Sergio Díaz is legal director at the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative.
As governments submit their updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) ahead of COP30, almost all of them share one glaring omission. While the climate plans speak of expanding renewables or boosting efficiency, almost none directly confront the other side of the equation – the production and use of fossil fuels.
This silence is indefensible. Ignoring fossil fuels – the primary source of greenhouse gas emissions – not only defies scientific imperatives to cut emissions at the source, it undermines countries’ legal obligations under the Paris Agreement and customary international law, as clarified by the International Court of Justice (ICJ). In contrast, decisive commitments would uphold their legal obligations, protect the 1.5C global warming threshold and secure the just transition the world urgently needs.
For years, governments have deliberately sidestepped fossil fuels in their climate plans, highlighting renewables and net-zero targets while continuing to expand oil, fossil gas and coal with impunity. States know fossil fuels are driving the climate crisis, yet according to the latest Production Gap Report by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), they still plan to produce 120% more by 2030 than is compatible with 1.5C.
Fossil fuel impunity
That impunity needs to end. International courts have now removed any doubt that such conduct is not only scientifically reckless, it can also be unlawful.
In its July advisory opinion, the ICJ – the world’s highest court – confirmed that states must act with due diligence to prevent significant environmental harm, and that the content of their NDCs matters. Submitting a plan that ignores fossil fuels while approving new drilling licenses or maintaining subsidies may constitute an internationally wrongful act.
The Inter-American Court of Human Rights reached the same conclusion this year, ruling that states are legally obliged to regulate fossil fuel exploration, extraction, transport and processing in order to protect human rights.
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Two rare exceptions – Colombia and Vanuatu – show the legal and political pathway that others must now follow. Both countries explicitly address fossil fuel production and use in their updated NDCs, and have also joined calls for a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty. Colombia has suspended new oil and gas exploration contracts, is planning the phase-out of coal power, and has become the first Latin American country to endorse the Treaty initiative.
While not a fossil fuel producer, Vanuatu, for its part, is spearheading the Pacific call for a Fossil Fuel Free Pacific and advocating for new governance structures such as a Pacific Energy Commissioner, alongside a global Fossil Fuel Treaty. As stated in its NDC, Vanuatu aims to steer the Pacific into becoming the “first region in the world to achieve the equitable phaseout of fossil fuel production and use”.
Weak NDCs fuel climate disasters
But for now, the example set by these two countries is the exception, not the rule. Excluding goals for cutting fossil fuel production or consumption from national climate plans is not a technical oversight – it is a failure with direct human and planetary costs.
Every weak NDC and every new drilling licence means more lives lost: from deadly heatwaves to rising seas swallowing homes, to communities displaced by fires and floods.
Instead, NDCs should include concrete measures to phase out fossil fuel production and consumption based on quantified equitable targets, halt new licensing, end subsidies and support workers and communities through a just transition. Failure to do so will undoubtedly pave the way for climate litigation worldwide, but sadly, not in time to prevent further climate catastrophes.
The ICJ has spoken, science has spoken, communities on the frontlines have spoken, and the message is simple: the threat of fossil fuels must be addressed urgently and directly.
Time for non-proliferation treaty
But no country can take on this task alone, which is why Colombia and Vanuatu have joined a growing group of 17 countries calling for a global Fossil Fuel Treaty.
What could a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty look like?
Similar to past treaties that ended the spread of nuclear weapons or landmines, the pact would create a framework to halt fossil fuel expansion, phase out production fairly and mobilise the necessary finance for a just transition. It would not replace stronger, more ambitious NDCs, but instead help governments to deliver on their plans.
As governments finalise their new NDCs, they should follow the path charted by Colombia, Vanuatu and other nations participating in the development of a Fossil Fuel Treaty to promote quantified fossil fuels phase-out targets, international cooperation and a livable, fair future for all. There is still time.
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Three countries have been named by the Paris Agreement’s compliance committee for failing to submit a nationally determined contribution (NDC) and repeatedly snubbing offers of help with their climate plans.
After months of internal debate over whether to identify serial non-responders, the Paris Agreement’s Implementation and Compliance Committee (PAICC) named the three countries which have failed to engage with it over their NDCs on Friday.
It named Democratic Republic of Congo, Senegal and North Korea in a footnote of its annual report, adding that it decided to name them “with a view to facilitating engagement”, adding that representatives of the three nations had been invited to its meeting in early 2027 “with the purpose of identifying any challenges and constraints”.
“The Committee noted the importance of Parties engaging with the Committee in a timely manner, while noting that some delays may be due to the national capabilities and circumstances of the Parties”, the report said.
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Paris Agreement committee snubbed over missing NDC climate plans
Many governments have still not submitted a nationally determined contribution to the UN, breaching a key requirement of the Paris Agreement
In July, PAICC said 12 countries had ignored its repeated attempts to discuss why they had not published an NDC as required every five years under the 2015 Paris accord.
Members of the committee had been divided over whether to name them, but at a September meeting decided to do so in their annual report to the annual climate COP summit.
By the time the report was published on Friday, only Congo, Senegal and North Korea “had not communicated an NDC or submitted a [Biennial Transparency Report] and had not yet responded to any of the Committee’s notifications, despite several reminders issued by the Committee in this regard”.
Rainforest and renewable energy ambitions
The silence from Congo and Senegal is notable because the former is home to much of the Congo Basin rainforest while the latter has sought billions of dollars in climate finance to support its renewable energy ambitions.
After Brazil, Congo has more rainforest than any country in the world. This forest, and the country’s peatlands, absorb huge amounts of greenhouse gas but are fast being lost to expanding farmland, charcoal production, logging and mining.
Senegal signed a Just Energy Transition Partnership with Canada and wealthy European nations in 2023, to help it meet its renewable energy targets under the-then government of Macky Sall. It was chair of the Least Developed Countries group between January 2022 and December 2023.
Tejas Rao, who is researching the PAICC as part of a doctoral thesis at Cambridge University, said the governments of the three countries should engage with the committee.
“Engagement costs these governments very little and the committee has shown it will listen,” he said.
“Silence leaves the committee with no basis to help, and it leaves the [governments] exposed to the narrative that they are simply disengaged,” he told Climate Home News.
Paris Agreement requirement
The 2015 Paris Agreement requires all parties to publish an NDC every five years outlining their emissions reduction targets, with each plan meant to be more ambitious than the country’s last NDC.
The latest set – the third round of plans, with new targets for 2035 – was due in February 2025. While most countries missed this deadline, all but around 30 – mostly small emitters but including Egypt, Vietnam and Argentina – have now submitted them.
Over the year, the PAICC – which is made up of government climate officials from developed and developing countries – has been communicating with governments that have not submitted NDCs and trying to overcome barriers to them doing so.
Some nations have cited exceptional circumstances as the reason for not submitting an NDC, a process that requires a significant amount of work in tracking emissions and consulting on how to curb them across the economy. For example, a letter from a Sudanese official to the PAICC, seen by Climate Home News, said that the country’s civil war had led to the suspension of its NDC preparation.
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The US and Iran are not signed up to the Paris Agreement and so do not have active NDCs, nor does Taiwan, which is not a UN member state.
Rao said that because the PAICC is “facilitative and non-punitive”, naming the countries “is meant to open a door, not close one – the invited consultation is the point”.
“In recent months, governments that explained their constraints, whether capacity, finance or domestic process, have been met with follow-up and support rather than sanction, and the number of silent governments has fallen sharply,” Rao said.
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Paris Agreement committee names three countries snubbing it over NDCs