Western powers and nations most threatened by climate change yesterday fought against oil producer Saudi Arabia for stronger calls on exiting fossil fuels as negotiators worked past a host-set deadline in UN talks in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
The 13-day COP28 summit in the glitzy metropolis built on petrodollars has debated a historic first-ever global “phase-out” from oil, gas and coal, the main culprits in a planetary crisis of warming.
However, a draft put forward on Monday by COP28 president Sultan Al Jaber, head of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Co, fell well short, instead presenting reductions in fossil fuels as one of several options.
Photo: Reuters
With low-lying island nations warning that their very survival is at risk, negotiators worked through the night and the Emirati hosts promised a new draft to try to find consensus.
Danish Minister for Development Cooperation and Global Climate Policy Dan Jorgensen, one of the climate ministers tasked with leading the talks, said that the Dubai summit needed to be clear that fossil fuels were on their way out.
“I’m personally not married to one word,” he said. “But I am insisting that the meaning of this formulation, whichever one we will end up having, has to be extremely ambitious.”
French Minister for Energy Transition Agnes Pannier-Runacher called for the “clearest language possible,” but added: “Obviously we can accept edits that note that we’re not all coming from the same place.”
US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry has also urged stronger language on phasing out fossil fuel, even though the US is the world’s top oil producer.
Kerry met ahead of COP28 with his Chinese counterpart and reached an agreement to ramp up renewables, hoping to keep tensions between the two powers — the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitters — from scuttling global action on climate.
“I wouldn’t say China is fighting with us, but we’re not fighting China,” said one person close to the negotiations who backs phasing out fossil fuels.
But as for the Saudis, “they show forcefully that they are not willing to move,” the person said.
Saudi Arabia has told COP28 to take its “concerns” into consideration while the OPEC oil cartel has urged members to resist calls to end their lucrative export.
The most emotionally charged appeals have come from low-lying islands, which fear being submerged as polar ice melts and whose teams flew to Dubai at great expense to their national budgets.
John Silk, the negotiator from the Marshall Islands, which lies on average 2.1m above sea level, on Monday said that his country “did not come here to sign our death warrant.”
The Emirati hosts had urged a deal before the summit’s official close yesterday morning, but COP28 director-general Majid Al Suwaidi said after the deadline that the priority was to “get the most ambitious outcome possible.”
Tropical Storm Usagi strengthened to a typhoon yesterday morning and remains on track to brush past southeastern Taiwan from tomorrow to Sunday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was approximately 950km east-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost point, the CWA said. It is expected to enter the Bashi Channel and then turn north, moving into waters southeast of Taiwan, it said. The agency said it could issue a sea warning in the early hours of today and a land warning in the afternoon. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was moving at
UPDATED FORECAST: The warning covered areas of Pingtung County and Hengchun Peninsula, while a sea warning covering the southern Taiwan Strait was amended The Central Weather Administration (CWA) at 5:30pm yesterday issued a land warning for Typhoon Usagi as the storm approached Taiwan from the south after passing over the Philippines. As of 5pm, Usagi was 420km south-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost tip, with an average radius of 150km, the CWA said. The land warning covered areas of Pingtung County and the Hengchun Peninsula (恆春), and came with an amended sea warning, updating a warning issued yesterday morning to cover the southern part of the Taiwan Strait. No local governments had announced any class or office closures as of press time last night. The typhoon
DISCONTENT: The CCP finds positive content about the lives of the Chinese living in Taiwan threatening, as such video could upset people in China, an expert said Chinese spouses of Taiwanese who make videos about their lives in Taiwan have been facing online threats from people in China, a source said yesterday. Some young Chinese spouses of Taiwanese make videos about their lives in Taiwan, often speaking favorably about their living conditions in the nation compared with those in China, the source said. However, the videos have caught the attention of Chinese officials, causing the spouses to come under attack by Beijing’s cyberarmy, they said. “People have been messing with the YouTube channels of these Chinese spouses and have been harassing their family members back in China,”
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said there are four weather systems in the western Pacific, with one likely to strengthen into a tropical storm and pose a threat to Taiwan. The nascent tropical storm would be named Usagi and would be the fourth storm in the western Pacific at the moment, along with Typhoon Yinxing and tropical storms Toraji and Manyi, the CWA said. It would be the first time that four tropical cyclones exist simultaneously in November, it added. Records from the meteorology agency showed that three tropical cyclones existed concurrently in January in 1968, 1991 and 1992.
RSS