Less than a year ago I posted a short article asking the above question, but about COP29. Although it may seem a little early to post this, there’s so much going on in the world regarding climate issues today, not least the implications of Trump’s arrival in the White House, posting this now would seem to be appropriate. Indeed, there are already some COP30 related items appearing on the COP29 thread.
As I said last year, having studied climate issues going back to the 1950s, I’ve followed UN climate negotiations in detail since 2007. My conclusion is simple: if global greenhouse gas emissions are to be cut substantially – as we are told is necessary if humanity is to avoid potential catastrophe – the overriding issue, far more important than any domestic concern, is whether or not the governments of major non-Western economies are willing to act accordingly. Yet they’ve shown, and continue to show, scant in interest in so doing. Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Agreement is hardly going to help.
I set out the evidence and reasons for this failure in an essay published in 2020. Nothing that’s happened since 2020 changes my conclusion. The ‘Dubai Stocktake’ agreed at COP28 in 2023 for example if anything reinforced it: the opening paragraph of its item 28 stating that Parties’ ‘global efforts’ should take ‘into account the Paris Agreement and their different national circumstances’ and item 38 repeated the Paris Agreement’s Article 4, unambiguously confirming developing countries’ exemption from any emission reduction obligation. That’s a perfect example of what always happens at these conferences: words are inserted in the concluding communiques or agreements letting developing countries off the hook. And COP29 turned out to be a total failure with nothing of substance or even of much interest being agreed.
So what’s going to happen at COP30?
Well, it’s supposed to be an especially important Conference as it will be held ten years since the adoption of the ‘landmark’ Paris Agreement. Moreover, 2025 is the year when Parties are required to submit their updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) – setting out targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 2035 and showing how they will reach them. These new NDCs have been described by Simon Stiell, executive director of UN Climate Change, as ‘among the most important policy documents governments will produce this century’.
The deadline for submission was 10 February. However only ten countries (all of which, apart from the USA, Brazil and the UK, are relatively insignificant) will achieve that. And, as the USA is no longer relevant and Brazil is the COP30 host, the whole thing would seem to be getting off to a particularly poor start. The plan now is to defer the deadline until September. But that will leave very little time for the UN to produce its planned assessment of expected emission reductions, which is supposed be the key document informing the Conference.
Will the Parties – especially big emitters such as China, India and Russia – meet the new deadline? And, if they do, will they produce NDCs that include credible emission-cutting targets? We’ll see – but, in view of past experience, it’s hard to be especially optimistic.
Robin Guenier – February 2025
Climate Scepticism 
Thanks Robin, that nicely sets out the issues. Although COP30 is many months away yet, I’m sure the Guardian and the BBC will be obsessing about it increasingly over the weeks and months to come, and this will prove to be a good place to comment on that.
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Thanks Mark. I thought that Simon Steill comment that the new NDCs will be ‘among the most important policy documents governments will produce this century’ especially worthy of comment. Does he really mean that? If so, it’s the clearest demonstration of how UN officials, inflated by self-importance, don’t understand what’s really happening in the world.
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Robin – as you say above about the Simon Steill comment, they “don’t understand what’s really happening in the world”.
He just repeats/rote the UN climate line, no thought or understanding needed, easy money & sleeps with a warm feeling.
ps – had to check “rote” in case I got it wrong – “learning something in order to be able to repeat it from memory, rather than in order to understand it”
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“How Trump’s ‘drill, baby, drill’ pledge is affecting other countries”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce85709xdk4o
The UN climate summit in the United Arab Emirates in 2023 ended with a call to “transition away from fossil fuels”. It was applauded as a historic milestone in global climate action.
Barely a year later, however, there are fears that the global commitment may be losing momentum, as the growth of clean energy transition is slowing, external down while burning of fossil fuels continues to rise.
And now there is US President Donald Trump’s “national energy emergency”, embracing fossil fuels and ditching clean energy policies – that has also begun to influence some countries and energy companies already.
In response to Trump’s “drill, baby, drill” slogan aimed at ramping up fossil fuel extraction, and the US notifying the UN of its withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement, Indonesia, for instance, has hinted that it may follow suit.”If the United States does not want to comply with the international agreement, why should a country like Indonesia comply with it?” asked Hashim Djojohadikusumo, special envoy for climate change and energy of Indonesia, as reported by the country’s government-run news agency Antara., external
Indonesia has remained in the list of top 10 carbon-emitting countries for years now….
...In South Africa, Africa’s biggest economy and a major carbon emitter, a $8.5bn foreign-aided transition project from the coal sector was already moving at a snail’s pace, and now there are fears that it may get derailed further.
Wikus Kruger, director of Power Futures Lab at the University of Cape Town, said there was a “possibility” that decommissioning of old coal-fired power stations would be “further delayed”.…
...Argentina withdrew its negotiators from the COP29 climate meeting in Baku last November, days after Trump won the US presidency. It has since followed Trump’s lead in signalling it will withdraw from the Paris Agreement of 2015 – which underpins global efforts to combat climate change.
“We now expect our oil and gas production to go up,” Enrique Viale, president of the Argentine Association of Environmental Lawyers, told the BBC.…
…Meanwhile, energy giant Equinor has just announced it is halving investment in renewable energy over the next two years while increasing oil and gas production, and another oil major, BP, is expected to make a similar announcement soon.…
…Trump has not just said “drill, baby, drill” but also: “We will export American energy all over the world.”
Potential foreign buyers are already lining up.
India and the US have agreed to significantly increase the supply of American oil and gas to the Indian market.
At the end of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s US visit on 14 February, the two countries issued a joint statement, external that “reaffirmed” the US would be “a leading supplier of crude oil and petroleum products and liquified natural gas to India“.
A few days after Trump’s inauguration, South Korea, the world’s third largest liquified natural gas importer, has hinted its intention to buy more American oil and gas aimed at reducing a trade surplus with the US and improving energy security, international media, external have reported from Seoul.
Officials with Japan’s largest power generator, JERA, have told Reuters, external they too want to increase purchases of liquified natural gas from the US to diversify supply, as it currently imports half of it from the Asia-Pacific region.…
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“Brazil asks UN to ditch proposed levy on global shipping
Those supporting the deal hope it will raise billions to help poor countries deal with climate breakdown”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/17/brazil-asks-un-to-ditch-proposed-levy-on-global-shipping
Brazil has asked the UN to throw out plans for a new levy on global shipping that would raise funds to fight the climate crisis, despite playing host to the next UN climate summit.
The proposed levy on carbon dioxide emissions from shipping will be discussed at a crunch meeting of the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) that begins on Monday. Those supporting the deal, including the UK, the EU and Japan, are hoping the levy will raise billions of dollars a year, which could be used to help poor countries cope with the effects of climate breakdown.
Brazil, China, Saudi Arabia and 12 other countries made a submission to the IMO on 31 January opposing the plans. They argued a levy could reduce exports from the developing world, raise food prices and increase inequalities.
They wrote: “A levy would not deliver a just and equitable transition [to low-CO2 shipping] and its adoption may trigger negative, economy-wide impacts … a levy is a fundamentally divisive proposal.”
The countries also claim a levy is not needed to meet the IMO’s greenhouse gas reduction targets.…
With 9 months to go, it already looks as though COP30 is going to be even more irrelevant than COP29 (and that takes some doing).
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Unsurprisingly I suppose the BBC’s ‘Environment Correspondent’ hasn’t done the most basic homework: i.e. actually reading what was agreed in 2023 (COP28). In fact, as I note in the header article, the ‘Dubai Stocktake’ unambiguously confirmed developing countries’ exemption from any emission reduction obligation. In other words, there was no ‘global commitment’ to transition away from fossil fuels and therefore no ‘momentum’ away from one. So what’s happening around the world today is not all Trump’s fault as the BBC would have us believe.
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…what’s happening around the world today is not all Trump’s fault as the BBC would have us believe.
Indeed not , but the BBC is happy to find yet another ostensible reason to have a go at him. And to seek to persuade people that he is single-handedly responsible for most of the world’s ills. I wonder when we will get an accurate BBC Verify article on the pointlessness of COPs?
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Mark – Had to look up – “Levy vs. Tariff” – not sure if this link explains it best, but sounds reasonable –
Levy vs. Tariff – What’s the Difference? | This vs. That – quote –
“Levy and tariff are both forms of taxes imposed on imported goods, but they differ in their application and purpose. A levy is a tax imposed by a government on goods produced within its own borders, while a tariff is a tax imposed on goods imported from foreign countries. Levies are typically used to generate revenue for the government, while tariffs are often used to protect domestic industries by making imported goods more expensive. Both levy and tariff can impact the cost of goods for consumers and the competitiveness of businesses in the global market.”
So, if I understand correctly from above, “A levy is a tax imposed by a government on goods produced within its own borders”.
So how does the statement – “Those supporting the deal, including the UK, the EU and Japan, are hoping the levy will raise billions of dollars a year, which could be used to help poor countries cope with the effects of climate breakdown.” make any any sense, and relevant for “global shipping” ?
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dfhunter, I suspect that “levy” is not being used in the sense that is stated in the definition you found. The interesting point, to me, is that Brazil, which will host COP30, is opposed to some of the measures that those behind the COP process are pushing.
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“Developing world urges rich nations to defy Trump’s ‘climate nihilism’”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/feb/19/developing-world-urges-rich-nations-to-defy-trumps-climate-nihilism
Much of the usual stuff here to be expected from the Guardian, including a risible final paragraph:
…Paul Bledsoe, a former Clinton White House climate adviser, now with the American University Center for Environmental Policy, called on the UK to fill the global leadership vacuum left by the “climate nihilism” of the US president. “Given the dearth of EU centre-left leadership, UK leaders like Keir Starmer and Ed Miliband must step forcefully into the void, leveraging relationships with key nations in the global south including Brazil, India, and Kenya,” he said. “This ought to be Britain’s most important Cop since Glasgow.”
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Mark – from your link –
“Yalchin Rafiyev, the chief negotiator for the Azerbaijani hosts, told the Guardian that his experience of Cop29 made him optimistic for Cop30, as countries should have more common ground in discussions of how to reduce emissions than they had in settling who should pay for it. “Finance [the subject of Cop29] was the most divisive issue,” he said. “If we could manage to get agreement on finance, I am hopeful that we should be able to agree on NDCs.”
Dream on Yalchin. As to why Paul Bledsoe thinks “This ought to be Britain’s most important Cop since Glasgow.” ?
Oh, might be related to this –
“While many of Europe’s major economies are taking a rightward turn, the exception is the UK, where the prime minister, Keir Starmer, has made shifting to a low-carbon economy one of his key “missions” for government. Starmer is seeking closer relations with China, the US and Europe. He had a 45-minute phone call with Trump days after the inauguration, though climate policy was not discussed. Rachel Reeves, the chancellor of the exchequer, visited China in January, and Ed Miliband, the secretary of state for energy security and net zero, is expected to make a trip to Beijing this year.”
“Clutching at straws” springs to mind (not plastic).
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There’s an article in this morning’s Daily Sceptic by Tilak Doshi, its energy editor, that’s particularly interesting:
Energy Geopolitics in a Putin-Trump World
Doshi, reporting on the meeting held (interestingly) in Saudi Arabia last week between senior Russian and American officials, noted that it covered far more than the Ukraine conflict – including the possibility of Russia/US co-operation on energy matters, bringing about a ‘new global energy order’. Noting that the US and Russia represent the world’s largest and third largest oil producers and the largest two gas producers respectively, he described what happened, correctly in my opinion, as potentially ‘a geopolitical earthquake, a pivotal moment in global affairs’.
He said:
In other words, my old description of global energy reality as ‘The West vs. The Rest’ would become ‘The EU/UK vs. The Rest’. That the EU and UK are the source of only 7% of global emissions puts this firmly into perspective. And, as they are rapidly deindustrialising, that can only get worse.
Read the article – it’s important.
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paywalled
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“US will be ‘central’ to climate fight even without Trump, says Cop30 president
André Corrêa do Lago suggests US organisations can play a constructive role even if government limits participation”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/mar/10/us-central-climate-fight-without-trump-cop30-president-andre-correa-do-lago
The US will be “central” to solving the climate crisis despite Donald Trump’s withdrawal of government support and cash, the president of the next UN climate summit has said.
André Corrêa do Lago, president-designate of the Cop30 summit for the host country, Brazil, hinted that businesses and other organisations in the US could play a constructive role without the White House.
“We have no idea of ignoring the US,” he told journalists on a call on Friday. “The US is a key country in this exercise. There is the US government, which will limit its participation [but] the US is a country with such amazing technology, amazing innovation – this is the US that can contribute. The US is a central country for these discussions and solutions.”
Brazil has also vowed to hold an “ethical stocktake” aimed at examining climate justice issues, for poor and vulnerable people, and to give Indigenous people a key role at the talks.
