A fragile path forward

CoP’s latest terminology is the ‘Global Goal on Adaptation’ (GGA), which seeks countries to achieve specific nationally determined targets related to actions focusing on food and water security, climate resilient infrastructure, health, ecosystems, poverty reduction, and cultural heritage. This would enhance adaptive capacity, strengthen resilience, and reduce vulnerability to climate change. It necessarily needs to scale up the finance mobilisation by developed countries. Currently, more than 195 countries are set to assess the risks and vulnerabilities and develop national adaptation plans by 2025. So far, climate finance is not flowing from developed countries, with many countries funding climate action domestically. India too has been investing in climate adaptation, and at the prevailing scale of damage, we would need Rs 57 lakh crores till 2030.

Developed countries have not responded adequately to the issue of climate finance. The annual climate conference after 2015 took place only in 2021. The then US President Donald Trump called climate change a hoax, and even his Republican colleagues overwhelmingly supported him (only 21 per cent of Republican members then disagreed with him). Trump is far ahead of his Republican rivals to be nominated for the 2024 presidential election. If he comes to office in 2024, climate action will again take the backburner. Even Democrats have not done enough to cut their emissions and pledge adequate funding for adaptation in developing countries.

In CoP27 at Sharm El Sheikh, climate finance was given the name ‘loss and damage fund’ and it took nearly one year for developed countries to pledge $83 billion that too when they met for COP 28 in Dubai. It is again being changed to the GGA framework to assess the requirement of funds based on risk and vulnerability. The track record of developed countries does not provide adequate finance for adaptation.

The finance that was to flow from developed countries to the global south was understood to be from loans and equity. CoP28 has worked on improving the quality of finance. The global stock take draft, for the first time, provided quality finance and technology for the development needs of the global south. Rich countries will provide special drawing rights (SDR) to the IMF for concessional finance. In my opinion, we do not need annual COP meetings to work out a new mode of operation for finance. It would be enough if $100 billion agreed upon earlier were made available by developed countries annually.

There is strong lobbying against the supporters arguing to phase out fossil fuels. CoP28 president Sultan Al Jaber earlier said that there was no science behind the need to phase out fossil fuels. He later backtracked. A record 2,456 lobbyists have attended the summit; this number is higher than the 1,509 delegates from the 10 most vulnerable countries, mainly small islands. Many of these island nations are likely to disappear if global warming goes beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries urged 13 of its member countries to proactively reject any text or formula that targets fossil fuels rather than emissions. He added that there is undue and disproportionate pressure against fossil fuels. It created shock waves at the CoP28 meeting in Dubai. European countries, island nations, and civil society members were rattled.

Arab officials who met for a conference on regional energy cooperation in Doha hit out at the attempts to secure a phase-out of fossil fuels at CoP28. Big fossil fuel producers led by the UAE and fast-growing developing nations like India and China have been continuously refusing to phase out fossil fuels. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said that phasing out is the only option for containing warming within a threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius; those responsible for warming should phase out first and immediately, and others can do it at different dates in line with the rise in temperature below 1.5 degrees Celsius to prevent low-lying nations from disappearing from the map.

The scientists of the IPCC say that if we are to limit warming to 1.50 Celsius, coal must be phased out by 2050, oil must come down by 50 per cent, and coal by 45 per cent. Only to phase down coal and not oil and gas is a convenient narrative of developed nations. The consumption of oil and gas in the western world is enormous and used for basic necessities to keep houses warm in winter. IPCC reports are understood to be manipulated by developed nations. COP 28 should have specified for whom the remaining quota of oil and gas after 2050 is available.

The conference document released for the discussion on the last day omitted the phasing out of fossil fuels. The US, European Union, and vulnerable nations expressed concern, and the US, UK, and Australia threatened to walk out, saying that they wouldn’t sign the death sentence for poor and vulnerable nations. The document was modified, and a deal for transitioning away from fossil fuels so as to reach net zero by 2050 was approved. This is not strong enough language to deter polluters.

The energy requirements of developing nations are largely met by coal. Post-pandemic, there has been a surge in coal consumption in India, China, Indonesia, and Brazil. In the year 2022, India’s coal consumption was 1.1 billion tonnes, and China's was a whopping 4.5 billion tonnes. One-fourth of nearly 56 gigatons of CO2 equivalent is emitted by China, the highest GHG emitter in the world. In fact, India and African countries should be allowed to use the remaining quota of fossil fuels.

The CoP28 deal also approved limiting methane emissions by 2030, a clause not supported by India. Livestock rearing and paddy cultivation push for emissions, which otherwise have important contributions to our rural economy. CoP28 focusing on methane is unwise, as the gas hardly stays in the atmosphere for a decade. As against this, CO2 is nonreactive and remains in the atmosphere for hundreds of years.

Annual CoPs are a hoax, and world leaders are unperturbed by frequent and destructive climatic catastrophes.

(The writer is the retired head of the Forest Force, Karnataka)