2023-11-30 03:40:00
– Monarchs, carbon and dollars: an extraordinary COP28 begins
The 28th United Nations conference on climate change opens this Thursday in Dubai. The Emirates and the UN are hoping for a COP as historic as that of Paris in 2015.
Published today at 04:40 Updated 29 minutes ago
In Dubai on November 29, 2023.
AFP
The Emirates saw the big picture: the small oil country in the Gulf spent lavishly to host the 28th United Nations conference on climate change from Thursday, supposed to encourage countries to move up a gear on the energy transition.
At the edge of the desert, in Dubai, the site of the 2020 Universal Expo becomes for two weeks the beating heart of climate diplomacy, with the Emirates and the UN hoping for a COP as historic as that of Paris in 2015. is the most important COP since Paris,” UN Climate chief Simon Stiell said on Wednesday. “We are moving forward today with small steps, while we are expecting giant steps.”
This is the second time a Gulf country has hosted a COP, after Qatar in 2012. UN Climate conferences typically change continents each year; two years ago, Asia Pacific countries nominated the Emirates for this COP.
Conflicts of interest?
But COP28 president Sultan Al Jaber, also chief executive of national oil company Adnoc, is under fire after the BBC and the Center for Climate Reporting published internal notes preparing for official meetings listing arguments for the promotion of Adnoc projects abroad. “I have never, ever seen these elements of language,” he defended himself on Wednesday.
If personalities and NGOs cry foul, a boycott of COP28 is not on the agenda, as the stakes are dizzying and obvious at the end of a year of overheating weather.
More than 97,000 people (delegations, media, NGOs, lobbies, organizers, technicians, etc.) are accredited, twice as many as last year, and around 180 heads of state and government are expected here according to the organizers December 12, theoretical end of the conference.
Charles, Israel and Palestinians
Pope Francis, suffering from the flu, has canceled his visit, but more than 140 leaders will parade to the podium Friday and Saturday, after the opening ceremonial day on Thursday, for speeches lasting a few minutes intended to give political impetus to the Byzantine negotiations which will occupy the delegations for two weeks. King Charles III will speak on Friday at the opening of this summit of leaders, without Joe Biden, replaced by his vice-president Kamala Harris, nor Xi Jinping.
While every evening since last Friday, Israeli hostages have been released by Hamas and Palestinian detainees released by Israel, Israeli President Isaac Herzog and the head of the Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas could cross paths because they are registered to meet. express within minutes of each other on Friday.
The Emiratis are preparing for this inaugural weekend a deluge of voluntary commitments from States to, for example, triple renewables by 2030 or boost financial aid from rich countries to the most vulnerable. The red carpet has also been rolled out for companies, which will increase the number of announcements.
But only the official texts adopted during the COP, in the meticulous UN process where consensus is obligatory, will have a force comparable to what the Paris agreement was. A fiasco cannot be ruled out, as resistance to talking explicitly about fossil fuels is strong among certain producing countries. “You judge the tree by the fruit,” said John Kerry, the American climate envoy, on Wednesday, when asked about the chances of success of COP28.
Useless COPs?
The question is legitimate, since since COP21 and the Paris agreement, greenhouse gas emissions have continued to increase. But while at the time we were counting on a 16% increase by 2030, the UN Environment has now reduced the increase to 2%.
This slowdown is not attributable to the text alone but the energy transition is undeniably underway, although still placing the world on an unsustainable warming trajectory.
Since 2015, around a hundred countries have committed to carbon neutrality, solar has become the cheapest energy to generate electricity, the peak in demand for fossil fuels is in sight this decade and the International Agency energy expects that more than a third of new cars in the world will be electric in 2030, a scenario unthinkable before 2015.
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