Corrêa do Lago wrote to all UN countries on Monday, setting out Brazil’s expectations that all governments will draw up national plans for steep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions before the conference starts in Belém, a rainforest city at the mouth of the Amazon, in November….
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Climate Home News also has a report on Corrêa Do Lago’s letter:
Brazil’s COP30 president: Climate summits must move from words to real action
In a letter outlining his vision for Brazil’s climate summit, Corrêa Do Lago calls for a “new era” with collective work on implementation
An extract:
Wow – that’s really going to make a difference.
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From today’s FT:
Is Europe losing its nerve on the green transition?
Flurry of recent initiatives raise worries about the pace of change in the region when China is accelerating development
Answer: yes.
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An interesting story on the BBC website:
Amazon forest felled to build road for climate summit
A new four-lane highway cutting through tens of thousands of acres of protected Amazon rainforest is being built for the COP30 climate summit in the Brazilian city of Belém.
Many locals are (understandably) unhappy. For example Claudio Verequete, who lives about 200m from where the road will be, said: ‘Everything was destroyed. Our harvest has already been cut down. We no longer have that income to support our family.’ He says he has received no compensation from the state government and is currently relying on savings.
But one has a more sanguine view:
The article claims that that will also be the hope of world leaders who attend the COP30 summit. But will it? There plenty of evidence – current and historical – that suggests not.
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More from the FT:
India approves legislation to boost oil and gas exploration
Far-reaching’ amendments to 1948 law highlight reluctance to wean world’s most populous nation off fossil fuels
Things are not looking so promising for COP30
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“Cop30 in talks to hire PR firm that worked for lobby seeking weaker Amazon protections
Revealed: Edelman worked for Brazilian trade group accused of pushing for environmental rollbacks in Amazon”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/mar/17/edelman-cop30-amazon-summit
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“Countries must bolster climate efforts or risk war, Cop30 chief executive warns
Ana Toni also criticises the UK’s plans to slash overseas aid to fund defence spending”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/mar/18/countries-must-bolster-climate-efforts-or-risk-war-cop30-chief-executive-warns
Countries looking to boost their national security through rearmament or increased defence spending must also bolster their climate efforts or face more wars in the future, one of the leaders of the next UN climate summit has warned.
Some countries could decide to include climate spending in their defence budgets, suggested Ana Toni, Brazil’s chief executive of the Cop30 summit.
“Climate change is an accelerator of inequalities and poverty, and we know that the consequences of inequality and poverty can turn into wars in the future,” she said. “The fight against climate change needs to be seen as something that’s not divorced from the big security issue of humanity.”
Toni is one of the top Brazilian officials coordinating the Cop30 conference, scheduled to take place this year in Belém, a rainforest city at the mouth of the Amazon. All countries will be expected to submit stringent national plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions, but preparations have been overshadowed by the complex geopolitical situation.…
That sounds like the voice of desperation, from someone who knows that COP30 is going to achieve even less than the previous 29.
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OK, so this isn’t about COP30, but it might as well be, given who is lining up on which side:
“Poor countries say rich world betraying them over climate pledges on shipping
Proposal that ships pay levy on emissions to fund climate action in poor countries opposed by powerful economies”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/apr/07/poor-countries-say-rich-world-betraying-them-over-climate-pledges-on-shipping
Poor countries have accused the rich world of “backsliding” and betrayal of their climate commitments, as they desperately tried to keep alive a long-awaited deal to cut carbon from shipping.
Nations from 175 countries have gathered in London this week at the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) to hammer out the final details of a deal, more than a decade in the making, that could finally deliver a plan to decarbonise shipping over the next 25 years.
If the most ambitious proposals are realised, the agreement would also require all ships to pay a small charge based on the greenhouse gases they emit, with the proceeds going to fund climate action in poor countries. This levy is seen as a crucial source of funding for poor countries, which are seeing increasing economic devastation from extreme weather.
But powerful economies, including China, Brazil and Saudi Arabia, oppose the levy, while others, including the EU, may agree to drastically water it down....
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When are the Guardian, EU and international organisations such as the IMO going to realise that China, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, Iran, India, Indonesia etc. are never really going to agree any ‘climate commitments’?
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“Will Cop30 in Belém help or harm the Amazon?
Trees are being cleared for rainforest mega-event – but state governor says a ‘new history’ is under way”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/apr/25/brazil-host-cop30-climate-talks-amazon
… Traffic congestion, already bad, is expected to become horrific with the expected influx of 50,000 visitors during the event. Conservation groups have been shocked by the clearance of forests for new highways and there is scepticism that the city’s infrastructure projects, including a doubling of the airport’s capacity, will be ready in time.…
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King Charles wades into politics with letter to Ed Miliband | NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
“The King has attracted criticism for becoming directly involved in political issues.
He has shared a rare message on energy transition, which was read by Energy Secretary Ed Miliband at a summit focused on the future of energy security.”
Wonder where he thinks the “transition to more sustainable energy sources” has led to “a more resilient & secure energy system”.
Can’t think of a comedy double act that makes me laugh & cry at the same time.
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It may be nothing more than a coincidence that the Crown Estate is enjoying a windfall from offshore wind farms…
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This morning the Daily Sceptic published an excellent overview of international climate politics by its Energy Editor, Tilak Doshi. Titled China’s Climate Charade: A Green Façade for Economic Supremacy, here’s it’s opening sentence: ‘A trifecta [interesting word] of global meetings last month laid bare the geopolitical chessboard of climate and energy policy, spotlighting the tussle between the US and China for economic and energy dominance.’
It’s full of quotable material. For example:
Er … exactly so.
It concludes with this:
Most interesting and well worth reading in full.
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They’re definitely worried:
“World faces new danger of ‘economic denial’ in climate fight, Cop30 head says
Exclusive: André Corrêa do Lago says ‘answers have to come from the economy’ as climate policies trigger populist-fuelled backlash”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/may/28/andre-correa-do-lago-cop30-interview-climate-crisis
The world is facing a new form of climate denial – not the dismissal of climate science, but a concerted attack on the idea that the economy can be reorganised to fight the crisis, the president of global climate talks has warned.
André Corrêa do Lago, the veteran Brazilian diplomat who will direct this year’s UN summit, Cop30, believes his biggest job will be to counter the attempt from some vested interests to prevent climate policies aimed at shifting the global economy to a low-carbon footing.
“There is a new kind of opposition to climate action. We are facing a discredit of climate policies. I don’t think we are facing climate denial,” he said, referring to the increasingly desperate attempts to pretend there is no consensus on climate science that have plagued climate action for the past 30 years. “It’s not a scientific denial, it’s an economic denial.”
This economic denial could be just as dangerous and cause as much delay as repeated attempts to deny climate science in previous years, he warned in an exclusive interview with the Guardian....
I have news for him. Climate policies have discredited themselves. And it doesn’t take those awful populists (aka people offering the people what they want, rather than imposing on the people what they don’t want) for growing numbers of the populace to work out that climate policies are impoverishing them and damaging the environment, while strengthening China, damaging energy security and doing nothing to deal with climate change.
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Mark – you have to laugh or cry at how that article ends –
“Cop30 is scheduled to take place in Belém, a city near the mouth of the Amazon river. But participants are increasingly concerned about the lack of facilities in the city, despite its emblematic situation in the rainforest state of Pará.”
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Another excellent piece by Tilak Doshi in the Daily Sceptic. Headed The Guardian’s Climate Cult: Fiona Harvey’s Latest Sermon on COP30 it concludes thus:
Recommended.
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I have long thought Fiona Harvey is propagandist in chief at the Guardian, and I also consider her work to be largely removed from reality and logic.
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“Brazil to auction oil exploration rights months before hosting Cop30
Sale covering 56,000 square miles set to go ahead despite opposition from Indigenous and environmental groups”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jun/13/brazil-to-auction-oil-exploration-rights-months-before-hosting-cop30
The Brazilian government is preparing to stage an oil exploration auction months before it hosts the Cop30 UN climate summit, despite opposition from environmental campaigners and Indigenous communities worried about the environmental and climate impacts of the plans.
Brazil’s oil sector regulator, ANP, will auction the exploration rights to 172 oil and gas blocks spanning 56,000 square miles (146,000 sq km), an area more than twice the size of Scotland, most of it offshore.
The “doomsday auction”, as campaigners have called it, includes 47 blocks in the Amazon basin, in a sensitive area near the mouth of the river that fossil fuel companies consider a promising new oil frontier.
The auction is key to Brazil’s plans to become the world’s fourth-largest oil producer, an ambition supported by the president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who argues that oil revenue will bring economic development and fund the energy transition….
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From today’s FT:
Brazil’s COP30 chief warns of tensions over 1.5C global warming pledges
Brazilian presidency is under pressure to address issue even as oil-producing countries resist limiting fossil fuels
Not looking good for COP30. And any prospect of limiting global warming to 1.5ºC (or even 2.0ºC) is long gone. Why are these people kidding themselves?
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“No room at the inn: COP30 logistics chaos overshadows climate talks
Brazil struggles to reassure countries that hotels will be available and affordable at November’s pivotal climate conference in Belém.”
https://www.politico.eu/article/no-room-belem-brazil-cop30-logistics-chaos-overshadows-climate-talks/
…Already, hotels have sold out in record time — and what’s left is astronomically priced, threatening to exclude low-income countries and civil society from the pivotal conference.
Delegates might now find themselves staying in converted schools, military barracks or rented cruise ships. There’s a chance they’ll have to share rooms, despite forking over more than $1,000 a night.
Even rich countries are balking at the cost. No European delegation POLITICO spoke to in Bonn had booked their accommodation...
Pivotal conference ? Really? Such lazy journalism.
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“‘Climate is our biggest war’, warns CEO of Cop30 ahead of UN summit in Brazil
Negotiators doubt countries’ financial and environmental commitment as military and trade wars divert attention”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jun/29/climate-is-our-biggest-war-warns-ceo-of-cop30-ahead-of-un-summit-in-brazil
“Climate is our biggest war. Climate is here for the next 100 years. We need to focus and … not allow those [other] wars to take our attention away from the bigger fight that we need to have.”
Ana Toni, the chief executive of Cop30, the UN climate summit to be held in Brazil this November, is worried. With only four months before the crucial global summit, the world’s response to the climate crisis is in limbo.
Fewer than 30 of the 200 countries that will gather in the Amazonian city of Belém have drafted plans, required by the 2015 Paris agreement, to stave off the worst ravages of climate breakdown.
And that crisis is escalating. In the last two years, for the first time, global land temperatures soared to more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels – breaching the limit that governments have promised at multiple climate meetings to keep.
Meanwhile, the US president, Donald Trump, has withdrawn from the Paris agreement and is intent on expanding fossil fuels and dismantling carbon-cutting efforts. The EU is mired in tense arguments over its plans. China, the world’s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, is rumoured to be considering weak targets that would condemn the world to much greater heating.
And the attention of world leaders is elsewhere, as the conflict in the Middle East threatens to spiral further. Poor countries are labouring under a mountain of debt, and the continuing cost of living crisis in many countries is fuelling populism and a backlash against green policy….
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This morning I came across yet another lavishly funded organisation tackling climate change. This time it’s Quadrature Climate Foundation (QCF) described as ‘an independent charitable foundation dedicated to addressing the climate emergency’. You can find out about it HERE.
It provides an address for contact. So I sent them this email:
A reply might be interesting. If I get one.
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Yes, Robin, a reply may be most interesting. It may help to illuminate whether this organisation is really about applying pressure to the major CO2/methane emitting countries, or (as would not surprise me one jot) more about putting pressure on the political/media elites of Western countries who (at their populaces’ great expense) have shown themselves to be very vulnerable to such cajoling.
Did you find the source of their funding? I could not, but I had only a short foray into their web site. Regards, John C.
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John, I asked ChatGPD about the source of QCF’s funding. Here’s its reply:
Source of funds
QCF receives a proportion of Quadrature Capital’s profits each year, allocated under its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) framework
Commitment levels
When established in 2019, the founders pledged to contribute at least $100 million annually to climate solutions
As of mid‑2024, QCF had committed over USD 1 billion in grants
Financial transparency
According to official accounts filed with the UK Charity Commission, QCF’s income for the year ending December 2023 totaled £269.7 million, all reported under “donations and legacies” — i.e., contributions from Quadrature Capital
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Robin, thank you for researching their funding. I am afraid that the ChatGPD answers rather reinforce my fears about this charity; time will tell. Regards, John C.
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From this morning’s FT:
Canada’s bid to become an energy superpower
The government has a plan to exploit its abundant fossil fuel resources to help ward off the ill effects of Trump’s tariffs
Carney does seem to have changed his spots. Although this does sound a bit like ‘a big boy made me do it‘.
