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Trade unionists and climate justice advocates seeking a fair deal for workers whose jobs will be affected by the transition away from planet-heating fossil fuels are placing their hopes in next year’s UN climate conference in Brazil following a disappointing outcome at COP29 in Azerbaijan last month.

From coal mines and oil refineries to car factories and construction, the global shift to cleaner sources of energy will alter the nature of employment, leading to job losses in some sectors and creation in others, opportunities and risks in clean technology supply chains, and new threats and benefits for the communities where the changes are happening.

In a bid to share the pain and gain more equally, governments at the 2022 COP27 climate summit in Egypt launched a “Just Transition Work Programme” (JTWP). But so far it has delivered little – and talks on how the programme should proceed in practice ended without agreement at COP29.

The Azerbaijan presidency running the talks instead focused on landing a new deal on climate finance for developing countries, and governments ended up delaying further discussions on the JWTP until the mid-year climate talks next June in Bonn and COP30 in Belém.

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Bert De Wel, global climate policy coordinator at the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), tagged this year’s Baku summit a “wasted COP” in terms of implementing the JTWP. He said just transition was not given the attention it deserves, noting that the interests of workers are often “kicked out or minimalised” at UN talks. “When there is reference to rights, they tend to leave out labour rights. We want to be mentioned too,” he added.

But others said no deal on just transition at COP29 was better than a bad deal.

Kenya’s Fatuma Hussein, who is the African Group’s lead negotiator on just transition, said she preferred the option of having “no outcome” than “putting the process at risk”. She told Climate Home that developed countries in Baku had avoided discussing finance, international cooperation and adaptation to climate impacts in the context of a just transition – and this was “the biggest problem”.

Telling developing nations, including those in Africa, that they must work towards just transition on their own would be “missing the point” and not delivering on the goals of the 2015 Paris Agreement, she added.

Right to develop

According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), climate change and extreme weather conditions affect 70% of the world’s economic sectors, with rising global temperatures and environmental risks harming businesses and workers through damage to property and productivity. It estimates that transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy would lead to about 6 million job losses but would in turn create around 24 million new jobs by 2030.

Under the ILO’s guidelines for a just transition to a low-carbon, climate-resilient world, the organisation calls for economic, environmental and social policies, as well as education and training, to help companies, workers, investors and consumers play a proactive role.

Climate campaigners and labour rights activists had looked – in vain – to COP29 to agree a work plan for governments to help them take the concrete steps needed.

What was decided at the COP29 climate summit in Baku?

According to the ITUC’s De Wel, the outcomes they were hoping for included provision of finance to implement national-level efforts to secure a just transition and guidance on preparing new national climate plans based on consultation with workers’ representatives and trade unions. Support is also required to put in place social protection systems for workers who might lose their jobs, as well as defining what the energy transition will mean for the future of employment and industrial development within countries.

“Systematising these things and taking lessons out of it for the whole group of countries – that’s what we want and recommend,” he said.

De Wel called for a broad global view of just transition that is not narrowly focused on Polish or German coal miners, for example, “without taking into account the robbery of minerals and materials from Africa” or denying the right of countries in the Global South “to have industrial development”.

Activists call for end to fossil fuels, payment by polluters and a just transition for workers, at the COP29 climate summit in Azerbaijan, November 16, 2024. (Photo: Climate Home News/Megan Rowling)

Amos Wemanya, a campaigner with Greenpeace Africa, said Africa’s colonial history continues to pose development and economic challenges that fuel indebtedness and keep the continent mainly as a provider of raw materials to the rest of the world and a dumping ground for low-value-added products.

Wemanya said current global trade policies and finance flows worsen the structural socioeconomic and technological inequalities between developed and developing countries and should be addressed by the UN’s  Just Transition Work Programme.

At the local level, Gvantsa Gverdtsiteli, research and policy coordinator for climate governance with Transparency International, said communities needed to own and benefit directly from transition projects, such as renewable energy power facilities, in their area.

Attention should be paid to ensuring that “their economic status is changing, that they get better opportunities and better living conditions, and their socioeconomic environment improves”, she added.

