COP28 Head Sultan Al-Jaber Discusses Phasing Out Fossil Fuels Ahead of Climate Conference

“How quickly this happens will depend on how quickly we gradually develop carbon-neutral alternatives, while ensuring the security and availability of energy at reasonable costs,” Al-Jaber said.

Observers are closely following Al-Jaber’s statements about fossil fuels, six months before the Conference of the Parties, which the Executive Secretary for Climate Change at the United Nations described as the most important since the 2015 session that ended with the Paris Agreement.

Al-Jaber defended a roadmap for the COP28 conference, which includes a “global goal to triple renewable energies, double energy efficiency and double clean hydrogen, all by 2030.”

These statements come at a time when many participants and observers in the climate negotiations under the auspices of the United Nations called on Sultan Al-Jaber to explicitly recognize the importance of phasing out fossil fuels, a goal that no conference of the parties has succeeded in endorsing.

The head of the “COP28” conference to be held in Dubai signed in Brussels on Wednesday a declaration with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen calling for “a transition towards energy systems without fossil fuels except those with (technology) carbon capture,” a formula that could represent a possible settlement in The coming months between the different blocs involved in the negotiations.

Al-Jaber said in another speech in Petersberg, near Bonn, in May that “we must set a threshold necessary to eliminate fossil fuel emissions.”

But his emphasis on reducing “emissions” has been interpreted as a defense of using oil and gas with carbon dioxide capture technologies that are still limited.

In Bonn, which Sultan Al-Jaber visits Thursday and Friday, the issue of ditching fossil fuels is being raised vigorously by NGOs and experts, who reiterate that the scientific consensus confirms that fossil fuels are responsible for warming.

A number of activists and observers organized demonstrations calling for the “expulsion of oil polluters” from the negotiations, and a banner reading “Stop fossil fuels now” was raised in the lobby of the conference center where thousands of negotiators gathered.