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Robin,
Canada’s govt has been (quietly) ambivalent about fossil fuels for many years. While being highly obstructive in public, behind the scenes they have supported massive investment in gas pipelines to the west coast and a major new LNG export facility. The first liquefaction train has just come into operation, shipping its first cargo last month, with a second due to start up soon. Its position gives it a significant advantage for supplying China, Japan and the rest of Asia.
The economy is in deep trouble and they have similar problems to us with medical services, etc.. I suspect Carney has recognised the reality that exploiting their massive natural resources is the only viable option. Trump’s tariffs provide useful cover to deflect attention.
While I’m typing, thanks for all your efforts on various forums, highlighting the insanity of net zero.
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“Brazil passes ‘devastation bill’ that drastically weakens environmental law
President has 15 days to approve or veto legislation that critics say will lead to vast deforestation and destruction of Indigenous communities”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/17/brazil-passes-devastation-bill-that-drastically-weakens-environmental-law
Brazilian lawmakers have passed a bill that drastically weakens the country’s environmental safeguards and is seen by many activists as the most significant setback for the country’s environmental legislation in the past 40 years.…
…According to the Climate Observatory’s Araújo, the law also creates a major embarrassment for both Brazil and Lula just months before the country is to host Cop30 in the Amazon in November. “This law is a serious setback and will shape how Brazil is viewed by those who see it as a potential environmental leader,” she said.
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A more interesting and thoughtful read than usual by Fiona Harvey at the Guardian:
“‘Keeping us hooked on fossil fuels’: how can we negotiate with autocracies on the climate crisis?”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/18/climate-crisis-fossil-fuels-autocracies-authoritorian-countries
Although the article doesn’t really have a conclusion, the overall thrust is one of deep pessimism with regard to COP30 and emissions reductions generally. I particularly liked this:
...With an autocracy, there is no way of knowing quite how or why a decision has been made or whether it will be made again. China has pledged to produce a new national plan on emissions before the Cop30 UN climate summit in November. That single document will do more than any other political decision this year to determine whether the world can hold global heating to safe limits.
But the country’s officials are under strict orders to be tight-lipped about its contents. “The plan is all in Xi Jinping’s head at the moment,” one veteran observer of Cops said. “We are finding that no one [in government] will talk about it.”
China could double down on its huge investment in renewables, or Xi could listen to the strong vested interests of the coal sector, deeply embedded in China’s economy and polity. “I would not rule out a return to coal,” said Li Shuo, the director of the China climate hub at the Asia Society Policy Institute....
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As you say Mark, Fiona Harvey’s Guardian article is thoughtful and interesting – but ultimately (and I think inevitably) pessimistic. [FYI I’m trying to get MB to engage with exactly this issue at OxCAN – you might like to have a look].
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It’s good that the Guardian is finally talking about major global GHG emitters who have no interest in reducing emissions. I wonder if and when the penny will drop that the UK is wasting its time and the whole COP process is a farce?
“‘We’re the canary in the coalmine’: when will Russia take action on the climate?”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/18/when-will-russia-take-action-on-the-climate
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Fiona Harvey’s article has the following statement:
They hold our future in their hands, and of the top 20 with the biggest carbon output globally, 16 are state-owned and were responsible for 52% of global emissions in 2023
The companies, referred to as the “carbon majors” are providing a commodity that is in demand around the world. She then conflates the emissions from the combustion of products that can be attributed to these companies with the total emissions of each country using those commodities. Double counting much? They are not “responsible ” for 52% of global emissions. We are…. for using their products.
The carbon majors [of all kinds] are keeping the world hooked on fossil fuels, with no plans to slow production……
Why should they. The demand for their products continues to grow. The only rationale to slow production would be to increase the price.
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Mark – you have to laugh at “We’re the canary in the coalmine” quote.
Does nobody remember the woolly mammoth – What Caused The Extinction Of The Woolly Mammoths? – WorldAtlas
“Several theories have been put forward to try to explain the extinction of the woolly mammoth. One of the theories is climate change. As stated earlier, the animals became extinct during the early stages of the Holocene period, which was roughly 10,000 years ago and the period of the last ice age. After the ice age, other animals of that era such as ground sloths, Native American horse and camels, and the saber-toothed cat also began going extinct. Scientists have theorized that all these animals, which were uniquely suited to cold environments, could not cope with the heating of the earth. Furthermore, if climate change contributed to the death of a plant that provided vital nutrients to woolly mammoths, then the number would have been adversely affected. An important thing to note is that climate change had affected the distribution of the animals even before the end of the last ice age. For example, the habitat of the animals some 42,000 years ago was 3,000,000 square miles but reduced to only 310,000 square miles 6,000 years ago due to climate change.”
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“Gas flaring created 389m tonnes of carbon pollution last year, report finds
Rules to prevent ‘enormous waste’ of fuel are seen as weak and poorly enforced and firms have little incentive to stop”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/18/gas-flaring-created-389m-tonnes-carbon-pollution-last-year-report
…The report found that nine countries – Russia, Iran, Iraq, the US, Venezuela, Algeria, Libya, Mexico and Nigeria – were responsible for three-quarters of all gas flaring in 2024. Most of the worst offenders were countries with state-owned oil companies.…
Good luck getting of any of those countries on board at COP 30.
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This seems likely to be the start of the propaganda onslaught ahead of COP30:
“World on brink of climate breakthrough as fossil fuels ‘run out of road’, UN chief says
António Guterres says ‘sun is rising on a clean energy age’ as 90% of renewable power projects cheaper than fossil fuels”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/22/antonio-guterres-climate-breakthrough-clean-energy-fossil-fuels
The world is on the brink of a breakthrough in the climate fight and fossil fuels are running out of road, the UN chief said on Tuesday, as he urged countries to funnel support into low-carbon energy.
More than nine in 10 renewable power projects globally are now cheaper than fossil fuel alternatives. Solar power is about 41% cheaper than the lowest-cost fossil fuel alternative, and onshore wind generation is less than half the price of fossil fuels, according to a report from the International Renewable Energy Agency…..
And sure enough, the final paragraph offers up a quote from our old friends at E3G and a link to COP30:
…Kaysie Brown, associate director at the E3G thinktank, called for countries to bring forward strong national climate plans before the UN’s Cop30 summit in Brazil this November. “The world now has both the technical solutions and the economic imperative to accelerate the clean energy transition – a transition essential for global stability and shared prosperity,” she said. “But unlocking this opportunity demands bold leadership and deeper cooperation.”
But what of the report from IRENA? Well, it contains rather a lot of caveats:
…While continued cost reductions are expected as technologies mature and supply chains strengthen, short-term challenges remain. Geopolitical shifts including trade tariffs, raw material bottlenecks, and evolving manufacturing dynamics, particularly in China, pose risks that could temporarily raise costs.
Higher costs are likely to persist in Europe and North America, driven by structural challenges such as permitting delays, limited grid capacity, and higher balance-of-system expenses….
…Particularly, integration costs are emerging as a new constraint on deployment of renewables. Increasingly, wind and solar projects are delayed due to grid connection bottlenecks, slow permitting and costly local supply chains. This is acute in G20 and emerging markets, where grid investment must keep pace with rising electricity demand and the expansion of renewables.
Furthermore, financing costs remain a decisive factor in determining project viability. In many developing countries of the Global South, high capital costs, influenced by macroeconomic conditions and perceived investment risks, significantly inflate the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) of renewables....
…However, digital infrastructure, flexibility, and grid expansion and modernisation remain pressing challenges, including in emerging markets, where the full potential of renewables cannot be realised without further investment.…
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Gosh – do we need a COP31 thread already?!
“UN chief urges Australia to aim higher as it debates climate goals”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn47yjeevdvo
…Prime Minister Anthony Albanese came to power in 2022, promising to take greater action, but his Labor government has been criticised for its continued support of coal and gas projects.
The country is currently seeking to co-host the UN’s COP31 climate summit with the Pacific next year.
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“New Brazil development law risks Amazon deforestation, UN expert warns”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy98jqr4p0xo
A new law in Brazil could cause “significant environmental harm and human rights violations”, and represents a “rollback for decades” of protections in Brazil, including for the Amazon, a UN expert has told BBC News.
Plans to speed up approvals for development projects were criticised by Astrid Puentes Riaño, a UN special rapporteur, as the country prepares to host the COP30 climate summit this year.
Lawmakers passed plans to simplify environmental licences for infrastructure including roads, dams, energy and mines this month, though the president has not formally approved the bill.
Critics have dubbed it the “devastation bill” and say it could lead to environmental abuses and deforestation….
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“UN holds emergency talks over sky-high accommodation costs at Cop30 in Brazil
Concerns poorer countries could be priced out of negotiations in Belém as room rates soar amid shortage”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/30/un-emergency-talks-sky-high-accommodation-costs-cop30-brazil
…Brazil has faced criticism for its decision to host the conference in a small city in the rainforest rather than in a bigger urban centre that already has the necessary infrastructure and hotel rooms. The country is racing to expand the 18,000 hotel beds usually available in Belém, a coastal city of 1.3 million, to accommodate roughly 45,000 people who are expected to attend Cop30.
This month, the Brazilian government said it had secured two cruise ships to provide 6,000 extra beds for delegates. It also opened bookings to developing countries at more affordable nightly rates of up to $220 (£165). That is still above the daily subsistence allowance (DSA) the UN offers some poorer nations to support their participation at Cops. For Belém, that DSA is $149.
A diplomat familiar with Tuesday’s meeting said complaints about affordability came from both developed and developing countries...
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From comment above –
“Cop30 is scheduled to take place in Belém, a city near the mouth of the Amazon river. But participants are increasingly concerned about the lack of facilities in the city, despite its emblematic situation in the rainforest state of Pará.”
Wonder if “UN special rapporteur Astrid Puentes Riaño” & UN colleagues will then refuse any invitation to COP30.
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Mark – as usual you beat me to it. The western world spends/will spend trillions of dollars/pounds on this & they complain about hotel prices!!!
Lula: “I Won’t Remove the Poor for COP30” – 14/02/2025 – Science and Health – Folha (can’t link)
Liked this apt quote from Lula –
“The president declared: “If there’s no five-star hotel, stay in a four-star one. If there’s no four-star, stay in a three-star one. If there’s no three-star, sleep under the star of the sky.”
Maybe the UN special rapporteur should have a look at Favela living in Brazil when time permits.
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Well, this is going well:
“Brazil issues last-ditch plea for countries to submit climate plans ahead of Cop30
Only 28 countries have submitted carbon-cutting proposals to the UN, with some of the biggest emitters yet to produce plans”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/19/brazil-issues-last-ditch-plea-for-countries-to-submit-climate-plans-ahead-of-cop30
Brazil has issued an urgent call for all countries to come forward with strengthened national plans on the climate, in a last-ditch attempt to meet a key September deadline.
Only 28 countries have so far submitted carbon-cutting proposals to the UN, with some of the biggest emitters of greenhouse gases – including China and the EU – still to produce their plans.
On Tuesday Brazil, which will host the crunch Cop30 UN climate summit this November, issued a summons to all governments to a key meeting on 25 September, on the sidelines of the UN annual general assembly in New York. The UN needs all national plans – known as nationally determined contributions (NDCs) – by that date to compile a “synthesis report”, which will show how far off track the world is on the crucial goal of limiting global heating to 1.5C above preindustrial levels.
André Corrêa do Lago, the veteran Brazilian diplomat who will preside over Cop30, wrote to governments on Tuesday to urge them to submit ambitious NDCs, and warned that if they were not strong enough then further action would be needed at Cop30....
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COP30 will be in Brazil. Hmm.
“Brazil authorities suspend key Amazon rainforest protection measure
Suspension of soy moratorium could open up area of rainforest the size of Portugal to destruction”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/21/brazil-authorities-suspend-key-amazon-rainforest-protection-measure
One of the key agreements for Amazon rainforest protection – the soy moratorium – has been suspended by Brazilian authorities, potentially opening up an area the size of Portugal to destruction by farmers.
Coming less than three months before Brazil hosts the Cop30 climate summit in Belém, the news has shocked conservation groups, who say it is now more important than ever that consumers, supermarkets and traders stand up against Brazilian agribusiness groups that are using their growing political power to reverse past environmental gains.
Brazil is the world’s biggest soya bean exporter. The legume, used largely for animal and fish feed, is one of the most widely grown crops in Brazil, and posed a huge deforestation threat to the Amazon rainforest until stakeholders voluntarily agreed to impose a moratorium and no longer source it from the region in 2006.…
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Mark – just read your 19 Aug comment, partial quote (bold mine) –
“The UN needs all national plans – known as nationally determined contributions (NDCs) – by that date to compile a “synthesis report”, which will show how far off track the world is on the crucial goal of limiting global heating to 1.5C above preindustrial levels.“
Take It that means they already know the “world” is off track for this impossible target?