Early action needed from Brazil

Climate justice advocates say that the JTWP must deliver on its mandate of leaving no one behind as the world consumes less fossil fuel and more clean energy, while ensuring fair collaboration in global efforts to address the challenges posed by the transition. Under the Paris Agreement, governments committed to take into account “the imperatives of a just transition of the workforce and the creation of decent work and quality jobs in accordance with nationally defined development priorities”.

De Wel said the JTWP offers an avenue to discuss these issues more deeply at COP30 and in the coming years, as the green transition picks up pace. He said he hoped the Brazilian presidency of next year’s climate summit would give the JTWP “more centre space in the negotiations” and put it “much higher on the agenda” than at COP29, where workers’ rights and concerns got little prominence.

“We want a voice at the table and we want to be respected,” De Wel said, outlining expectations that Brazil will take the social impacts of the energy transition on workers and their communities seriously and ensure they are reflected in the decisions taken at COP30 on its soil.

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Gverdtsiteli of Transparency International said COP30 should give priority to “strong governance, transparency, accountability and integrity in the transition initiatives” that will be implemented, to prevent corruption and make them accountable to the people affected.

Anabella Rosemberg, senior strategist on just transition and climate justice at Climate Action Network International, said she hoped governments would “heal and redress” the failure on just transition at COP29 with a fresh approach to moving the conversation forward. She emphasised that Brazil would need to play an active role in convening informal discussions among governments before the Bonn talks to pave the way for effective decisions at COP30 in November.

Greenpeace Africa’s Wemanya said work on just transition at COP30 should advance ideas on the social, economic and environmental aspects of sustainable development, as well as eradicating poverty, boosting food and energy security, and protecting fragile ecosystems.

“COP30 must lead to just transition outcomes that take into consideration domestic and local realities to ensure well-being and safeguard the rights of communities and people,” he added.

(Reporting by Vivian Chime; editing by Megan Rowling)

The post After Baku setback, activists call for ‘just transition’ to be front and centre at COP30 appeared first on Climate Home News.

After Baku setback, activists call for ‘just transition’ to be front and centre at COP30

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New Zealand moves to protect business with law curtailing climate litigation

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August 24, 2026

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New Zealand’s parliament has adopted a controversial new law blocking a whole avenue of climate litigation and shutting down its most advanced corporate lawsuit, which has been blamed by the government for shaking business confidence and investment.

The Climate Change Response (Tort Liability) Amendment Bill, expected to take effect in the coming days after it is formally signed by the Governor-General, prevents all current and future civil claims for climate loss or harm under tort law.

Justice minister Paul Goldsmith said last week that the aim was to give businesses “certainty around their climate change obligations”, noting it would not alter the government’s responsibilities under the Climate Change Response Act 2002 nor business obligations under the Emissions Trading Scheme.

“Our response to climate change is best managed by the Government at a national level and not through piece-meal litigation in the courts,” he added in a statement.

Such litigation, he said, “risks developing a new regime that contradicts the framework Parliament has already enacted” to tackle climate change.

    Goldsmith singled out a key domestic climate lawsuit brought by Northland iwi leader and activist Mike Smith against six big companies: dairy firms Fonterra and Dairy Holdings, energy firms Genesis Energy and Z Energy, New Zealand Steel and coal mining firm BT Mining. A seventh original defendant, Channel Infrastructure, was dropped after it permanently decommissioned its Marsden Point oil refinery.

    Smith argued that these companies had caused him harm under public nuisance and negligence law, as well as a third breach of a duty to cease contributing to climate change that has yet to be tested domestically. He did not seek financial compensation, instead asking for the companies to immediately stop emitting or contributing to net greenhouse gas emissions.

    In one of the most advanced corporate climate accountability lawsuits in the world, a trial had been scheduled for April 2027 after the Supreme Court unanimously allowed the case to continue.

    Corporate lobbying in the shadows

    Smith described the passing of the bill as “deeply concerning”, particularly as it coincided with the Supreme Court hearing another of his climate lawsuits. In that case, Smith v Attorney-General, he argues that the government’s response to climate change and its impacts on Māori communities in particular breaches rights to life and culture.

