Cop28 live: draft text receives mixed reactions after calling for ‘transition away’ from fossil fuels
Asked to grade the new text, if the previous draft was an F, the analysts/campaigners ranged from B to C, writes Nina Lakhani.
Catherine Abreu, founder and Executive Director of Destination Zero, said:
“The text does give a clear signal on the need to transition away from fossil fuels in a just and equitable manner, and calls on parties to begin doing that. In this critical decade, that being said, it does not yet represent the highest level of ambition outcome that we were looking forward to here at.
“The text does give some indication of the level of finance required to enable the energy transition, it also gives some acknowledgement of the fact that countries will be moving in this energy transition at different paces. However, it does not yet give us a clear enough sense of who needs to be taking the lead in the energy transition, and that is the developed countries particularly those that are legacy fossil fuel producers. And it should be clearer on who provides the necessary finance for the energy transition, and again that money needs to be coming from developed countries.”
Some are very critical of what they see as the influence of lobbyists on the process. We have reported on this extensively – the record number of fossil fuel lobbyists at Cop28, as well as those from the big meat and diary and the carbon capture industries, and the billionaires present who made their fortunes from polluting industries.
Rachel Rose Jackson, director of climate research and policy at Corporate Accountability, who has done research into lobbying, said:
“A Cop flooded by more than 2,400 fossil fuel lobbyists and overseen by a fossil fuel executive delivered a text that might contain some key words, but on closer inspection is littered with their polluting rubbish, false solutions, and dangerous distractions that guarantee the continuation of the fossil fuel era. The United States, UK, EU, Norway, and others self-proclaim themselves climate ‘champions’, but yet again are twisting the outcomes of these talks so they don’t have to wean themselves off their fossil fuel addiction. They have bullied and blocked efforts to deliver the public finance, technology, and capacity we need to actually be able to deliver a just fossil fuel phaseout, and are yet again orchestrating their great escape from having to do their fair share by ripping equity out of the text.”
First takes from non-profit analysts are coming in, writes Nina Lakhani, and the overall consensus is that the new global stocktake draft text is a significant improvement on the last, especially the shift from “should” to “calls on” – but still not as strong as had been hoped a few days ago. There is too much emphasis on unproven technological fixes – which one analyst calls “false solutions” - such as carbon capture and hydrogen, which climate scientists have long said can only ever play a niche role in cutting greenhouse gasses.
“Overall we get a clear signal to phase out fossil fuels… It is not the most ambitious outcome that we could have landed at this Cop given the momentum from over a hundred countries demanding strong language on this, but it’s a step forward,” said Amos Wemanya, senior advisor, Renewable Energy and Just Transitions. “But we still have a lot of false solutions in the text.”
Caroline Brouillette, Executive Director of Climate Action Network, said:
“This text truly represents the paradox that is Cop28. On the one hand we’ve seen the most visible ever capture of the process by oil and gas lobbyists, and on the other hand, you’ve seen a record momentum to finally tackle the root cause.
We see in the text the need to transition away from fossil fuels, which is a significant improvement from the last text, on the other hand, opening the door to not only dangerous technological distractions like blue hydrogen, nuclear, but the reference to traditional fuels being acceptable, which is a myth, being promoted by the LNG industry and is not grounded in science.”
On the draft Global Goal on Adaptation outcome, which developing countries including the African groups have been pushing on for eight years, Brouillette said: “The global goal on adaptation text is still a hollow commitment, as there’s no means of implementation attached to the targets. One perhaps positive small step forward is that the reference to Article 2.1C [linking adaptation to private finance] has been removed.”
Members of the media wait for reaction to the new text at Cop28. Photograph: Peter Dejong/AP
Our reporters are up early in the UAE. Here’s the first dispatch from Patrick Greenfield.
Good morning from Dubai where, after a very long wait, the second text is finally with us. The crucial language on fossil fuels has been changed from the previous version after uproar from island states, the EU, NGOs and many others. It now reads:
“Transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems, in a just orderly and equitable manner, accelerating action in this critical decade, so as to achieve net zero by 2050 in keeping with the science.”
I am back on site at Cop28, where it is still very quiet. The sun is rising over the giant dome in the middle of the Expo Centre and returning delegates are being greeted with news that coffee shops are open in some areas. This is good news: today could be a long one.
Some people have spent the night here waiting for news about the text, sleeping in the corridors and pavilions of the giant convention centre. The last few days have been exhausting for negotiators in particular and, I am sure, the UAE presidency, who is tasked with bringing the opinions of the world together for the final text package.
Delegations will be digesting the documents ahead of a final plenary in the next few hours. Will this be enough for small islands states fighting for their survival, for whom 1.5C is a matter of life and death, or will they reject it? Can petrostates accept this indication that the fossil fuel era is ending? Are developing countries happy with the text on adapting to a new economic system? We will find out today.
We do not yet know if this is a final text, a “take it or leave it” offer to the world, or whether another round of negotiations will be needed. These talks famously drag on. The negotiation venue will be closed on Friday, we have been told, so parties need to get moving.
Hello, and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of what it is hoped will be the final stretch of the Cop28 climate conference. After the UAE presidency’s first text of the global stocktake – the main document being discussed at the summit – was widely condemned as not being ambitious enough, a second draft has now been published.
The proposed agreement calls on nations to transition away from fossil fuels to avert the worst impacts of climate change, writes my colleague Adam Morton.
The latest draft text, released early on Wednesday in the United Arab Emirates, does not include a commitment to phase out or phase down fossil fuels, as many countries, civil society groups and scientists have urged.
Instead, it called on countries to contribute to global efforts to transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems “in a just, orderly and equitable manner, accelerating action in this critical decade, so as to achieve net zero by 2050 in keeping with the science”.