Seems he thinks he can pull a rabbit out of a hat – “André Corrêa do Lago, the veteran Brazilian diplomat….. He wrote: “Far from representing mere climate targets for 2035, our NDCs represent the vision of our shared future. They are vehicles of cooperation, enabling us to realise this vision together. If the image shown by NDCs turns out disappointing, it is our collective responsibility to convert it into a picture that will ensure a livable planet, protect all economies, and improve living standards and life opportunities for all peoples, for all generations.”
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Oh dear, this doesn’t look so good:
COP bureau meeting ends in stalemate as Brazil insists Belém logistics can work
A UN survey this month showed a majority of nations had yet to book hotels in Belém due to high costs, raising concerns about lower participation at the climate summit
An extract:
Just how many delegates are needed to participate in a negotiation? Many, many years ago I represented a major British aerospace company re the negotiation of a pan-European space consortium. I was the only delegate.
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Quite a few, as it turns out – figure needs another update!
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Robin,
My experience reflects yours. I generally found that the ability to make progress is in inverse proportion to the number of people involved.
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Counting down to COP30, the Guardian starts to ramp it up:
“Counting down to zero: the final warning from a climate diplomat
Before Peter Betts died in 2023, he wanted to pass on what he had learned over many years of negotiating at Cops – including how Paris 2015 was saved at the last bell”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/26/counting-down-to-zero-the-final-warning-from-a-climate-diplomat
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Never mind COP 30. What about COP31?
“Former UN climate chief urges Australia to set ‘prosperity’ target of cutting emissions by 75% by 2035
Exclusive: Ambitious target would increase the country’s chance of winning rights to host Cop31 in 2026, Christiana Figueres says”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/31/former-un-climate-chief-urges-australia-to-set-prosperity-target-of-cutting-emissions-by-75-by-2035
Wow! What a great prize.
...The intervention by Christiana Figueres, an architect of the 2015 Paris agreement when she was the executive secretary of the UN framework convention on climate change, comes before discussions about Australia’s commitment, due to be announced next month.
Cabinet is yet to receive formal advice from the Climate Change Authority, chaired by the former NSW Liberal treasurer Matt Kean. A decision on the target is expected before Anthony Albanese attends the UN general assembly in New York in late September.…
That’s rather blatant. isn’t it? Do our bidding and we’ll give you a present.
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Spiked has published an interesting article today headed:
The reactionary heart of the Green Party
Why the Greens’ dark neo-Malthusian vision resonates with the middle-class Corbynista left.
My comment (the only comment so far) is I think relevant to the prospects of success at COP30.
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Robin,
Please can you post your Spiked comment here – I don’t think it’s visible there unless one logs in.
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Good point Mark. Although it makes the best sense as a comment on a long and interesting piece, I think it can stand alone. Here it is:
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“Brazil’s Amazon love motels ditch erotic decor to host Cop30 climate summit
In Belém, motels known for sex chairs and mirrored ceilings are stripping risqué features for climate negotiators”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/03/amazon-love-motels-cop30-summit
Guests at the Love Lomas Pousada in the Amazon city of Belém receive an email from reception before check-in with two questions, one conventional, the other unforeseen.
“Could you kindly let us know what time you expect to arrive at our establishment,” the message reads. “And one other thing, our rooms feature erotic chairs. Would you like to have it removed?”
With less than three months until tens of thousands of climate negotiators, campaigners and diplomats flock to this sweltering riverside metropolis to discuss the future of the planet, Belém’s love motels are racing to remodel themselves to receive visitors from around the globe.
Ricardo Teixeira, the owner of Love Lomas, said a “de-eroticization” campaign was in full swing as motels – traditionally used for passionate rendezvous between lovers – stepped into the breach to help authorities cope with the huge influx of outsiders for November’s Cop30 summit….
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“EU states still fighting over crucial targets in run-up to Cop30, leaked draft shows
Exclusive: Experts decry lack of nationally determined contributions in negotiating document with weeks to go before UN-set deadline”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/08/eu-states-still-fighting-over-crucial-targets-in-run-up-to-cop30-leaked-draft-shows
…So far, only 28 out of 196 countries have submitted a new target. Only the EU’s submission could unleash momentum and move other countries to follow suit.…
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The 2025 edition of the EDGAR GHG emissions of all world countries was published this morning. As always, it contains a wealth of useful data. Here are its principal findings:
Compared with 2023 global GHG emissions increased by 665.6 Mt. China, India, Russia and Indonesia all increased their emissions, with Indonesia having the largest increase in relative terms (+ 5.0%) and India the largest in absolute terms (164.8 Mt).
Note also how Brazil, the host of COP30 and the world’s sixth biggest emitter, has continued to increase emissions.
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Robin, for context (and if I have read the table correctly) then the UK’s annual emissions FELL by 13.9 Mton CO2eq thereby indicating both (i) the puny change we in the UK can make , (ii) and yet our elites are determined we shall commit this self-warm for so little CO2 abated. Specifically, UK reduction is just 2% of the global annual increase.
We are p!ssing in the wind rather than becoming the Saudi Arabia of Wind.
Regards, John C.
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John: indeed. And it would hardly make a discernible difference if we doubled our emissions.
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Just noticed Mark’s comment above – “Erotic chair next to the jacuzzi in the presidential suite at the Love Lomas motel in Belém, Brazil, on 20 August. Photograph: Alessandro Falco/The Guardian”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/03/amazon-love-motels-cop30-summit#img-1
Wonder if Ed will agree to be tied up?
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A very important article by Tilak Doshi:
How the West Snookered Itself in Energy Geopolitics
The Tianjin summit underscores Europe’s slide into irrelevance
An extract:
In view of this, and bearing in mind that the world’s largest economy – the USA – is no longer interested, anyone who thinks COP30 will get anywhere is surely living in dreamland.
PS: one (minor) criticism Russia is not one of the world’s five largest economies – although it is one of the world’s five largest emitters of GHG emissions.
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More COP30 pessimism:
Countries trail COP30 clash over global response to shortfall in national climate plans
China, India and Saudi Arabia rejected a COP30 dialogue on an upcoming UN review of climate plans, widely expected to show the world is not on track to limit global warming to agreed levels
https://www.climatechangenews.com/2025/09/12/countries-trail-cop30-ndcs-clash-on-global-response-to-shortfall-in-national-climate-plans/
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“UN tries to limit staff going to Cop30 in Brazil due to high price of hotels
Accommodation costs at climate summit in Belem are pricing out some developing countries and media outlets”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/16/un-tries-to-limit-staff-going-to-cop30-in-brazil-due-to-high-price-of-hotels
The United Nations has urged its staff to limit attendance at the Cop30 climate summit in Brazil in November due to high accommodation prices, while government delegations are still scrambling to find rooms within their budgets….
It’s interesting that it’s cost, not associated emissions, that has led the UN to suggest fewer people might attend.
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“EU set to miss UN deadline for new target under Paris climate accord
The delay is intended to allow countries more time to agree to an ambitious goal.”
https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-paris-climate-accord-un-deadline-new-target/
Sorry, guys. We’ll get back to you.
That’s the message the European Union is expected to deliver at a pivotal climate summit of world leaders next week after the bloc’s countries were unable to agree on a plan to reduce planet-warming emissions by 2035.
Failure to submit a target to the United Nations this month would undermine the EU’s ability to influence the efforts of other nations and result in diplomatic embarrassment for the bloc, which has long claimed a leadership role in global climate talks — particularly as China is expected to present its plan on time.
But EU governments, who have to unanimously approve the 2035 plan mandated by the Paris Agreement, are at odds over how to arrive at the target.
As a result, Denmark, the country currently chairing negotiations among governments, suggested to other countries on Tuesday that the EU will merely send a “statement of intent” to the U.N. instead of submitting the required formal plan.…
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Several years ago I bookmarked this article (LEADING NOWHERE The Futility and Farce of Global Climate Negotiations) and then forgot about it. Until today when a reference to the author, Oren Cass, reminded me of it and I read it again. It was published in October 2015, just before COP21 and the Paris Agreement. It foretold how the conference would do nothing to further the UNFCCC agenda and would epitomise the utter pointlessness of these UN climate conferences. Yet here we are ten years later and heading for another.
Cass’s conclusion:
But have policymakers and activists taken note? Apart from the evil Trump, they have not – and are even arguing about who should host COPs 31 and 32!
The article, full of insightful observations, is well worth reading.
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One thing that isn’t going to happen at COP30 – developing countries like Guyana, which are now exploiting oil reserves, aren’t suddenly going to stop doing so.
“Guyana found huge oil reserves 10 years ago, so why are most people still poor?
With a ‘one-sided’ deal handing vast profits to the world’s top oil firms, many Guyanese ask when the energy bonanza will benefit them”
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2025/sep/17/guyana-oil-reserves-poverty-venezuela-chevron-exxon
...Data from the oil consortium suggests there are 11bn barrels of recoverable oil, or nearly 50 years at the current rate of output.
The 650,000 barrels produced daily originate from three oilfields, while permits for four more have already been granted or are at an advanced stage. Exxon says that by 2027, Guyana could be producing nearly 1.3m barrels daily, making it one of the world’s highest per capita producers....
…Until 2015, when oil and gas were discovered, Guyana’s primary exports were gold, bauxite, sugar, rice, timber and seafood. These now pale in significance compared with oil and gas as the country becomes a petro-economy.
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Robin – thanks for the link, as you say well worth a read just to remind us 10yrs on of progress.
Will only give a few quotes after a quick read –
“no plan B—nothing to follow,” declared Miguel Cañete, the EU’s commissioner for climate action. “This is not just ongoing U.N. discussions. Paris is final.”
“Between 2000 and 2100, in the A1B scenario, per-capita income will increase fivefold in developed
nations and 60-fold in developing nations. Whereas in 2000 the developing world’s per-capita income was only 5 percent that of the developed world, by 2100 it will exceed 60 percent (and, remarkably, will more than double the current level of prosperity in the developed world). Global GDP will grow by a factor of 20.11 Clearly, fueling the growth of a world where the rich continue to get richer and the poor become rich will require enormous supplies of energy.”
Probably more quotes, but that last one with “a world where the rich continue to get richer” makes me wonder?
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“How Macron joined the climate bad guys club
The French president has joined Poland, Italy and Hungary to stall discussions ahead of the COP30 climate conference in November. “
https://www.politico.eu/article/emmanuel-macron-joined-climate-bad-guys-camp-targets/
Emmanuel Macron built his reputation as Europe’s climate crusader with a defiant call to “make our planet great again.” Now he’s the one jamming on the brakes.
The French president spent the last few months pressing his fellow leaders to hit pause on setting the European Union’s next climate goals, culminating in last week’s cancellation of a vote that was expected to set the EU’s targets for 2035 and 2040.
Macron insists he’s in favor of rigorous climate targets and just wants more time to ensure the EU is getting this far-reaching decision right. But his efforts have put him in the same camp as traditional climate blockers such as Poland and Hungary, boosting their chances of weakening the bloc’s green ambitions.
And they have left the EU struggling to comply with the Paris Agreement, exactly 10 years after France led the world to the breakthrough climate accord….
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Reuters has just published a report on the EU’s failure to publish an update on its emission reduction targets in time to meet the UN’s September deadline – in fact it was a February deadline but that had to be postponed as so many countries failed to meet it. Titled ‘EU set to miss UN climate deadline amid internal divisions’ the report said that ‘The delay could knock the EU’s international leadership’. A bizarre comment – having followed the UN COP summits for too many years that I care to remember, I’m unaware of any evidence of the EU exercising climate leadership.
It seems the EU plans to deflect criticism by issuing a ‘statement of intent’ outlining what climate goals it eventually hopes to approve. Far from deflecting criticism I fear that will only draw attention to the huge contrast between where it is now and its erstwhile position as a major supporter of the ‘ratcheting’ concept that was a key feature of the so-called ‘breakthrough’ Paris Agreement.
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Further to the above Tilak Doshi has just published an important article in the Daily Sceptic. Titled Europe’s Days of Carbon Colonialism are Numbered, its subtitle is ‘The EU’s grandiloquent carbon tariffs scheme is destined to collapse under the weight of the bloc’s utter economic irrelevance’. The article examines in detail the absurdity in today’s global context of the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) – to be introduced next January.
His concluding paragraph:
Well worth reading in full.
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Hi Robin – unfortunately could only read the 1st few para’s & the rest is paywalled.