    “That timing raises profound questions about the separation of powers and the rule of law,” said Smith. “Whatever one’s view of the merits of these cases, it is deeply troubling when parliament intervenes to remove a legal pathway while the courts are actively considering fundamental questions about climate responsibility, rights and the crown’s obligations.”

    The bill – which says that no person (including the government) can be found liable in tort for emissions-related climate change effects – followed major lobbying efforts by the companies defending themselves in Smith’s lawsuit. They outlined a proposed legal amendment in a briefing note to the government in 2024.

    The centre-right government has been fiercely criticised over its lack of transparency in relation to this lobbying activity. The national ombudsman recently found that the Prime Minister’s Office effectively withheld information requested by the Environmental Law Initiative about meetings, discussions and conversations regarding Smith’s case.

    Green groups fail to stop bill

    The bill sparked huge concern among environmental campaigners in New Zealand and elsewhere. Greenpeace Aotearoa called it a “shocking abuse of executive power” and the vast majority of submissions to a parliamentary inquiry said it should be rejected.

    But in the end, it was adopted with little resistance, moving relatively smoothly through parliament, passing its third reading by 67 votes to 53. Sam Bookman, climate law lecturer at Melbourne Law School, told Climate Home News he was not surprised by this, given that the coalition government has a secure majority.

    A complaint has been made to the UN special rapporteur on climate change and human rights by Smith, the National Iwi Chairs Forum Pou Tikanga and youth coalition Climate Clinic Aotearoa over what they see as the government’s heavy-handed approach. Smith is also challenging the new law in yet another lawsuit.

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    Bookman thinks it “very unlikely” that such a challenge will succeed, noting that New Zealand’s constitution is firmly anchored in parliamentary sovereignty.

    But the expert in climate law does not see the bill as the end of legal action in the country, noting that New Zealand has a “sophisticated climate litigation landscape with a growing number of specialist and experienced lawyers and NGOs”.

    The country is also approaching its next general election in November, and some opposition parties have pledged to restore access to the courts if elected.

    Amanda Larsson, global project lead on agriculture for Greenpeace International, said: “This law deserves to be tested, and I strongly encourage the international climate litigation community to unite and help defend New Zealanders’ fundamental right to hold polluters accountable before this becomes a global blueprint.”

    Copycat legislation on the rise

    New Zealand’s move is part of a small but growing legislative effort to shut down climate litigation around the world.

    In the US, Republican politicians introduced legislation in the House and Senate in April that would shield fossil fuel firms from climate liability lawsuits. Similar laws have already been passed at state level in Tennessee, Utah, Iowa and Louisiana.

    The German state of Bavaria has put forward a similar proposal to the Federal Council, aiming to block private climate claims as well as the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments imposing such liability. There are also proposals to limit available remedies and actions in the Netherlands and Belgium.

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    Bookman said he expects more efforts to counter climate damages litigation and advised plaintiffs to think about how to respond, including drawing on broader support in opposing them.

    “Even though it’s very hard for plaintiffs to win these types of cases, companies are very eager to avoid the expense, embarrassment and political accountability that come even with unsuccessful lawsuits,” he said.

    The post New Zealand moves to protect business with law curtailing climate litigation appeared first on Climate Home News.

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    Climate Change

    Indonesia’s nickel production cuts are not enough to create a sustainable industry 

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    August 24, 2026

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    Bhima Yudhistira Adhinegara is the Executive Director of the Center of Economic and Law Studies (CELIOS), an Indonesia-based economic think tank. Muhammad Zulfikar Rakhmat is the Director of the China-Indonesia desk at CELIOS. 

    Indonesia produces around 60% of the world’s nickel, a metal used to manufacture batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) – more than any other country in the world. But in 2026, the government sharply reduced how much of its nickel can be extracted from the ground.

    Production quotas were reduced by around 40% this year compared to 2025. Weda Bay, the largest nickel mine on Earth, had its allowance cut by more than 70% and exhausted its full-year quota by the end of May, halting mining entirely; it cannot resume large-scale extraction until next year unless regulators grant an extension.

