Shortly before the end of the World Climate Conference in Dubai, the EU and dozens of other countries want to make far-reaching improvements to the planned final text. The draft of the host countries from the United Arab Emirates on Monday is seen as disappointing by many countries. The Austrian Minister of the Environment also called for improvements and does not want to hear any more excuses.
Representatives of environmental organizations expressed some shock and outrage. The background is that the phasing out of coal, oil and gas demanded by more than a hundred countries no longer appears in the text – unlike previous versions.
The most important information about the final of the climate summit:
“The design presented does not do justice to the seriousness of the situation. “Fossil fuels as a cause of the climate crisis are being explicitly mentioned for the first time – but unfortunately the numerous mitigations surrounding them clearly outweigh them,” said Austrian Environment Minister Leonore Gewessler (Greens). Improvements are now being demanded, according to the department head. “We’ve heard enough excuses.”
The conference goes into extra time
According to the plan, the two-week negotiations between the almost two hundred governments were to end on Tuesday afternoon, but in the morning the fight over the final declaration made it clear that the conference would last longer. A number of countries have recently raised concerns about a decision to phase out fossil fuels, including oil-rich Saudi Arabia, as well as China, Iraq, India and Russia.
EU chief negotiator Wopke Hoekstra said the 1.5 degree target for maximum global warming above pre-industrial times, agreed in Paris in 2015, must be kept alive. “This is what science demands, and this is what our children deserve.” The negotiator for the Marshall Islands, which are threatened by rising sea levels, John Silk, said they had not come to Dubai “to sign our death warrant”.
Among other things, the text lacked concrete instruments to get on the 1.5 degree path and advance the necessary energy transition, especially in many regions of Africa, Asia and Latin America – which these states would have strongly requested in Dubai. And the passage about fossil energies wrongly suggests that coal, oil and gas can continue to play a decisive role in our future.
There are still many gaps to close
From the start, there was much criticism of the fact that conference chairman Sultan al Jaber is also the head of state oil company Adnoc and that around 1,400 lobbyists for coal, oil and gas were officially accredited. The sultan said that the time for discussions was now coming to an end, but also indicated in the evening that he expected improvements to the text. “There are still a lot of gaps we need to fill,” he says.
Greenpeace speaks of “serious setback”
From Greenpeace Austria’s point of view, the draft is a “serious setback” because the option for a clear phase-out of fossil fuels has now completely disappeared. “Only a weak concession remains to reduce fossil energy around 2050.” This is just one of many options that include nuclear power or pseudo-solutions such as carbon storage. “This is not the much-needed signal we need in the fight against the climate crisis,” criticized Jasmin Duregger, climate and energy expert at Greenpeace in Austria.
WWF Austria described the draft “Global Inventory” as disappointing because it needed an agreement to phase out all fossil energy sources.
Source: Krone
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