One relevant thing that sprang to my mind was this – 2050 long-term strategy – European Commission – partial quote –
“Striving to become the world’s first climate-neutral continent by 2050 – The EU aims to be climate-neutral by 2050 – an economy with net-zero greenhouse gas emissions. This objective is at the heart of the European Green Deal, and is a legally binding target thanks to the European Climate Law. The transition to a climate-neutral society is an opportunity to build a better future for all, while leaving no one behind. All parts of society and economic sectors will play a role – from the power sector to industry, transport, buildings, agriculture and forestry. The EU can lead the way by investing in technological solutions, empowering citizens and ensuring action to support a smooth and just transition in key areas such as industrial policy, finance, and research.
The pursuit of climate neutrality is also in line with the EU’s commitment to global climate action under the Paris Agreement. The EU submitted its long-term strategy to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in March 2020.”
Having noted the “is a legally binding target thanks to the European Climate Law” bit, I had a look – European Climate Law – European Commission.
Not to bore readers, just a partial quote –
“Preparation – The Commission conducted extensive analysis and stakeholder consultation in preparation of its strategic vision for a climate-neutral EU published in November 2018. This was followed by an EU-wide debate on the vision. A high-level public conference on 28 January 2020 provided a further opportunity for open, public stakeholder debate on the European Climate Law before its finalisation and adoption.
The public also had the possibility to provide feedback on the roadmap for the legislative proposal, with nearly 1000 contributions.
Formal adoption – The European Climate Law was published in the Official Journal on 9 July 2021 and entered into force on 29 July 2021.”
Nearly 1000 public contributions!!! wonder what that tells you?
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The last one leaving the building won’t have to switch off the lights.
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dfhunter,
One of the reasons the UK voted for Brexit is the undemocratic nature of the EU. The pieces you have cited relating to the EU’s legally-binding European Climate Law says it all, really. “The Commission conducted extensive analysis and stakeholder consultation” and “The public also had the possibility to provide feedback”. That’s not what democracy is supposed to look like.
In the EU, the European Climate Law will be repealed or amended only if “stakeholders” decide they no longer want it and the unelected European Commission agrees with them. What the public thinks won’t enter into it. In the UK we might be saddled with the Climate Change Act, amended to provide for net zero in a pretty undemocratic way (was it in the Tory Party manifesto?), but at least we can (and I hope will) elect a different bunch of politicians to repeal it in 2029 (if not sooner).
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How to put a positive spin on failure (with the assistance of the Guardian, naturally):
“‘Something is working’: UN climate chief optimistic about green transition
Exclusive: Simon Stiell believes economic benefits will compel countries to speed up climate action”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/20/simon-stiell-un-climate-chief-climate-progress-green-transition
…In a last-ditch call to heads of government summoned to New York by the UN secretary general this week, Simon Stiell, the executive secretary of the UN framework convention on climate change, said governments would almost certainly fail to come up with the climate commitments needed to fulfil the Paris agreement before a deadline this month, but they could still reset their economies to reap the advantages of low-carbon growth.
“We’re moving in the right direction,” he said. “Not fast enough, not deep enough, but [the progress countries have made on moving to a low-carbon economy] is showing that something is working. We need to find all the levers that are available to us, to see how we can accelerate further.”
On Wednesday, on the sidelines of the UN general assembly, Stiell and the UN secretary general, António Guterres, will make a final plea to world leaders – excluding Donald Trump, who is snubbing the meeting – to present national plans on the climate, before the Cop30 climate summit in Brazil in November. These plans – known as nationally determined contributions (NDCs) – are required under the Paris agreement, to set out how countries will limit global temperature rises to 1.5C above preindustrial levels, beyond which the impacts of the climate crisis become catastrophic and irreversible.
The deadline for the plans, which cover the next crucial decade of greenhouse gas emissions, was meant to be February this year, but in the midst of Trump taking office and global political upheaval, Stiell extended it to the end of this month. At that point, the UN will assess the NDCs and judge whether they fulfil the Paris aims.
Stiell knows the NDCs will fall short of the 1.5C target, as many countries are likely to present inadequate responses. These include the US, Russia and Saudi Arabia, all of which have sought to disrupt recent climate talks. But there are also significant concerns over the plans of other big emitters, such as China and the EU, which outwardly profess commitment to the climate….
…China is widely expected to submit an NDC that is much weaker than it should be…The EU, for decades the champion of climate action, is mired in internal tension among member states spooked by a seeming backlash from the populist right.
The bloc has still not finalised its NDC, and will not meet the end of month deadline…
So far so negative, yet:
…Yet Stiell believes Cop30 can still be a success, if it can point the way to remedying the shortcomings and investing in the benefits of a green economic transformation.
“We know [the NDCs] are going to be softer than what science dictates is needed,” he told the Guardian in an exclusive interview at the UN’s climate headquarters in Bonn. “But it’s about how the real economy picks up those signals. Inadequate as some may think they are, those signals have a significant impact on what’s happening in the real economy.”
He pointed to global private sector investments last year of more than $2tn in green energy and low-carbon industry, dwarfing the $1tn poured into fossil fuels. “I see promise, I see action,” he said. “I see tangible output. But not enough.”
It is easy to look at the UN’s annual Cops and say nothing happens – in the words of Greta Thunberg, “blah blah blah”. But before the 2015 Paris agreement, the world was headed for more than 5C of heating – a level that would leave the world unrecognisable. Ten years later, the projection – if all current commitments are fulfilled – is for 2.7C of heating.…
COPs are a success, Jim, just not as we know it.
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If Simon Stiell really believes all this he’s completely deluded. For example, it’s been obvious for some time that, unless the IPCC’s 2018 Special Report got it wrong, the Paris 1.5ºC target is completely unachievable. Surely he knows that? And his idea that China has somehow ‘gained access to billions in investment and reaped bumper profits, by turning to clean energy and a green transformation‘ is plainly ridiculous. Perhaps he’s simply trying to keep his (and Guardian readers) spirits up.
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Perhaps he’s simply trying to keep his (and Guardian readers) spirits up.
Or perhaps he’s trying to justify the ongoing existence of his job!
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Stiell said “We need to find all the levers that are available to us, to see how we can accelerate further.”
Funny how a little comment like that reminded me of “the Numskulls” from comics many years ago. As I remember them from 50 odd years ago, they ran around your brain pulling levers & causing chaos for the “person” they inhabit. Very appropriate with regards to the Stiell comment.
Seems they have been updated, but still around – Meet the Numskulls | Characters from the Beano Comic | Beano.com
ps – from that link, bet Stiell Numskull is – “Brainy is in charge of the brain. It’s up to him to listen to the other Numskulls and try to get them to do what’s best for you. That doesn’t always work out too well, though!”
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“‘A heavy burden’: Belém residents evicted in rush for profits from Cop30 rentals
As the Brazilian city prepares to host 50,000 delegates, local people are being pushed from their homes”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/22/belem-residents-evicted-to-make-way-for-cop30-rentals
The two-bedroom apartment in Belém became Suelen Freitas’s home in 2020, when she moved her family to the same building as her elderly mother. On the edge of the Amazon rainforest, it was where her story played out for five years, from enduring the Covid pandemic, to watching her two children get into the university.
But in March everything changed. An eviction notice gave them and their neighbours 30 days to vacate their apartments. One by one, all 12 families were forced out. “It was very painful,” Freitas said.
The reason, she was told, was that the building’s owner planned to convert all of the flats into short-term rentals for Cop30, the annual climate summit which is scheduled to take place in the Brazilian city in November.
This year’s summit, which began with an idealistic dream that the world would come to see the climate crisis for themselves in the rainforest, is increasingly enmeshed in anger and recriminations over sky-high accommodation costs and accusations that poorer countries are being forced out of the meetings….
…It was clear from the beginning that Belém would not have enough hotel rooms for the 50,000-odd people expected to attend the summit, so resorting to private homes was always a condition for the event to happen. But the way it has played out has in some cases been unfortunate.
Giovana Silva moved with her husband to a three-bedroom house with a back yard in February 2024, when the couple decided to start a family.
A year into the three-year fixed-rate lease, however, the landlord approached them. In exchange for agreeing to vacate the house in November, Silva and her husband were offered about a tenth of the landlord’s expected profits from Cop30 rentals.
The verbal agreement included some remodelling of the property, which was supposed to last a week. Instead, it dragged on for almost three months. “The worst part was being confined to our bedroom, the only part of the house that remained undisturbed,” Silva said….
Never mind, the tens of thousands of people who descend on the venue for each succeeding COP are saving the planet, they’re the good guys (and girls), so it’s worth the pain, surely….
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“‘Science demands action’: world leaders and UN push climate agenda forward despite Trump’s attacks
Leaders unveil new targets to cut planet-heating pollution after Trump called climate crisis a ‘con job’”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/24/world-leaders-united-nations-climate-agenda
The realism is left to the very end of the article:
…Regardless of the latest round of announced emissions cuts, known as nationally determined contributions (or NDCs), the world is still on course to blow past 1.5C, a situation that countries vulnerable to sea level rise and other threats consider to be existential.
“Many of them need to be better,” said Tina Stege, climate envoy of the Marshall Islands, of the pledges. “There has to be a real honest assessment that they won’t be. We already know that these will not get us to where we need to be.”
Governments will convene in Belém, Brazil, in an attempt to bridge this shortfall in November, although delegations may be shrunken due to a lack of available hotel rooms in the Amazon city.
Juan Carlos Navarro, Panama’s minister of the environment, said that the logistics of Cop30 have been “a nightmare” and that he has scant optimism of a positive outcome in Brazil. “To be frank, I have seen a lot of hot air and BS and very little progress,” he said.
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The FT this morning:
Keir Starmer has no plans to attend COP30 climate summit in Brazil
Final decision has yet to be made amid ‘big fight inside government’ over trip by prime minister
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Robin,
Starmer has to be one of the worst ever UK Prime Ministers for strutting around on the world stage, trying to look big while making no difference to anything, and all the while ignoring the manifest problems at home. Right now, though, going to COP30 would be – and would look like – a catastrophic error of judgement. As well as playing badly with the UK public, he might return to find that he’s on the verge of ceasing to be PM.
I wonder which will prevail – hubris or common sense?
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“‘History will remember who showed up’: Keir Starmer faces call to attend Cop30 summit
Response from leaders and key climate figures comes after PM’s aides advised non-attendance over concerns Reform may attack him”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/26/keir-starmer-faces-call-to-attend-cop30-summit
Worth reading, for the great deal of delusional thinking on show.
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In the Christian world there is a famous prayer known as the Serenity Prayer [Ref. 1]. In one of its versions it reads as follows:-
“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” The prayer is popular, according to Wikipedia, amongst self-help groups such as Alcoholics Anonymous.
A similar thought was expressed by Schiller, “Blessed is he, who has learned to bear what he cannot change, and to give up with dignity, what he cannot save.” [Ref. 1].
I wonder whether, in the context of the series of COP conflabs, the Serenity Prayer is useful for sorting the sheep from the goats i.e. for distinguishing those people/governments/organisations who, on the one hand, are addicted to their anti-CO2 policies (and the subsidies that those policies extract from the public purse) from those, if any, who are there to promote more constructive and effective policies.
Even after many COP conferences, the Keeling curve of CO2 concentration goes ever upward [Ref. 2] indicating that the COPs have been useless at halting (let alone reversing) the rise of atmospheric CO2 concentration; the Serenity Prayer indicates that such people/governments/organisations should “accept the things [they] cannot change” or should, with Schiller, “… Give up with dignity, what [they] cannot save.”
References
Regards, John C.
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Mark – thanks for the link. As you say worth a read. Will only give 2 partial quotes –
“Simon Stiell, the UN’s climate chief, said: “Cop30 is where leaders are expected to come and roll up their sleeves, make deals to help their nation’s economy transition faster, creating more jobs, and guide the world on what next steps we take together.””
“Sir David King, the former chief scientific adviser to the government, said: “The attendance of world leaders on the first day of Cop30 is vital to set the trend of the meeting. A very good example is the commitment of the UK to reduce emissions by 81% by 2035, made by Starmer at the last Cop. This needs to be reiterated by the prime minister in Brazil, to persuade other countries to make similar major commitments.””
As you say “delusional thinking on show”. Can’t make up my mind if they actually believe the nonsense they spout, or just keep repeating the same old tired mantra because they can’t face real world reality.
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dfhunter, for some reason your quote regarding Sir David King made me think of Keat’s poem ‘Ode to a Nightingale’, specifically this section, “The voice I hear this passing night was heard / In ancient days by emperor and clown: / Perhaps the self-same song that found a path / Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home, / She stood in tears amidst the alien corn”. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44479/ode-to-a-nightingale
Sir David is no emperor, but perhaps he cannot face your ‘real world reality’ and, in a sense, has therefore to play the clown. By contrast, I suspect that there are several of us here at Cliscep who are sad at heart given the continuing multiple stupidities of the alien corn that is Net Zero. Regards, John C.
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Very nicely put John – thank you.
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John Cullen – funnily enough, your apt Serenity Prayer comment made me think of Desiderata: Original Text which I went back and read again, as I do every few years to ground myself.
