oil, gas and coal has increased the average global temperature by about 1.2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Above 1.5 degrees Celsius, people will struggle to adapt to rising sea levels, forest fires, extreme storms and drought, scientists say. To keep warming below that threshold, countries need to cut greenhouse gas emissions by about 43 percent by 2030, scientists say.

“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. At their highest point, the Marshall Islands rise just over two meters above the sea.

“What we have seen today is completely unacceptable,” Mr Silk said. “We will not go quietly to our watery graves.”

Mona Ainuu, the natural resources minister of the Pacific island of Niue, was moved to tears as she described what she would tell her 12-year-old daughter about the outcome of this summit and implored other countries to reconsider the draft.

“It makes me sad that I came all this way,” she said. “We traveled thousands of miles to get to COP and nothing happened.”

The United States believes that language around fossil fuels needs to be “substantially strengthened,” Chad Houghton, spokesman for John Kerry, President Biden’s special envoy for climate change, said in a statement.

“COP28 is now on the brink of complete failure,” former Vice President Al Gore said in a statement. “The world urgently needs to phase out fossil fuels as quickly as possible, but this obsequious draft reads as if OPEC dictated it word for word.”

Saudi Arabia is the leading opponent of language calling for phasing out or even phasing out fossil fuels. Environmental groups on Monday accused Saudi officials of weakening the text.

“I cannot hide that the text as it stands now is disappointing,” said Wopke Hoekstra, European Commissioner for Climate Action. “On the whole it is insufficient. Scientists are crystal clear about the need to phase out fossil fuels.”

Oil-producing countries like Saudi Arabia and the fossil fuel industry have tried to frame the problem as one of emissions. If greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane could be trapped or removed from the atmosphere, the world could continue to burn oil, gas and coal. Others say this is currently technically impossible and that fossil fuels should be replaced by solar, wind and other forms of renewable energy.

Supporters of the draft agreement said late Monday that by urging countries to reduce fossil fuel production, the deal would achieve essentially the same result as a phase-out.

Energy experts disagreed. Farooq Ullah, senior energy policy adviser at the International Institute for Sustainable Development, said “phasing out” means getting emissions as close to zero as possible, while “reducing” could mean a marginal reduction.

Mr Ullah said the design was “very indicative of the fact that we are at a climate summit in a petrostate, and this is very much an appeasement for fossil fuel producing countries.”

Brad Plumer, Max Berak, Somini Sengupta And Jenny Gross contributed reporting from Dubai.