OPEC members keep climate accords from acknowledging reality

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 CO₂ 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.