It’s an uplifting poem, but that makes it not really appropriate for this thread.
Or maybe the last few lines are – “And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.”
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dfhunter,
Yes, I remember ‘Desiderata’ from university days, some 50 years ago. It was very popular. And I particularly remember the final exhortations about being cheerful and striving to be happy.
For myself in the here and now, I will certainly strive to be happy … but I am not yet cheerful (by a long chalk) but I can, I think, anticipate the beginnings of cheerfulness as the Net Zero world starts to fall apart under the weight of its internal inconsistencies and its self-serving demand for ever increasing subsidies. Regards, John C.
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An examination of the UNFCCC’s NDC Register shows that the following big emitters, having failed to submit updated NDCs by the original February deadline, failed also to submit them by the extended September deadline: China, the EU (including of course Germany a big emitter), India, Indonesia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, South Africa, Australia and Turkey. These countries are the source of 54% of emissions. And, to reflect current reality, the USA’s 11% should probably be added.
This is a dreadful outcome. The Paris Agreement was designed on the basis of a progressive ratcheting up of planned emission reductions. And that’s completely failed. It doesn’t bode at all well for COP30 – billed as the ‘implementation COP’.
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Robin,
I have now found an English-language version of the updated NDC filed by the Russian Federation. It is a complete joke, especially in the context of their ongoing war against Ukraine. If I can summon up the enthusiasm, I might write something about it.
However, your point is very valid. Whither now, COPs?
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Mark,
Of course the whole NDC outcome is really much worse than I indicated. I looked only at countries that emitted over 1% of the global total but of course there are many smaller emitters that failed to submit in time. Moreover the submissions of some of those that did submit something (e.g. Russia and Brazil) were inadequate.
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The Conversation has published two articles both of which allow comments and both of which are directly relevant to this thread. They can be accessed HERE and HERE. Clisceppers might be interested to see my contributions and perhaps add some of their own.
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Robin,
I see the authors of those articles at the Conversation haven’t bothered to respond to comments. And China still hasn’t filed its updated NDC.
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No Mark they haven’t. And one in particular should have been especially interesting.
One of the authors of the first TC article to which I referred above was Professor Myles Allen, Head of Atmospheric, Oceanic and Planetary Physics, University of Oxford and, like me, an alumnus of St John’s College Oxford. I used an extract from the article to set out my view (supported by clear evidence) that, if the 2018 IPCC Special Report on 1.5ºC got it right, there is no chance of the world keeping warming below 2°C. If correct that would be hugely significant – not least because many ‘experts’ and international authorities still seem to believe that the 1.5ºC target is achievable.
It’s especially interesting because Myles Allen was a Coordinating Lead Author of the Special Report. It seemed to me therefore that his view on this could be revealing. So I specifically addressed my comment to him – even mentioning that we were fellow alumni of St John’s. I posted the comment yesterday morning. This morning however he hadn’t replied. So I sent a reminder just two hours ago. And what happened? TC closed comments.
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Mark / Robin, I am still going at the second of The Conversation articles you linked to, Robin. Regards, John C.
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I am not signed in to the Conversation, so can’t comment there. The level of debate from the consensus defenders is lamentably poor. I see one individual, who provides no evidence for his claim that renewables are cheaper than fossil fuels if you take “the cost of carbon” into account, dismisses the closely-argued and referenced views of retired engineer, John Cullen as the views of someone who knows nothing about renewable energy (!); and finally, for good measure, casually dismisses the views of Sir Dieter Helm (author of a government -commissioned report on UK energy and Professor of Economic Policy at the University of Oxford), demands further evidence, all the while providing none of his own. Some conversation!
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Mark (and John),
I’m glad and interested to see that John is continuing to fight the good fight. But it’s a pity that he’s having to do so with somebody called ‘john lasonia’ and not with Will de Freitas, the author of the article under discussion. That authors rarely deign to respond BTL is one of TC’s many problems.
Which brings me back to the Myles Allen article. What do you make of comments being closed there just after I posted a polite question?
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Well, we mustn’t be too conspiracy theorist, but it does make you wonder if closing comments wasn’t a response to comments going “the wrong way”.
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Perhaps so Mark. I have no idea why it happened and like you am suspicious of conspiracy theories. But I was genuinely disappointed: I think the apparent probability that we have missed the Paris ‘well below 2ºC’ target is important and, as Allen was a Coordinating Lead Author of the Special Report on which I base my argument, I saw this as an opportunity for a really interesting exchange. I’ll probably email him – noting that it was unfortunate that comments were closed before he had an opportunity to answer my question – but somehow that’s not as good as a public discussion.
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Mark,
I fear that, like John, you may come to regret your decision to start an exchange with ‘john lasonia’. He doesn’t play by the rules that you and I recognise.
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Robin,
People like John Lasonia at the Conversation are all too typical of alarmists. Present them with evidence and they refuse to accept it, demanding more, while providing none of their own. Then they declare that they are right and you are simply pushing a fossil fuel company-funded narrative.
The only consolation is that it encourages me to think that if that’s the best they can do, then we sceptics must be on to something.
It might be fun if Jaime joined in over there!
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I’ve been tempted to join in but decided it would achieve nothing. I’m content to have posted the opening comment (about China’s failure to publish an updated NDC) which I think goes to the heart of the subject article. My regret of course is that – as usual – the author hasn’t chosen to respond.
I think I may post a comment – again addressed to Will de Freitas – pointing out that my comment amounts to a direct criticism of his article and that surely he’s going to defend it. Or something like that.
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An excellent ‘last word’ Mark!
PS: I’m about to post my comment to Will de Freitas.
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A very silly title:
“Starmer can help shape the future of the world at Cop30. He can’t let fear of Farage stop him”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/oct/02/starmer-cop30-climate-summit-brazil
But interesting that reality is nevertheless dawning:
…Lula knows he has a problem. Cop30 is one of those once-every-five-years moments under the Paris agreement when countries must bring their new climate targets, so-called nationally determined contributions or NDCs. But we already know that the NDCs are not strong enough to achieve the Paris goals of holding global warming to 1.5C or 2C above preindustrial levels.
Last week the world’s largest carbon polluter, China, announced its new targets. President Xi Jinping said China would cut its emissions by 7-10% from peak levels by 2035. But this is far from the cut of 30% over 2021 levels which analysts believe would be consistent with a global path to net zero after 2050. For the EU, Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, confirmed that the EU will cut its emissions by somewhere between 66% and 72% on 1990 levels by 2035 – but opposition from key member states left her unable to commit to the higher figure.
The UK’s NDC was announced a year ago at Cop29 by Starmer himself, standing alongside Ed Miliband. Aiming to cut nationally produced emissions by at least 81% on 1990 levels by 2035, the UK’s target is one of the few which analysts say is consistent with a global 1.5C pathway.
Later this month, the UN will publish an official assessment adding up all the NDCs. But after China’s announcement, we know that the world will be heading for much more than 2C of warming – probably closer to 2.5C...
…So Cop30 has a huge task: to get the world back on track to 1.5/2C. The only problem is that it can’t do this. The Paris agreement was a compromise between collective agreement on climate goals and “nationally determined contributions” to achieve them. The clue is in the name: these are not subject to scrutiny or criticism by anyone else. The “emissions gap” will not even be on the formal conference agenda. China, India and Saudi Arabia are insisting that the Paris agreement forbids negotiators from discussing it.…
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John,
I admire the way you’re continuing to plug away on that TC thread.
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But ‘john lasonIa’ has not given up posting his absurd and evidence free comments. Far from it. I suggest John, that you either forget about him or follow Mark’s example and give him the strong critical blast that he deserves.
PS: still no reply from Will de Freitas.
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Yes, Robin, I agree. I have just posted my last offering on that conversation at The Conversation. I essentially (i) promoted the EROEI message in the Weissbach/Turver graph, and (ii) summarised Lasonia’s arguments as essentially religious dogma rather than science/economics.
On a technical matter, the pagination at The Conversation can be weird for me. It often omits spaces thereby scrunching up my text, and it even posts my replies in different but adjacent Reply boxes to those I thought I was replying in! Bizarre … but it is not the first time that has happened to me there. I will need to be even more careful there in future.
Regards, John C.
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Well done John: a good final offering. Unsurprisingly he hasn’t given up. I’m glad I trusted my instincts and kept out of it.
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Yes, you can only bang you head against a brick wall for so long before it starts to hurt.
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The TC article has closed for comments. And the author, Will de Freitas (TC’s UK Environment and Energy Editor) hasn’t replied to my second comment addressed to him. Posted it 24 hours ago, here’s what I said:
His failure to reply is pathetic (disgraceful?) and confirms my negative view of The Conversation.
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Of the sixteen big emitters (over 1% of emissions) only six (the USA, Russia, Brazil, Japan, Canada and Mexico) posted an NDC before the deadline. But of course the USA’s can be ignored and now we know thanks to Mark’s excellent analysis that Russia’s is essentially meaningless. And what’s left – Brazil, Japan, Canada and Mexico (in total the source of 7% of global emissions) are hardly key players. This completely undermines the only genuine achievement of the ‘landmark’ Paris Agreement: the concept of steadily increasing pledges.
Prospects for COP30 are looking increasingly grim.
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Just had a look at his Conversation bio – Will de Freitas
Environment + Energy Editor – Will de Freitas helped to establish The Conversation in the UK. Previously, he worked on data projects for the Guardian’s Global Development website, and for three years worked in ministerial offices at Whitehall.
“Academic rigour, journalistic flair” at it’s most pathetic.
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Just had a read of that Will de Freitas Conversation post comments.
John C – top marks for staying cool while that troll could only reply with the usual “fossil fuel companies continue to feed misinformation” playbook answers.
Liked this from him/her that put you in your place –
“John lasonia – Your problem is you lack critical thinking skills. Renewable electricity is still electricity. You have been indoctrinated by fossil fuel misinformation. Fortunately some of us have critical thinking skills and see through their misinformation. You have fun. I will follow science and facts.”
God help us if that’s the childish mentality the Conversation allows in comments.
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“The Guardian view on Cop30: Starmer must stop havering and announce that he’s going to Brazil
With global heating on a dangerous trajectory, it would be unforgivable for the prime minister to miss the summit in Belém”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/oct/08/the-guardian-view-on-cop30-starmer-must-stop-havering-and-announce-that-hes-going-to-brazil
...The UK is one of the world’s biggest polluters historically, due to its early industrialisation and its empire. But the climate policies of the last two decades have been ambitious compared with other wealthy countries, and the UK’s NDC is one of the few that climate analysts regard as helping to keep the 1.5C goal in view. All of which makes it even more important that Sir Keir should be in Brazil, in person, standing up for evidence-based policy in multilateral climate talks.
Cop30 comes at a fraught moment for climate politics in Britain. The Tories’ promise to repeal the Climate Change Act was populist posturing, aimed at pandering to an anti-science, Trumpian right. Labour must not flinch. It has been reported that Sir Keir’s aides are advising against going to Belém, fearing backlash from Reform UK. Retreat would be cowardly and wrong. Sir Keir should instead reaffirm his commitment to national targets and the Cop process – confident that shifting to renewable energy is both right and popular.
Sir Keir is, of course, not the only leader who should be making travel plans. The leaders of Australia and Canada both made climate policies part of their pitches to voters in recent elections. They too should be heading for Belém, as should the leaders of the EU, China, India and Japan. As the former UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon noted, attendance is not ceremonial but a test of leadership. He warned that the world was watching – and said that history would remember who showed up.…
I would like the Guardian to explain exactly what difference will be made by Starmer’s presence – what could it achieve? Also, why it’s more important for him to be there, where his views count for nothing, than (for once) being at home dealing with all the urgent issues facing the UK.
Meanwhile, I note there’s still no sign of China, India or the EU registering their updated NDCs with the UN. In fact, nobody has registered an updated NDC with the UN since Kyrgyzstan did so 6 days ago. The small amount of faltering momentum that seemed to be generated by some tiny CO2 emitters updating their NDCs over the period of a week or two seems to have collapsed now.
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Thanks Mark – interesting. I thought it might be useful to compile a list of all UNFCCC Parties emitting more that 0.5% of global GHGs (according to EDGAR) showing (Y/N) whether or not they have registered an updated NDC by September 2025. Here it is (+ percentage shares of global total):
China – N 29.20%
USA – Y (but this is pre Trump) 11.11%
India – N 8.22%
Russia – Y (but see Mark’s analysis) 4.84%
Indonesia – N 2.49%
Brazil – Y 2.44%
Japan – Y 2.00%
Iran – N 1.98%
Saudi Arabia – N 1.56%
Canada – Y 1.44%
Mexico – Y 1.29%
Germany – N (EU joint NDC) 1.27%
South Korea – N 1.26%
Australia – N 1.11%
Vietnam – N 1.10%
Turkey – N 1.09%
South Africa – N 1.07%
Pakistan – Y 0.99%
Thailand – N 0.79%
Iraq – N 0.78%
Egypt – N 0.73%
UK – Y 0.73%
France – N (EU joint NDC) 0.71%
Argentina – N 0.70%
Nigeria – Y 0.66%
Poland – N (EU joint NDC) 0.65%
Kazakhstan – N 0.62%
Malaysia – N 0.62%
Taiwan – N 0.58%
Spain – N (EU joint NDC) 0.54%
Note: Taiwan is not listed for NDCs but an ‘N’ assumed here.
