As another year of record emissions draws to an end, it’s worth looking back on what’s been achieved.
Like every year, the quick answer is more than nothing but less than enough. To dissect that in more detail, here are our six takeaways from the year in climate.
1. Oil and gas felt the heat
Phasing out or down fossil fuels? Abated or unabated? Scaling up renewables, carbon capture and storage (CCS) and techno solutions. Energy dilemmas, and their buzzwords animated international talks in 2023.
The headline breakthrough came at the end. The Cop28 agreement included for the first time a goal to move away from all fossil fuels in energy systems.
It was the centrepiece of a bigger package that included a call for the tripling of renewables and doubling energy efficiency by 2030.
But it also gave a platform to “transitional fuels” (read gas) and CCS, which some politicians and campaigners regard as “dangerous loopholes” for continued fossil fuel use.
Cop hosts the UAE and most developed countries welcomed the deal as “historic”. For small island states and other vulnerable nations it did not go far enough.
Like most Cop agreements, it was the result of a hard-won compromise struck in overtime – after Saudi-led opposition threatened to leave oil and gas out of the text altogether.
Cop28 president Sultan Al Jaber applauds in the closing plenary (Photo: Flickr/Cop28/Christopher Pike)
The road to Dubai had been equally bumpy. The G7 saw fights over gas and coal with hosts Japan attempting to push controversial strategies like ammonia co-firing.
The G20 in Delhi offered a dress rehearsal of what was to expect at Cop with broad agreement over renewables and bitter disputes over fossil fuels.
In the background, Sultan Al Jaber, oil executive turned Cop president, garnered constant curiosity and scrutiny. He was initially adamant that the focus should be on emissions and not on the fuels themselves, raising more than an eyebrow. But, amid a series of controversies and apparent slip-ups, his position gradually shifted.
Al Jaber contended the Dubai deal would be enough to keep the 1.5C goal in sight. A day later he told the Guardian that Adnoc, the oil firm he runs, would press ahead with a massive oil and gas expansion.
Other rich nations, like the US, keep him company on that front. Such chasms between words and actions will continue to be closely watched.
2. Slow progress on climate cash
The other side of the coin from the fossil fuels debate is finance. When rich countries ask their developing counterparts to sign on to ambitious energy transition plans, many reply: ‘who is going to be paying for that?’
When governments wrangled over targets for adapting to climate change, similar questions were asked.
A clear answer was never forthcoming. We might get more clarity in 2024, with governments set to discuss, and hopefully agree on, a new collective goal at Cop29 in Baku in November.
But a lack of trust has taken root. Rich countries have so far not respected the previous commitment to provide $100 billion a year in climate finance to vulnerable countries.
That was “likely” met in 2022, two years after the original deadline, according to the OECD. We will be looking out for the receipts for confirmation.
Countries were also invited to refill the coffers of the Green Climate Fund. The four-yearly replenishment round got off to a decent start, but an underwhelming pledging summit in October put ambition at risk.
Then the US landed in Dubai in December with a $3 billion funding promise. It brought total pledges to $12.8 billion – setting the GCF on course for a “middling” level of ambition.
But that comes with a gigantic caveat. To deliver the dollars, the Biden administration will have to persuade Republicans in Congress or take control of it by winning elections. Both are tall orders.
Graphic: Joe Thwaites/NRDC
Money talked outside UN diplomacy too. Lots of attention centred on the much-touted reforms of multilateral development banks inspired by the Bridgetown Agenda.
Progress has been slower than many were hoping for. The World Bank lowered its equity-to-loan ratio, freeing up $4 billion a year.
It also installed a new more climate-aware president, officially changed its mission statement and promised pauses in debt repayments for disaster-hit countries. Encouraging steps, but far short of the trillions of dollars developing countries have been calling for.
3.US-China climate talks thawed
Formal diplomatic relations between the world’s biggest polluters suffered an ice-age-like deep freeze in the latter part of 2022 after US Congressional leader Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan. Climate talks were collateral damage.
But 2023 saw a slow but steady thawing. It culminated in a momentous bilateral meeting held in Califonia’s Sunnylands resort a few weeks before Cop28.