    The policy has sparked a vivid debate in Indonesian policy circles: how can the country shift its strategy from a decade of mining vast quantities of cheap nickel to producing a high-value and low-carbon material that the rest of the world wants for EV batteries.

    The cuts aren’t a silver bullet to clean up Indonesia’s nickel industry, whose smelters are powered by coal – the most polluting fossil fuels. But alongside stricter enforcement of environmental rules, it is one side of efforts to produce more sustainable nickel for a premium.

    Restricting Indonesia’s nickel output

    Production quotas were introduced to stop the collapse of nickel prices because of oversupply in the market. Prices had fallen more than 40% in 2023 alone and kept sliding as Indonesian supply kept growing, hitting a four-year low of around $13,900 a ton in late 2025.

    Critics called the recent tightening of production quotas proof that Indonesia’s nickel strategy has failed, arguing that the industry shouldn’t need to throttle its own output to survive. But when assessed against what the policy was supposed to do – push up nickel prices – it has worked. Prices jumped to $20,000 a ton in May, the highest since 2024.

      Chinese industry groups representing companies that have invested billions to mine and refine the country’s nickel were furious, warning Indonesia’s president Prabowo Subianto that the cuts put $50 billion worth of investment at risk. But much of that Chinese capital is sunk into smelters and processing plants built specifically to run on Indonesian ore, and cannot simply be moved elsewhere. That gives Jakarta more room to hold its ground than the warning suggests.

      Stronger environmental enforcement

      Since the start of the year, Indonesia’s forestry task force has seized more than four million hectares of land from mines and plantations operating illegally in protected forests, collecting over two trillion rupiah ($113 million) in fines.

      This included 148 hectares seized from Weda Bay for lacking a forestry permit. The share of nickel produced from illegal small-scale mining also fell from about a quarter in 2022 to roughly 10% by 2024.

      The crackdown responds to serious environmental damages in the nickel industry. On Obi Island, a waste pond collapsed after heavy rain in June 2025, flooding three villages and killing a resident. Internal company tests found chromium-6 – a carcinogen – in the water, in quantities far above the legal limit. The footprint of another mine near Raja Ampat, which is home to some of the world’s richest coral reefs, grew 60-fold in just eight years.

      A coastal village is wedged between the sea and a large nickel mine in Indonesia
      The fishing villages of Tapunggaya in Sulawesi, Indonesia, are squeezed between the sea and an expanding nickel mine (Photo by Garry Lotulung/NurPhoto)

      The market is responding to early cleanup efforts. Low-carbon nickel now sells for a real premium, roughly $18,800 to $19,300 a ton compared with $17,900 to $18,300 otherwise, as carmakers seek to source cleaner materials to comply with the European Union’s new emissions rules for imports.

      In turn, this is incentivising the industry to do more to green its operations. Vale Indonesia’s smelter in South Sulawesi now runs almost entirely on hydropower, for example.

      None of this addresses coal use, however. Major Indonesian nickel producers still emitted an estimated 15 million metric tons of greenhouse gases in 2023. Indonesia may be cracking down on illegal mining and rewarding cleaner producers but it is still running its mines on the dirtiest fuel available.

      Unequal benefits

      For Indonesia to truly benefit from producing cleaner and high-value nickel, it needs to reap the economic benefits too. Although the industry has boosted the country’s economic growth, the reality on the ground tells a different story.

      Konawe in Southeast Sulawesi is home to a major smelting complex. Growth in the district jumped from 6% to 22% between 2015 and 2023, driven almost entirely by the nickel industry, according to a study by the Lowy Institute study. At the same time, poverty levels increased slightly and unemployment remained unchanged.

        In Halmahera, another epicentre of the nickel industry, spending by the poorest fifth grew just 5% between 2019 and 2022, compared with 28% for the wealthiest fifth, according to a separate study.

        Part of the reason for this inequality is the system for transferring mining royalties to district authorities where the mines are located. In theory, they are entitled to the largest share. But in practice, payments are delayed, companies routinely dispute what they owe and royalties are pooled and distributed across a larger area.