Not very impressive. And it doesn’t bode well for COP30. Also I suspect some of the Ys may like Russia not stand up to detailed analysis.
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Note: my post above has been significantly altered to include countries that were missing and to include each country’s percentage of global GHG emissions.
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This diagram from the Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit displays an almost unbelievable degree of misunderstanding, wishful thinking and delusion:
COP30: A visual guide Everything you need to know about this year’s UN climate summit in Belém, Brazil.
I think we know the answer.
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“Brazil to ask countries at Cop30 to vastly increase biofuel use, leak suggests
Exclusive: Document sets draft pledge for leaders gathering at climate summit to increase use of controversial fuels”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/oct/16/brazil-ask-countries-quadruple-biofuel-use-leak-suggests
Brazil will ask countries to quadruple the global use of “sustainable fuels”, including controversial biofuels, despite concerns from environmental experts, the Guardian has learned.
A leaked document seen by the Guardian sets out a draft pledge for world leaders gathering for the Cop30 climate conference next month in Brazil to increase the use of “sustainable fuels” – chiefly biofuels and biogas, but also hydrogen – in the next decade by four times compared with 2024 levels.
Brazil is the world’s second-largest producer of ethanol, one of several types of biofuel. It argues in the document that biofuels – made from a wide variety of organic matter such as sugar cane in the case of ethanol – will displace fossil fuels and that they represent a benefit to the climate and environment.
But this is disputed by green experts and campaigners, who point out that biofuel production is resulting in increased deforestation in many regions, leading to the replacement of land that is rich in species with monocultures, and reducing the land available for food production. A study by the Transport and Environment thinktank, published this month, shows that at present “biofuels are responsible globally for 16% more CO2 emissions than the fossil fuels they replace due to the indirect impacts of farming and deforestation”....
It hasn’t even started, and already it’s going badly. By the way – note to Guardian editors. Brazil isn’t simply the world’s second-largest producer of ethanol:
https://brazilenergyinsight.com/2025/08/11/brazil-sets-new-oil-and-gas-production-record-with-4-9-million-barrels-per-day/
It’s yet another ironic location for a COP.
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Moving goalposts…..
According to an article on Jo Nova’s site, there are claims that the Paris Agreement is working as we are – apparently – on track for only 2.6 degrees of warming instead of the 4 degrees forecast by the models.
https://joannenova.com.au/2025/10/theyre-looking-for-an-escape-hatch-from-the-climate-scam-the-paris-agreement-is-starting-to-work/
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I suppose this was supposed to be the warm-up act for COP30:
“Landmark deal to cut global shipping emissions in tatters after US pressure”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3vnl0yxg53o
Not the best of starts, then.
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“Keir Starmer will attend Cop30 in Brazil, No 10 confirms
After speculation and conflicting pressures, prime minister will attend climate summit next month”
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/oct/20/keir-starmer-will-attend-cop30-in-brazil-no-10-belem
I never doubted it for a moment. The man’s in the air more than he is in the UK. I could be wrong, but I doubt if any previous PM has spent so much time abroad. He and I are of a similar age, yet my lifetime carbon footprint won’t come close to his since he became PM.
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“Brazil grants oil exploration licence in Amazon region”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cm2735yp75ko
Brazil’s state oil firm has received a licence to conduct exploratory oil drilling in the sea off the Amazon, despite environmental concerns about the project.
The approval will allow Petrobras to drill in a block located in Amapá, 500km (311 miles) from the mouth of the Amazon River on the Brazilian Equatorial Margin.
The company said it had demonstrated to the government that it had robust environmental protection structures in place.
But many conservationists have raised concerns about plans, including fears that any oil spills would be in proximity, via sea currents, to the Amazon, which is home to around 10% of the world’s known species.
Groups such as Greenpeace have also raised concerns it could undermine Brazil’s climate leadership ahead of hosting the COP30 climate summit in the Amazonian city of Belém in November.…
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Ten years and 9 COPs later, this seems pretty topical:
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Posted this link on another post, but seems relevant here as well –
Bill Gates is suddenly skeptical: pivots away from climate doom and renewables « JoNova
Which links to “A new way to look at the problem, Three tough truths about climate
What I want everyone at COP30 to know.
By Bill Gates published 18 hours ago – A new approach for the world’s climate strategy | Bill Gates
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“‘Trump doesn’t represent us’: US activist groups to push for climate action at Cop30 in Brazil”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/oct/28/cop30-us-climate-trump
Despite historic environmental rollbacks under a president who pulled the US from a key international climate treaty – and recently called global warming “the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world” – US civil society groups say they are gearing up to push for bold international climate action at a major UN conference next month.
“This is a really important moment to illustrate that Trump does not represent the entirety, or even anywhere near a majority, of us,” said Collin Rees, US program manager at the environmental non-profit Oil Change International, who will attend the annual UN climate conference, known as Cop30....
Yes, but Trump won the Presidential election, so he does represent the USA on the international stage. It’s called democracy.
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The UN Secretary General António Guterres has generously given his only pre COP30 interview to the Guardian. And it was most interesting. Essentially he said that humanity will ‘overshoot’ the Paris 1.5ºC target and that means ‘devastating consequences’. Therefore the priority at COP30 was to ensure ‘the overshoot is as short as possible’.
But how might that be achieved? Well, he indicated that emissions must be cut by 60% – failing it seems to understand that the idea of a 60% cut by 2030 is completely absurd. He seemed to think that the problem was all the fault of greedy lobbyists – not the policies of the governments of nearly all major global economies. The answer he said was for world leaders to be ‘schooled by Indigenous peoples’ – I wonder if that would include the indigenous people of Western Europe?
He really is a waste of space.
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It’s ramping up at the BBC now, as it does every year at this time of year:
“What is COP30 and why does it matter?”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c04gqez4lkyo
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Mark – thanks for the BBC link. A few quotes harking back to the heady days of the Paris climate agreement in 2015 –
“COP30 is taking place ten years after the Paris climate agreement, in which countries pledged to try to restrict the rise in global temperatures to 1.5C.”
“In Paris in 2015, nearly 200 countries agreed to try to limit global temperature rises to 1.5C above “pre-industrial” levels of the late 1800s, and keep them “well below” 2C. There is very strong scientific evidence that the impacts of climate change – from extreme heat to sea-level rise – would be far greater at 2C than at 1.5C.
But while the use of renewable energy – particularly solar power – is growing at a rapid pace, countries’ climate plans have consistently fallen short of what is needed to meet the 1.5C goal.”
“Under the Paris agreement, countries were supposed to have submitted updated plans ahead of COP30 detailing how they will cut their emissions of planet-warming gases.
But only a third of countries have done so.”
“Despite the difficulties of delivering the 1.5C warming limit agreed at COP21 in Paris, the commitment has driven “near-universal climate action”, according to the UN. This has helped bring down the level of anticipated warming – even though the world is still not acting at anywhere near the pace needed to achieve the Paris goals.”
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dfhunter,
I think it’s fair to say that the final paragraph contains misinformation. BBC Verify might struggle to identify near-universal climate action.
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Not so, Mark. The continuing global increase in GHG emissions may not be what the BBC has in mind, but surely it’s near-universal climate action?
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“No high-level US representatives will go to UN climate talks, Trump officials say
Decision to stay away from Cop30 meeting in Brazil underscores administration’s hostility to climate action”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/oct/31/cop30-climate-us-officials
The Trump administration has confirmed that no high-level representatives will be sent by the US to upcoming UN climate talks in Brazil, underscoring the administration’s hostile stance towards action on the climate crisis.
The US has always sent delegations of various sizes to UN climate summits over the past three decades, even during periods under George W Bush and in Donald Trump’s first term, where there was scant desire to address the global heating crisis.
But the talks in Belém next month are set to be devoid of an official American presence to an extent never seen before. Trump has called the climate crisis a “hoax” and a “con job” and has said the US will withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, which calls for countries to limit the dangerous global temperature rise.
“The Green New Scam would have killed America if President Trump had not been elected to implement his commonsense energy agenda – which is focused on utilizing the liquid gold under our feet to strengthen our grid stability and drive down costs for American families and businesses,” Taylor Rogers, a White House spokeswoman, said in a statement to the Guardian….
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This article by Chris Morrison in the Daily Skeptic may well be the defining comment on COP30:
100,000 Rainforest Trees Likely to Have Died In Vain as COP30 Faces Brutal Net Zero Reality
Things just ain’t what they used to be
An extract:
For a spot of genuine entertainment, read it in full.
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The mayor of West Yorkshire is among those to have parachuted in to save the world. I’m sure her taxpayers see that as great value for money. Mail link.
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Whatever happens at COP30, it can’t be denied that the BBC is doing its best to rally the troops:
“How climate change worsens heatwaves, droughts, wildfires and floods”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy4dgp1p3p1o
No good news in the article, just bad news, and lots of it.
Also:
“What is COP30 and why does it matter for climate change?”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c04gqez4lkyo
and:
“What is the Paris agreement and why does 1.5C matter?”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c93d59d4zy1o
As the last one shows, it first appeared in December 2015, but was “updated” on 4th November 2025.
That’s three articles appearing on the BBC website yesterday and today. Expect a lot more once COP30 actually starts.
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“Experts call for new taxes on worst polluters to help poorer nations with climate crisis
Report to be discussed at Cop30 says global agreements should target carbon intensive activities and ‘ultra high net worth individuals’”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/05/wealth-and-fossil-fuel-taxes-to-fund-aid-for-poorer-states
New taxes on the super-rich, fossil fuels, financial transactions and highly polluting and carbon-intensive activities should be explored as key ways of raising the finance needed to help poor countries, governments have been told in an influential report.
The proposal is one of the top recommendations of a new blueprint for global climate finance, the Baku to Belém roadmap, drawn up by the governments of Brazil and Azerbaijan, the current and the previous president of the UN climate Cop process.
In a surprisingly strong intervention, they call for “strengthened international cooperation on taxation, and experiments with voluntary partnerships between countries on, for example, sector-based contributions, highly polluting and greenhouse gas intensive activities, financial transactions and ultra high net worth individuals”.
They add the caveat that countries should “carefully consider potential negative impacts on development priorities and trade and redistribution mechanisms”.
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A BBC report from Brazil:
COP30: World leaders take aim at Trump for climate inaction
Gulp … that sounds serious. Until, that is, you read that ‘Many leaders from the world’s largest nations – India, Russia, US and China – are notably absent from this year’s summit’ and that ‘Only a few dozen leaders have turned up here in Belém, and a majority of countries have failed to submit new plans to cut carbon emissions …’
However:
Chile and Columbia are the source of a mere 0.6% of global emissions. I don’t think Trump is likely be too concerned about their views.
But wait:
This whole boondoggle is utterly pathetic. I suspect Starmer may be having doubts about the wisdom of his decision to attend.
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Robin,
Starmer might be ruing the fact that he isn’t rubbing shoulders with the big boys in Brazil (because they’re not there) but his addiction to strutting about on the world stage is unabated (the man is rarely at home – ironically enough, given his claims about climate change and the need for net zero). And, as you know, I also think he’s utterly self-indoctrinated about net zero. He might be upset that the big hitters aren’t there, but I’m sure he’s gaining consolation from being the main “climate leader” present. I bet he’s loving it. He should, however, beware a Jim Callaghan moment when he emerges from his plane on (no doubt briefly) returning home:
Crisis? What crsisis?
Britain is in a mess. It’s facing a severe financial crisis, among others. The so-called climate crisis is dropping off the radar for most ordinary people. To paraphrase the gilet jaunes:
Starmer and MIliband worry about the end of the world. We worry about the end of the week.
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“Net zero is an insidious loophole that distracts from the scientific imperative to eliminate fossil fuels
History tells us that polite incrementalism and political kowtowing will prevail at Cop30 – even as catastrophe unfolds around us”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/nov/07/net-zero-distracts-from-scientific-imperative-to-eliminate-fossil-fuels-cop30
As world leaders gather in Brazil this year for Cop30 – the first Amazonian Cop – it’s worth doing a quick reality check on how we are collectively tracking to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions.