The countries’ respective climate envoys, John Kerry and Xie Zhenhua, agreed to revive a climate working group and sketched out the outline of a potential alignment in the upcoming negotiations.
It proved decisive. In particular, their joint support to “accelerate the substitution for coal, oil and gas generation” helped find the right formula to unstick the thorny energy language in Dubai.
U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry shakes hands with his Chinese counterpart Xie Zhenhua before a meeting in Beijing, China July 17, 2023. (Reuters/Valerie Volcovici/ File Photo)
The special personal relationship between Kerry and Xie was a big factor in these improved relations.
When formal diplomacy was on hold, the two kept talking. Xie even brought his grandson to Dubai because the 8-year-old wanted to say “happy birthday to my good friend Mr. Kerry”, who turned 80 during the summit.
But Cop28 was most likely their last hurrah together. Xie is set to retire soon ending a 16-years on-and-off stint. He is likely to be replaced by Liu Zhenmin, a former vice foreign minister.
Kerry has been vague about his future with US elections looming large on the horizon. He recently told Reuters that he would “continue as long as God gives me the breath and work on it [climate] one way or the other”.
4. Carbon credits terrible year
To say 2023 won’t be remembered as carbon credits’ finest year is an understatement. It began with a now-infamous report pouring cold water on forestry-based offsets and ended with talks over Article 6 falling apart spectacularly in Dubai.
In between, scandal after scandal dented the reputation of carbon markets. From the collapse of the world’s second largest project to the suspension of dozens of schemes over exaggerated claims or alleged human rights violations. The blowback prompted even some of the most enthusiastic corporate credits buyers to cool on the idea.
Co-chairs of negotiations at Cop28 on carbon trading rules
(Photo: Flickr/Cop28/Kiara Worth)
Many carbon market supporters had pinned hopes on Cop28 for a spot of good news. Ahead of the talks, it looked like governments could finally fire the starting gun on the creation of a long-awaited global carbon market under the Paris Agreement.
But those hopes were misplaced. Negotiations ended without an outcome following a bitter disagreement over integrity rules between the US and the EU.
Leaping on the string of failures, some critics have been pushing for the whole concept of carbon offsetting to be chucked into the dustbin of history.
But others claim carbon markets provide an essential source of finance for developing nations, love it or loathe it. They are trying to build them back up from the nadir with more stringent climate provisions and better social safeguards.
5. Coal-to-clean deals reality check
As promises turned into proper plans, Just energy transition partnerships (Jetp) hit the cold wall of reality in 2023. The three initial deals – with South Africa, Indonesia and Vietnam – have all been beset by issues.
The type of money put on the table by rich nations has been a source of common grievance. Grants make up a very small percentage of the funding packages, fuelling fears over debt. As a result, recipient countries revised climate targets downwards.
The energy transition deal aims to wean Indonesia off coal, which now takes up nearly half of the country’s electricity mix. Photo: Kemal Jufri / Greenpeace
Indonesia has watered down coal retirement plans. It now aims to start shutting down on-grid plants before their scheduled closure no earlier than 2035 – five years later than originally planned.
So-called captive plants, that power specific industries, have also caused a massive headache. Wrong assumptions meant a much lower number of them were baked in the original modelling. Struggling to find a way out, the Indonesian government has so far excluded them – and their emissions – wholesale from the Jetp blueprint.
Vietnam’s investment plan, unveiled during Cop28, has no timeline at all for retiring coal. It expects instead to operate plants “flexibly” and to rely on the controversial co-firing of biomass and ammonia with coal.
The authoritarian Vietnamese government has also all but buried the ‘just’ aspect of the partnership. It has jailed five environmentalists on tax evasion charges, which human rights groups say are trumped-up accusations.
Vietnamese campaigner Hoang Thi Minh Hong was sentenced to three years in prison. Photo: CHANGE/350Vietnam
In South Africa, the transition is meant to be reasonably easier as its Apartheid-era coal plants are nearing retirement. But crippling blackouts prompted President Cyril Ramaphosa to say the timetable “must be relooked at” earlier this year.
