DUBAI: Negotiations over the way forward for fossil fuels heated up at UN local weather talks on Saturday (Dec 9), with OPEC catching flak over the oil cartel’s push to dam any phase-out in the final deal.
The tone has veered between optimism and concern in regards to the tempo of the COP28 talks in Dubai as negotiators have held marathon periods geared toward discovering a compromise on the destiny of oil, fuel and coal.
OPEC added gas to the hearth after it emerged that its Kuwaiti secretary normal, Haitham Al Ghais, despatched a letter to the group’s 13 members and 10 allies this week urging them to “proactively reject” any language that “targets” fossil fuels as an alternative of emissions.
“I feel that it’s fairly, fairly a disgusting factor that OPEC nations are pushing in opposition to getting the bar the place it must be,” Spanish ecology transition minister Teresa Ribera, whose nation holds the rotating EU presidency, advised reporters.
French Vitality Minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher stated the OPEC assertion left her “surprised” and “indignant”.
Dramatically scaling up the deployment of renewable vitality whereas winding down the manufacturing and consumption of fossil fuels is essential to reaching the worldwide aim of limiting warming to 1.5 levels Celsius.
“1.5 is just not negotiable, and meaning an finish to fossil fuels,” stated Tina Stege, local weather envoy for the Marshall Islands, which chairs the Excessive Ambition Coalition, a broad group of countries starting from Barbados to France, Kenya and Pacific island states.
Round seven activists protested in entrance of OPEC’s sales space on the COP28 venue, with their palms held as much as present phrases corresponding to “section out”, in response to video footage shared by the NGO 350.org.