COP29 host moves beyond fossil fuels to dissipate methane and energy storage

Unlock Editor’s Digest for free

FT editor Roula Khalaf selects her favorite stories in this weekly newsletter.

The host country of the upcoming COP29 UN climate change summit skipped the transition away from fossil fuels in a list of priorities for the meeting in Azerbaijan, focusing instead on energy storage, methane waste and war.

The “action agenda” of global initiatives and commitments that Azerbaijan plans to present in Baku in November includes a six-fold increase in battery storage capacity, significant expansions of electricity networks and reductions in methane emissions from organic waste. It also includes a call for action plans for tourism and water.

But it did not cover plans to end the use of fossil fuels in energy systems, which was set out in last year’s landmark pact in Dubai, where nearly 200 countries struck an agreement, then described by UN leadership as “the beginning of the end of fossil fuel. era”. Burning fossil fuels is the biggest contributor to climate change.

The President-designate for COP29, Mukhtar Babayev, is Azerbaijan’s Minister of Ecology and a former vice-president of the state oil and gas company Socar.

In his letter on Tuesday to states and other organizations due to attend the summit, Babayev cited a warning by the 12th-century Persian poet Nizami Ganjavi that “humanity will self-destruct” if “harmony and consent” do not reign among people and nature.

He also referred to climate challenges facing Azeris at home, such as extreme heat and water shortages where the Caspian Sea has shrunk, as well as the country’s “abundant” wind and solar potential.

He proposed that countries adopt targets to reduce the production of methane as a by-product of waste and food systems. Waste is only the third most widespread source of man-made methane, after energy and agriculture, according to the UN.

He avoided suggesting that Azerbaijan should reassess the dominant role in its own economy of oil and gas exports, which he said allow it to help meet Europe’s energy demands.

The meeting in Baku in November is expected to be the second annual climate summit in a row to take place against the backdrop of the war in Gaza and Ukraine.

Babayev said the summit could be an opportunity for a “COP Armistice”, seven days before until seven days after the summit. This is modeled on efforts to urge a suspension of hostilities during the Olympics and could raise awareness of the need to find collective solutions to protect vulnerable people, he added.

Britain’s foreign secretary, David Lammy, also plans to link climate change to geopolitical risks in a speech on Tuesday morning. Heated temperatures and the greater risk of natural disaster are “more fundamental” than those represented by terrorists, he will say, according to the prepared observations.

COP29 will take place just days after the US election, which could see former President Trump push for the world’s biggest economy and second biggest polluter to pull out of the Paris Agreement again on climate change and block climate action.

One of the thorniest issues that diplomats and negotiators will tackle is how to channel finance from richer nations so that the poorest on the front lines of climate change can adapt.

Azerbaijan is to announce its own contributions to a new Climate Finance Action Fund with a target of $1 billion, capitalized by fossil fuel producing countries and companies, which will make voluntary payments linked to the volume of oil, gas and coal which I produce.

Climate Capital

Where climate change meets business, markets and politics. Explore the FT’s coverage here.

Curious about FT’s environmental sustainability commitments? Learn more about our science-based goals here