The plan is also facing fierce opposition from the powerful coal lobby. Our investigation with Oxpeckers discovered the sector partnered with politicians and even managed to water down or delay key policies in a bid to sink the scheme.
6. Loss and damage fund’s good start
As the Cop27 president gavelled the landmark decision on a loss and damage fund in Sharm-el-Sheik, a question loomed large: will countries manage to agree on how it should work within the following 12 months?
‘Yes, definitely’ was the answer.
Governments adopted the decision on operationalising the fund on the very first day of Cop28. It gave the summit’s president Al Jaber an early win and prevented loss and damage from being used as a bargaining chip in the ensuing negotiations.
The success is down to the painstaking work of a 24-member transitional committee that hashed out the details over five gruelling meetings. At the outset, developed and developing countries were at odds on just about everything: who should benefit from the fund, who is expected to pay into it, where it’s meant to be hosted.
Distances gradually narrowed and a compromise deal was eventually struck a month before the climate summit. The World Bank will initially host the fund for four years, despite strong resistance to its involvement from developing nations.
Campaigners at Cop27 call for a loss and damage fund to be set up (Photo credit: Kiara Worth/UNFCCC)
All developing countries “particularly vulnerable” to the effects of climate change will be eligible to benefit from the mechanism. However, the definition of vulnerability – one of the thorniest issues – has not yet been defined.
The decision “urges” developed countries to provide financial resources to the fund, while other nations are only “encouraged” to do so “on a voluntary basis”. Rich nations have been strongly pushing to broaden the donor pool and will likely keep up their efforts.
Pledges from a slew of countries should inject over $700 million for the start-up of the fund. The UAE won plaudits by committing $100 million. The US was lambasted for offering a paltry $17.5m, despite being the world’s largest economy and biggest historical emitter.
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Stientje van Veldhoven is Minister of Climate and Green Growth for the Netherlands.
When we co-hosted the first-ever conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels (TAFF) this April, the world was reeling from the volatility in oil and gas prices due to the Hormuz blockade. Fossil fuels moved to the centre of the debate as country leaders scrambled to secure supplies for their people.
We saw the very opposite in Santa Marta. Nearly 60 nations came together with 2,600-plus participants from civil society and community organisations, businesses and scientists to discuss concrete solutions on how governments can shift away from fossil fuels. Together, we defined the ‘Santa Marta process’ to serve as an extra engine for the broader process of the UNFCCC.
The Santa Marta process will see expert groups and committed countries develop national roadmaps, chart pathways to overcome financial constraints, and drive economic transformation. We made a multi-year commitment to take this process forward. With Tuvalu and Ireland taking over as co-chairs for 2027, transitioning away from fossil fuels is now moving from words to action.
European nations signal support for fossil fuel roadmap, says COP30 president
Work gets underway
At the opening of the Santa Marta conference, my co-chair Colombia’s then energy minister Irene Veléz Torres and I repeatedly stressed one thing: that the forum was not a space for negotiations, but a forum for countries and other partners to discuss practical steps to move away from fossil fuels.
Since then, we have seen three roadmaps already submitted: by France, Germany and our own. Pacific Island ministers also recently announced their intention to develop a regional roadmap to transition away from fossil fuels. And I called on the European Commission to do the same for the European Union.
On top of this, numerous countries are already working on parts of the transition, such as phasing out coal or ending fossil fuel subsidies. More countries are expected to follow soon.
Workstreams were launched in early August, followed by sign-ups from countries willing to take a larger role and lead on organising different activities. Each workstream has an assigned lead organisation (or madrina). Each has its own working structure.
When the oil companies leave, who pays?
Across the world, communities facing the decline of fossil fuel industries are demanding a Just Transition that gives them a say in what comes next. Establishing a strong mechanism at COP31 could help them secure itCOP31 Bulletin Day 1: Agenda settled as COP urged to “supercharge solutions”
An agenda row is averted at the opening session, where the UN climate chief said strong results are needed from the talks to boost “real-world outcomes”
Workstream 1 focuses on supporting countries in developing and implementing flexible, country-owned national roadmaps. It operates as an open, collaborative hub that coordinates partner institutions to provide tailored technical, financial and policy support directly aligned with each country’s specific needs and existing frameworks. The consortium, which functions as a hub, currently consists of the NDC Partnership, the Powering Past Coal Alliance, the World Resources Institute and the newly established Science Panel on the Global Energy Transition.
