Dubai: Nearly 200 countries at the Cop28 climate summit have failed to reach an agreement to include an explicit commitment to phase out or even phase down fossil fuels.
Instead, the final agreement reached a compromise that called on countries to contribute to global efforts to transition “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”.
Despite a heavily toned down agreement, Cop28 president, Sultan Al Jaber, received an ovation from delegates and a hug from the UN climate chief, Simon Stiell.
Al Jaber argued that the deal, reached in the hottest year on record, was a comprehensive response to a global stocktake that found countries were failing to live up to the goals of the landmark Paris climate agreement, particularly a commitment to try to limit global heating to 1.5C (2.7F) above preindustrial levels.
“We have delivered a robust action plan to keep 1.5C in reach,” he said. “It is an enhanced, balanced, but make no mistake, a historic package to accelerate climate action. It is the UAE consensus. We have language on fossil fuel in our final agreement for the first time ever.”
Countries from the global south and climate justice advocates said the text fell short of what was needed on emissions reductions and finance to help the most vulnerable cope with worsening extreme weather and heat, and included language that appeared to placate fossil fuel interests.
There was confusion in the plenary hall shortly after the agreement was passed as many parties had assumed there would be a debate over the text. The Alliance of Small Island States, representing 39 countries, said it had not been in the room when the deal was adopted as it was still coordinating its response.
Its lead negotiator, Anne Rasmussen, from Samoa, did not formally object to the agreement and believed the deal had good elements, but said the “the process has failed us” and the text included a “litany of loopholes”. “We have made an incremental advancement over business as usual when what we really needed is an exponential step change in our actions and support,” she said. Her speech was met with a standing ovation.
Most praise for the deal focused on the call to transition away from coal, oil and gas. Prof Johan Rockström, of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, said: “No, the Cop28 agreement will not enable the world to hold the 1.5C limit, but yes, the result is a pivotal landmark. This agreement delivers on making it clear to all financial institutions, businesses and societies that we are now finally – eight years behind the Paris schedule – at the true ‘beginning of the end’ of the fossil fuel-driven world economy.”
