COP 28: Admitting that we will need fossil fuels for a long time

[dan_s]

MY OPINION: The Paris Climate Accord is a worthless document unless China and India agree to abide by it. All it is a tranfer of wealth from the West to the East.
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Bloomberg 12/12/2023
Oil-producing countries are apparently succeeding in their attempts to
eliminate language from an international climate agreement that calls for
countries to phase out the use of fossil fuels. Draft forms of the agreement
had included text that called upon the countries that are part of the Paris
Agreement to work toward "an orderly and just phase out of fossil fuels."
Reports now indicate that this text has gone missing from the latest versions
of the draft.

The agreement is being negotiated at the United Nations' COP28 climate change
conference, taking place in the United Arab Emirates. The COP, or Conference
of the Parties, meetings are annual events that attempt to bring together UN
members to discuss ways to deal with climate change. They were central to the
negotiations that brought about the Paris Agreement, which calls for
participants to develop plans that should bring the world to net-zero
emissions by the middle of the century.

Initial plans submitted by countries would lower the world's greenhouse gas
emissions, but not by nearly enough to reach net zero. However, the agreement
included mechanisms by which countries would continue to evaluate their
progress and submit more stringent goals. So, additional COP meetings have
included what's termed a "stocktake" to evaluate where countries stand, and
statements are issued to encourage and direct future actions.

The language of that statement needs to be agreed upon by every party and is
invariably contentious. This year's statement has been especially difficult,
as early drafts (such as this one) included the potential to call for parties
to stop using fossil fuels, along with a separate, vague alternative:

Option 1: An orderly and just phase out of fossil fuels;
Option 2: Accelerating efforts toward phasing out unabated fossil fuels and
to rapidly reducing their use so as to achieve net zero CO[2] in energy
systems by or around mid-century;
Option 3: No text.

The "unabated" language in the alternative is widely interpreted as referring
to abatement via the use of large-scale carbon capture to offset the emissions
from continued fossil fuel use.

While we know that carbon capture can work, it has not been tried at large
scales, much less on anything close to the scales needed to offset continued
fossil fuel use. Critical details like the capacity and stability of different
storage options haven't been worked out, nor has the very tricky question of
who will be paying to operate all the infrastructure that would be required
for it to work.

As a result, carbon capture is not generally considered a viable option for
offsetting anything more than a few difficult-to-decarbonize use cases, such
as international shipping. Which why most countries and NGOs are supporting
the UN's secretary-general, who promoted the alternate language calling for a
phase-out of fossil fuels.

Most, but not all. One notable NGO, OPEC, directly called on its members to
reject any language that targeted fossil fuels. And a prominent OPEC member,
Saudia Arabia, appears to have been trying to block any deals that would
include that language, in part by bogging down all negotiations at COP28.
Matters weren't helped when a video surfaced that showed the conference's
host, Sultan Al Jaber, saying that there was "no science" behind calls to
phase out fossil fuels, although he quickly disavowed that position.

The loss of Option 1 from the latest drafts is a sign that oil-producing
nations have succeeded. Which in turn indicates that they have no intention of
slowing production even as indications of continued warming and its
consequences have grown ever more dramatic. It will also provide cover for
many other countries that may be looking for excuses to act.

That said, the same draft includes several actions that do not have any
alternative language and call for countries to take significant actions:

* Triple renewable energy capacity by 2030.
* Double the annual rate of energy efficiency improvements.
* Immediately stop issuing permits for coal plants that do not include
carbon capture and rapidly phase out any existing plants of this sort.
* Rapidly phase in zero-emissions vehicles.
* Eliminate fossil fuel subsidies.

Negotiations are ongoing, and that draft is nearly a week old, but it may
indicate that some positive things could be accomplished while everyone is
distracted by arguments over the phase-out of fossil fuels.

Dec/12/2023 13:01 GMT