Workstream 2 focuses on mobilising collective coalition power to tackle national and international financial constraints, debt-related barriers and macroeconomic dependencies that hinder the transition away from fossil fuels. Starting with a scoping phase, it will deliver transparent, actionable recommendations and reform solutions to support countries’ structural fiscal needs at global fora. Its madrinas are the International Institute for Sustainable Development and Transforma, a Latin American think-and-do-tank.
Workstream 3 focuses on driving economic transformation by mapping green partnership potential, decarbonising trade balances and building competitive, mutually beneficial clean markets. It aims to help countries, especially producers, diversify their economies, scale domestic value creation, and unlock collective trade opportunities. The madrina is the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development working together with the South Centre.
Incorporating Santa Marta into COP
What was abundantly clear in Santa Marta is that our coalition’s efforts are a strong support to, rather than a replacement for, the COP process. Over the past decade or so, the focus at COPs was on setting goals. Now we must focus on implementation. The COP31 presidencies have previously indicated their willingness to incorporate elements of the Santa Marta process into COP31 outcomes. We look forward to seeing how we can achieve this together.
The Brazilian COP30 Presidency delivered its global roadmap on the transition away from fossil fuels – a voluntary toolkit for countries that want to move ahead – just before the COP started in Antalya on Monday. During the coming two weeks, it’s critical that we see more concrete, actionable roadmaps for the fossil fuel phase-out. These documents can be crucial for a strong second Global Stocktake of national climate plans in two years’ time.
Brazil’s fossil fuel roadmap sketches out first global timetable
At COP31, a variety of TAFF-related events will be hosted, focusing on next steps within the Santa Marta workstreams. We welcome any leader and expert from around the world to take part as they work to develop their roadmaps, identify the fossil fuel subsidies they need to phase out, or establish green/clean markets at home.
Only by reducing fossil fuel demand and replacing it with clean electricity to run our economies can we all become more economically resilient and sharply cut the pace of climate change.
The post COP31 outcome needs to prioritise transition away from fossil fuels appeared first on Climate Home News.
COP31 outcome needs to prioritise transition away from fossil fuels
An older teaching about land acknowledgement
As I have come to understand the spirit and intention of land acknowledgement, I often return to fond memories of my grandmother and her words of wisdom. She taught that the health of the places we call home comes first, because the wellbeing of the people depends on it.
In her teaching, land acknowledgement began with the land. Long before it became a paragraph read at the start of a meeting, it was a way of recognizing a homeland: its waters, its species, its seasons, and the spirit that revealed whether the place was well.
Her teaching echoes a practice found across many Indigenous Nations. Haudenosaunee gatherings, for example, have long opened with the Ohén:ton Karihwatéhkwen, the Thanksgiving Address, often translated as “the words that come before all else.” The speaker greets and gives thanks to the people, the earth, the waters, the plants, the animals, the winds, the sun, the moon and the stars. Only after everything that sustains life has been acknowledged does the gathering turn to its own business.
That order changes what an acknowledgement is for. Its purpose was to share the story of a place with neighbours and to draw them into the work of tending it. People entered the story second, as the ones responsible for what had just been named.
Understood this way, an acknowledgement does more than open a meeting. It asks us to reconsider where we stand, and what we owe the ground beneath us.
Nations among nations
In her teaching, people are one nation among many. The salmon are a nation. So are the cedars, the bison, the medicine plants, and the pollinators. Each belongs to a place, carries its own responsibilities, and offers gifts no other nation can give.
This idea of kinship runs through many Indigenous philosophies. The phrase “all my relations,” heard in ceremonies and gatherings across Turtle Island, is a reminder that family extends beyond people to the animals, plants, waters and lands that make life possible. Some Indigenous languages carry the same understanding in their grammar, speaking of many plants, animals and natural forces as living beings rather than objects.