        The Natural Resource Governance Institute has found that decentralisation handed local governments power to approve new mines faster than they could build their capacity to manage them. Higher output raises national income on paper, but local governments remain constrained by fiscal rules and infrastructure costs that scale with mining.

        None of this makes the 2026 quota cuts a mistake. Indonesia has every right to defend its pricing power over a resource it controls. But limiting extraction isn’t going to fix underlying issues around environmental enforcement and revenue-sharing. That requires rules that are consistently enforced, royalties that reach communities living by the mines, and a plan to wean smelters off coal.

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        Climate Change

        Risk of “catastrophic” oil spill reaching Kimberley coast found in Woodside’s Scott Reef gas drilling plans

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        August 24, 2026

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        SYDNEY, Monday 24 August 2026 – New analysis of Woodside modelling released by Greenpeace Australia Pacific and Environs Kimberley has revealed the oil and gas corporation’s plans to drill at Scott Reef could cause an oil spill up to 30 times bigger than the 2009 Montara disaster, impacting the Kimberley coastline and reaching as far as Indonesia.

        The new analysis details the “catastrophic” oil spill risk put to environmental regulators for approval by Woodside in its Browse to North West Shelf Project (Browse) plans, the worst-case scenario being a blowout directly below Scott Reef, polluting whale migratory pathways and covering isolated turtle nesting ground with oil condensate.

        An FOI application (F348) revealed the federal environment department (DCCEEW) asked offshore oil and gas regulator NOPSEMA to look into the oil spill risk in 2025. NOPSEMA’s response to the application refused access to its report, and one document shows DCCEEW sought further advice this year.

        Greenpeace and Environs Kimberley are calling on the Federal Government to publicly release the NOPSEMA report given the risk of an uncontrolled release of oil condensate from directly below Scott Reef.

        Hannah Schuch, Senior Campaigner at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said: “Woodside is aware that drilling at Scott Reef risks a massive oil spill that would have severe, far-reaching consequences. It appears environmental regulators are aware too.

        “The state and federal governments need to take this risk from Woodside’s drilling plans seriously, as they could end up allowing the worst oil spill in Australian history.

        “The pygmy blue whales that migrate up and down the WA coast with their newborns each year could be swimming and feeding in toxic, oil-slicked water. Woodside’s proposal to drill at Scott Reef is an environmental disaster waiting to happen, and the WA and federal governments have one surefire way to prevent catastrophe — reject Browse.”

        Martin Prichard, Executive Director at Environs Kimberley, said: “A catastrophic oil spill by Woodside would be disastrous not just for marine life in the area but also for the Kimberley’s $500 million tourism industry.

        “The state and federal governments will see five marine parks on the Kimberley coast included in the risk area of a catastrophic Woodside oil spill.

        “The Montara oil spill was disastrous for West Timor with the toxic oil destroying seaweed farmers’ livelihoods. The Kimberley dodged a bullet with Montara, we were lucky the spill didn’t head our way. Myself and a crew flew over the Montara oil spill and followed it as far as we could. It was like a scene from a disaster movie.”

        After the WA Environmental Protection Authority deemed Browse “unacceptable” due, in part, to oil spill risk, Woodside submitted a mitigation plan based on technology that has never been used “in anger”, a weakness stated in an independent expert review of the plan.

        Professor Richard Steiner, independent oil spill expert, said: “A large offshore spill is impossible to effectively contain or recover. Historically, only 2-6% of total spill volume is recovered and the ecological injury from the release of toxic hydrocarbons in the sea can be severe, extensive, and long-term.

        “Here in Alaska, government research concludes that several marine populations injured by the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, including whales, fish, and seabirds, are still not recovering today, 37 years later. We should expect similar long-term ecological impacts in Western Australia if there were to be a major oil spill. The only sure way to avoid the risk of a catastrophic marine oil spill is to not develop oil and gas projects in marine environments.”

        -ENDS-

        Media contact

        Emma Sangalli on emma.sangalli@greenpeace.org or 0431 513 465

        Risk of “catastrophic” oil spill reaching Kimberley coast found in Woodside’s Scott Reef gas drilling plans

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