COP28's smooth start could lead to tougher talks
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Illustration: Maura Losch/Axios
The first several days of the COP28 climate summit in Dubai have gone relatively smoothly, with a deal on providing aid to developing countries to better withstand climate change impacts, along with a blitz of side agreements.
Yes, but: The tasks that lie ahead could prove far harder to resolve.
Zoom in: On Monday, a draft of the so-called "Global Stocktake" is expected to be circulated. This would respond to scientific studies showing the world is still careening toward potentially catastrophic levels of warming, well above the Paris goals.
- How the COP presidency's draft text incorporates the countries' views on contentious issues such as phasing out fossil fuel use will help determine how difficult the rest of the talks turn out to be.
The intrigue: A Nov. 21 video published Sunday by The Guardian could embolden the nations in favor of a fossil fuel phaseout to push for such language in a Dubai agreement.
- In the video, COP president Sultan Ahmed al-Jaber, who also chairs the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), squares off with Mary Robinson, a longtime climate activist and the former president of Ireland.
- Jaber asserts that "there is no science out there or no scenario out there that says that the phase-out of fossil fuel is what's going to achieve 1.5 degrees," referring to the more stringent of the Paris temperature targets.
Context: The most recent assessments from the UN's own climate science panel clearly say that cutting emissions steeply by 2030, reaching net zero by 2050, is required to have a chance at limiting warming to 1.5 degrees.
- That would entail drastically reducing fossil fuel use and deploying nascent emissions-capturing technologies but would not necessarily be a complete phaseout.