Sovereignty, understood through this relationship, is a kind of standing more than a form of control. Each nation belongs fully to its place and carries its share of that place’s life. No nation thrives alone, and none thrives by taking over the whole.
The land is also the source of instruction. Over generations, people watched how a river valley or a stretch of prairie kept itself well: who arrived when, who fed whom, and how much could be taken before the giving stopped. In my grandmother’s telling, those observations became instructions, and those instructions helped shape law and protocol. They guided when to harvest, where to camp, how to enter a neighbour’s territory, and what was owed in return.
Indigenous legal scholars today often describe this as law that comes from the land itself, learned by watching how living systems sustain one another. A plainer name for it is knowing how to live somewhere.
The host and the guest
One of the clearest teachings in this understanding of the world is the relationship between host and guest. My grandmother invited us to recognize that relationship in the lives of plants and animals.
A host prepares the place before anyone arrives. A beaver family dams a stream, and the pond becomes a home for fish, frogs, birds and plants. A fallen tree becomes a nurse log, feeding the next generation of seedlings as it returns to the soil.
A host offers first. A flowering plant sets out nectar. A berry bush ripens fruit. These provisions come in their own season, not whenever a visitor happens to want them.
A host also makes its presence known. Birdsong, scent and the marks left along a trail tell newcomers that a place is already inhabited. The visitor does not arrive in an empty world.
The guest has responsibilities too. A guest attends to the season and to what the place can offer. A guest does not assume that everything within reach is theirs to take. A guest leaves something that helps sustain the relationship.
A bee takes nectar and carries pollen. Read through this teaching, that exchange offers an image of visiting well: receiving a gift while helping the host continue its life.
Many Indigenous harvesting protocols carry the same ethic into daily practice: ask before taking, take only what is needed, offer thanks, and leave enough for others and for the plant or animal to recover.
None of this suggests that every relationship in nature is peaceful or generous. These are ways of seeing responsibilities that people can learn to carry.
Everyone is both
No being is only a host or only a guest.
A tree makes room for other life while depending on soil, water, sunlight, fungi, and relationships beyond itself. People, too, may welcome others into their homes while remaining dependent on the larger homeland that sustains them.
The distinction between host and guest is therefore about roles, not ranks. Everyone receives. Everyone has something to give.
The question is whether the exchange sustains the place.
A visitor who takes without restraint leaves less for those who come next. A host who neglects the place has less to offer. Both have responsibilities, and neither can fulfil them alone.
This is the heart of reciprocity, a principle found across Indigenous philosophies: relationships stay healthy when gifts move in both directions. The Haudenosaunee teaching of the seventh generation extends that exchange across time, asking that decisions made today leave the place well for those not yet born.
Mutual benefit begins here, with the recognition that different beings carry different gifts and obligations.
What people carry forward
My grandmother’s teaching connects these relationships to the ways people meet their neighbours.
The host prepares a place, offers food and rest, and explains where the visitor has arrived. The guest makes themselves known, explains why they have come, listens to the terms of the visit, and brings something in return. The gift may be material. It may also be labour, knowledge, news, or a commitment to help.
Nations around the Great Lakes carried this ethic into treaty. The Dish with One Spoon, an agreement among the Haudenosaunee, Anishinaabe and allied Nations, describes shared hunting grounds as a single dish. Everyone eats from it with one spoon, takes only what they need, leaves enough for others, and keeps the dish clean. The Two Row Wampum, between the Haudenosaunee and European newcomers, shows two vessels travelling side by side on the same river, each keeping its own ways and neither steering the other.
In this understanding, acknowledgement is more than naming the people associated with a territory. It is learning enough about a homeland to behave responsibly within it.
Whose home is this? What sustains it? What laws and agreements guide our presence? What can we receive, and what must we return?
These questions make acknowledgement a relationship rather than a recital.
They also make it diplomatic. A guest who recognizes the host’s homeland recognizes that they have entered a place with its own relationships and responsibi