Oil-rich countries are slowing progress on UN climate pact, negotiators say

VaselineSeptember 13, 2024

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Oil-rich countries are slowing progress on UN climate pact, negotiators say

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Oil-rich nations are making a concerted effort to slow progress on a landmark UN climate accord to end fossil fuel use, according to Western nations participating in global climate change talks.

Negotiators from five Western countries have told the Financial Times they are pressuring Azerbaijan, as the host country for the upcoming UN COP29 summit, to prioritize talks on phasing out fossil fuels in a bid to counter “pushback” from petrostates and of their allies.

At COP28 in Dubai last December, nearly 200 countries agreed to phase out fossil fuels in their energy systems by 2050 and triple renewable energy capacity and double energy efficiency by 2030.

But negotiators said a group of countries including Saudi Arabia, Russia and Bolivia – which have historically proved a roadblock to any global deal to phase out fossil fuel use – were once again frustrating progress.

Azerbaijan, which relies heavily on oil and gas exports economically, is seen as reluctant to support a further shift away from oil and gas.

A negotiator from a major western country said “there is clearly pushback from some countries” in the fossil fuel deal talks.

“We need to be very clear with Azerbaijan that this COP will not be a success if we do not also talk about the mitigation implementation process, including the COP28 decision,” they said.

An EU official said the bloc had also made known to Baku its concerns about the lack of progress on the COP28 agreement. “We have confirmed (with Azerbaijan that) it is very important that we are able to continue the work on the Dubai consensus and we will make sure that it is part of the conversation.”

A negotiator from another western country added: “At this stage it looks extremely bleak and there is a real risk that the major issuers in the G77 (group of developing nations) will use the difficult financial negotiations to block any progress significant in terms of mitigation’.

At this year’s COP29 in November, countries are set to agree a new global target for climate finance, with nations clashing over how much it should be, who pays and how it should be structured. Over the weekend, African governments called for more than £1 billion a year in climate finance.

Oil and natural gas bring in about 90 percent of Azerbaijan’s export earnings and finance about 60 percent of its budget, according to International Energy Agency figures.

Earlier this month, Baku’s chief climate negotiator Yalchin Rafiyev gave a seven-page speech about recent talks between the countries at a retreat in Azerbaijan, but did not explicitly mention fossil fuels or renewable energy.

Rafiyev said it was “essential to emphasize the importance of mitigation,” the process of reducing or preventing the release of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, as opposed to reducing the burning of fossil fuels.

The absence of any specific mention of fossil fuels or renewable energy in the speech “reveals a staggering ignorance and inexcusable failure of Azerbaijan’s leadership,” said Andreas Sieber, associate director of policy and campaigns at 350.org, a watchdog group. . at COP.

The UAE’s COP28 presidency said it “maintains a relentless focus on implementation” of the Dubai agreement, officially called the UAE Consensus, which includes energy transition talks in Berlin earlier this year. It was said to “also work tirelessly with the G7 and G20”.

The Azerbaijani COP29 presidency said its leadership “repeatedly emphasized the importance of making progress on mitigation, which includes, among others, the transition away from fossil fuels.”

It said it was making “every effort to lead the parties to common ground and inclusive outcomes.”

Earlier this year, Saudi Arabia’s energy minister, Abdulaziz bin Salman, described the COP29 agreement as an “à la carte menu” of options rather than prescriptive.