COP28 Lessons for Fair Energy Futures
Dr Viktoria Spaiser reflects on her involvement with COP28 and its implications for Fair Energy Futures.
This year’s UNFCCC annual climate event, COP28, took place in Dubai, United Arab Emirates and several researchers from the University of Leeds were able to participate as observer delegates. One of them was Viktoria Spaiser, a member of the Fair Energy Futures Steering Committee. Here she is sharing some insights from COP28 with respect to fair energy futures.
Let’s start with the big breakthrough. For the first time in the almost 30 years of annual UNFCCC COP climate summits, the big elephant in the room, fossil fuels, the main contributor to anthropogenic climate change, is actually mentioned in the deal. The specific wording calls for a “transitioning away from fossil fuels”. That this achievement was reached in a fossil-fuel producing hosting country and with a COP28 president, who is also the head of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), is remarkable. In the end the pressure from a broad coalition of over 100 countries (including North American, South American, African, European, Pacific and Caribbean countries, spearheaded by SIDS (Small Island Development States), from global civil society, who mobilised around a call to phase-out fossil fuels and from scientists, was too big. Not surprising the text also includes a range of loopholes and the language of “transitioning away” is considered weaker than “phase-out” and yet, given the history of international climate negotiations, it is still a breakthrough and strong normative signal. And let’s be clear, there cannot be any (climate) justice without a phase-out of fossil fuels over the next three decades; the longer we hold on to fossil fuels, the worse climate change and its impacts will get, hitting often the most vulnerable, internationally and within each nation. But, while a phase-out of fossil fuels is a necessary condition for climate justice, for fair energy futures, it is not sufficient.
The COP28 agreement included a call that the “transitioning away from fossil fuels” should happen “in a just, orderly and equitable manner”. Hence, the principle that the transition needs to be fair is acknowledged in the deal, but the cover decision does not provide any concrete pledges or commitments, and this has left some countries and observers unsatisfied with the reached deal. Poorer countries, who are expected to make a leap to clean energy, will need financial and technical support from richer countries to achieve this. Countries, heavily relying on fossil fuels for revenues, will need help to develop alternative economic pathways. And workers around the world relying on income from work in the fossil fuel industry will need to be offered alternative sources of income, alternative jobs, and career perspectives. Moreover, the replacing of fossil fuels with clean energy needs to follow justice principles, avoiding “green” exploitation and extractivism that disregards human rights etc. Now that the international community has acknowledged that the era of fossil fuel is coming to an end, lots of thinking and efforts needs to be channelled into finding pathways and resources for this transition, bespoke for each country and region.
And there are some brilliant ideas for pathways towards fair energy futures for all. During COP28 the first ever Global Tipping Points Report was published, produced by over 200 experts from around the worlds. The report summarises our knowledge on the climate and other Earth system tipping points that we are approaching as climate change progresses (Section 1 of the report) and their potential devastating and often counterintuitive impacts around the world (Section 2 of the report). It also summarises our knowledge on possible governance mechanisms to deal with the challenge (Section 3 of the report) and most importantly on the potential of positive social tipping points (Section 4 of the report), demonstrating multiple pathways of accelerated transition towards a climate justice and fair energy futures.
Remarkable were also some other initiatives that happened during COP28 and that open up transition pathways. For instance, the COP28 deal includes tripling renewable energy capacity globally and doubling the global average annual rate of energy efficiency improvements by 2030. This is expected to further spur investment in clean energy deployment and innovation. COP climate summits are becoming increasingly not only a forum for international climate negotiations, but also a global fair, where innovators, investors and entrepreneurs come together, exploring practical solutions that are vital for reaching the goals, the international community is setting itself. A fair also for the global civil society that builds transnational advocacy and accountability networks, which will equally be important for reaching those goals and doing so in a just manner.
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