Despite 30 years of UN climate summits, about half of the carbon dioxide accumulated in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution has been emitted since 1990. Incidentally, 1990 was the year the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – the global authority on climate change science – released its First Assessment Report confirming the threat of human-caused global warming....
…In the avalanche of technical reports released before Cop30, the World Meteorological Organization stated that CO2 concentrations reached a record high of 423.9 parts per million in 2024, with the growth rate from 2023 to 2024 surging by the largest yearly increase since modern measurements began in 1957. The latest figures from Global Carbon Project show that 90% of total global CO2 emissions in 2024 were generated from the burning of fossil fuels, with the remaining 10% coming from land-use changes including deforestation and wildfires.
While the growth in fossil CO2 emissions in 2024 was driven by increases in gas and oil – together accounting for just over half of global emissions – the burning of coal reached a record high, accounting for 41%. ...
…To limit the magnitude and the duration of overshoot of the Paris Agreement temperature goals, ultimately the world needs to go well beyond the neutralising effect of net zero and begin to drawdown cumulative historical emissions to achieve “net negative emissions”.…
…our leaders [must] have the courage to put a price on carbon to bring the era of fossil fuels to a definitive end…
A strange mixture of hard data and (IMO) fantasy.
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“Who are the major players at Cop30 and what do they want?
Delegates from global giants and smaller nations expected to clash at Brazilian summit over how to tackle the climate crisis and who should pay”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/06/who-are-the-major-players-at-cop30-and-what-do-they-want
Some interesting nuggets:
…Brazil is the world’s 10th biggest economy and has risen to become the eighth biggest exporter of oil and gas..
…Technically, NDCs are not on the mandated agenda for Cop30. But Brazil cannot avoid discussing them and without a clear answer on how these inadequate plans will somehow be rescued and the world put on a path to 1.5C, it is hard to see how Cop30 could be a success...
…What is more concerning for participants is that the US president may try to wreak havoc from afar. At recent meetings of the International Maritime Organization, dealing with a potential carbon levy on shipping and a framework for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the sector, the US used tactics of “bullying and intimidation”, according to many countries present. Delegates received threatening phone calls and emails and were told if they voted for the proposals retaliation would extend not just to trade measures such as tariffs but would also target individuals, for instance through visa revocations.…
…China missed the early deadlines for presenting its NDC but fulfilled Xi’s promise to deliver it before the start of Cop30. The plan was a disappointment. China agreed to cut emissions only by between 7% and 10% of their peak by 2035. That is a long way off the 30% that experts say is necessary...
…Coal is a mainstay – Narendra Modi, the [Indian] prime minister, celebrated the production of the billionth tonne of coal earlier this year …
…[EU] Officials had to stay up late on Tuesday night as their political masters squabbled – because even with Cop30 imminent, member states could not agree on the EU target for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. For Brussels, long the global champion of climate action, without which there would be no Paris agreement, taking so long to agree its NDC was extraordinary.…In the end, the NDC was underwhelming…
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“Rich countries have lost enthusiasm for tackling climate crisis, says Cop30 chief”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/10/rich-countries-have-lost-enthusiasm-for-tackling-climate-crisis-says-cop30-chief
Another illustration of failure is contained in this Guardian wail of despair:
…As the conference begins, the Guardian can reveal that one key climate pledge is already being undermined. At Cop26 in Glasgow in 2021, the UK, the US, the EU and other countries forged the global methane pledge, requiring a cut in methane of 30% by 2030. About 159 countries subsequently signed up.
Yet emissions from some of the main signatories have increased, data from the satellite analysis company Kayrros shows, which is likely to further raise global temperatures. Collectively, emissions from six of the biggest signatories – the US, Australia, Kuwait, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Iraq – are now 8.5% above the 2020 level.
Kuwait and Australia have made progress on cutting their emissions but emissions from US oil and gas operations have increased by 18%.
Antoine Rostand, the president of Kayrros, said: “Despite the promises made year after year, despite the worsening state of the climate, methane emissions are rising. Our analysis makes that painfully clear. Can we expect things to change? We must at least hope they do. The clock is ticking.”…
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With some difficulty and prompting by me ChatGPT has just now produced a list of leaders of countries emitting over 0.5% of global who attended the pre-COP leaders’ meeting at Belém (6–7 Nov 2025). There were only 6 from a possible 31. Their countries were Brazil, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain and Mexico. Leaders did not attend from China, United States, India, Russia, Indonesia, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Australia, Canada, South Korea, Türkiye, South Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, Iraq, Egypt, South Africa, Argentina, Italy, Pakistan, Nigeria, Poland, Kazakhstan, Malaysia and Taiwan. The latter 25 countries are the source of about 77% of global GHG emissions. Not perhaps the best start to the ‘implementation’ COP.
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“Fight fake news and defeat climate deniers, Brazil’s Lula tells UN talks”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn51pn74l23o
...Addressing the conference, President Lula said “COP30 will be the COP of truth” in an era of “fake news and misrepresentation” and “rejection of scientific evidence”.
Without naming President Trump, President Lula continued, “they control the algorithms, sew hatred and spread fear“.
“It’s time to inflict a new defeat on the deniers,” he said….
Given the BBC’s current difficulties, and its part in spreading fake news and misinformation, not least around climate change, these are perhaps unfortunate words for Lula to use. Unfortunate, also for the BBC to lead with that in its choice of heading to its article about it. The ironies just keep piling up.
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“Ed Miliband to Make Two 12,000-Mile Trips to COP30 in Two Weeks”
https://dailysceptic.org/2025/11/11/ed-miliband-to-make-two-12000-mile-trips-to-cop30-in-two-weeks/
Ed Miliband is set to make the same 12,000-mile round trip twice in two weeks to attend COP30 – a climate conference to discuss reducing global CO2 emissions – at a cost to the taxpayer of an estimated £22,000.…
…By the time he has returned to Britain for a second time his four-leg plane journeys will have cost the taxpayer an estimated £22,000 – and created some six tons of CO2 emissions.
This amounts to the average annual carbon footprint for a whole household in the UK across an entire year....
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Another remarkable article by Tilak Doshi in the Climate Skeptic:
Trump’s Eisenhower Moment: COP30 and the End of Europe’s Green Agenda
Trump’s energy realism is ending Brussels’s grandiloquent claims to climate leadership
His opening paragraph:
If you read the rest in full you’ll be pleased you did so.
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Robin, president Eisenhower was on the money in other regards too! In his farewell address he warned us not only of the military-industrial complex but also of academics on the nation’s payroll:-
“The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocation, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded.
Yet in holding scientific discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwight_D._Eisenhower%27s_farewell_address
It is as though he foresaw the IPCC and all its mighty works. How foresightful – and a war hero too! Quite a man.
Perhaps I can hope for an Ozymandian finale, or “colossal wreck”, to the IPCC and its fellow travellers; or would that be too cruel?
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46565/ozymandias Regards, John C.
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“Row over definition of ‘gender’ hangs over Cop30 plans to support women
Advocates say conservative states’ push to define gender as ‘biological sex’ would backslide on decade-old language within the UN”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/13/row-over-definition-of-gender-hangs-over-cop30-plans-to-support-women
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The PLOP for COP30 is out – at least in summary form. I haven’t looked for a detailed breakdown as of yet. It could make entertaining reading. The headline figure is 56,118 attendees. Down about ten thousand on last year, but still the third biggest ever.
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Has it started, ended, still going?
Strange that this “existential” threat to the planet has been dropped from MSM news.
COP30: What is the climate meeting all about – BBC Newsround
Good old “BBC Climate editor Justin Rowlatt sent Newsround this report from Brazil.”
Wonder if the BBC has more “existential threats” to worry about.
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I’m always suspicious of anything with Carbon Brief’s fingerprints on it, but this is still interesting, and raises a wry smile from those of us who are sceptical of the whole COP process:
“China and Saudi Arabia among nations receiving climate loans, analysis reveals
Investigation by Guardian and Carbon Brief finds just a fifth of funds to fight global heating went to poorest 44 countries”
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2025/nov/14/china-and-saudi-arabia-among-nations-receiving-climate-loans-analysis-reveals
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It’s quite hard to understand how anyone can be quite as deluded as Christiana Figueres. See this report in the Independent:
Trump abandoning the climate opens door for China, says Paris deal chief
As the Cop30 climate conference opens in Brazil and 10 years after the key deal she brokered, Christiana Figueres speaks to Nick Ferris about why Beijing is stealing a march on the West when it comes to renewable energy – and why she is confident that the US will eventually return to the climate fold
An extract:
No comment needed.
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One of us should probably take a look at the PLOP list of attendees Jit mentioned in a comment above, not least because of things like this:
“Fossil fuel lobbyists outnumber all Cop30 delegations except Brazil, report says
One in every 25 participants at 2025 UN climate summit is a fossil fuel lobbyist, according to Kick Big Polluters Out”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/14/fossil-fuel-lobbyists-cop30
Who are the other 24 out of every 25, I wonder?
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“Cop30 was meant to be a turning point, so why do some say the climate summit is broken?
Swamped by lobbyists and hobbled by a lack of urgency, there are fears Cop could become a sprawling spectacle that betrays those who depend on it most”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/15/cop30-was-meant-to-be-a-turning-point-so-why-do-some-say-climate-summit-broken
…there are fears Cop could become a sprawling spectacle…
What planet are these people on? It has always been a sprawling spectacle.
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It sounds as if the organisation of the event is somewhat chaotic, according to WUWT.
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“Brazilian lawmakers seek to decimate green laws one week after hosting climate summit
Changes would damage President Lula’s efforts to cast Brazil as an environmental leader.”
https://www.politico.eu/article/brazilian-lawmakers-to-decimate-green-laws-one-week-after-hosting-climate-summit/
Brazilian lawmakers are pushing a historic rollback of environmental rules that would strip protections from the Amazon — less than a week after the country wraps up hosting the U.N. climate talks…..
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“Have courage to create fossil fuel phaseout roadmap at Cop30, Brazilian minister urges
Marina Silva says contentious plan would be ‘ethical answer’ to climate crisis but does not commit Brazil to it”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/16/have-courage-to-create-fossil-fuel-phaseout-roadmap-at-cop30-brazilian-minister-urges
Brazil’s environment minister, Marina Silva, has urged all countries to have the courage to address the need for a fossil fuel phaseout, calling the drawing up of a roadmap for it an “ethical” response to the climate crisis.
She emphasised, however, that the process would be voluntary for those governments that wished to participate, and “self-determined”....
…There is not enough time at Cop30 to draw up a roadmap, a process Silva said could take several years because many countries faced complex issues around dependence on fossil fuels, or wanted to use the proceeds from selling fossil fuels to finance their development.…
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“Can Cop30 begin the process of phasing out fossil fuels?
Ending use of coal, oil and gas is essential in tackling climate crisis – but even talking about it is controversial”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/16/can-cop30-begin-the-process-of-phasing-out-fossil-fuels
Surprising stuff from the Guardian – quite a frank, almost brutal, summary of the pointlessness of the COP process.
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What isn’t surprising Mark is that the Guardian‘s correspondents at Belém have only a superficial understanding of their subject. They rabbit on about how at at Cop28 conference in Dubai in 2023, Parties agreed in paragraph 28 of the ‘global stocktake’ to ‘transition away from fossil fuels’. But that didn’t happen: see the third paragraph of this thread’s subject article.
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Think my question above – “Strange that this “existential” threat to the planet has been dropped from MSM news” has been answered by the debacle it has turned into.
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dfhunter,
I’m hoping that the existential threat is to the COP gravy train. Imagine how much good could have been achieved if all the money spent by/on the tens of thousands who turn up each time over 30 years had been spent on something useful instead. And would greenhouse gas emissions really be any higher than they are now if no COPs had taken place? The UN has lost its way.
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This morning the Guardian has another article based firmly on misinterpretation of the ‘Dubai Stocktake’ agreed at COP28 in 2023:
Keeping promises on renewables, energy efficiency and methane ‘would avoid nearly 1C of global heating’
Analysis published at Cop30 summit shows adhering to pledges offer world hope of avoiding climate breakdown
What they have overlooked or deliberately ignored is that the so-called ‘promises’ are hedged about in the actual text by so much qualification that they are made virtually meaningless. (See the third paragraph of this thread’s subject article.
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This morning the BBC has published an article that illustrates perfectly how far journalists’ wishful thinking has drifted away from reality:
Fossil fuel emissions rise again – but renewables boom offers hope for climate
All this seemingly optimistic comment about how emissions are ‘growing less quickly’, have ‘flatlined’ and ‘could peak within the next few years’ seems to have completely forgotten that, in its 2018 Special Report, the IPCC recommended that global emissions should come down to 18.7 Gt of CO2 by 2030 to meet the 1.5ºC target. Global CO2 emissions today are 39.6 Gt. That means a 53% cut within the next 5 years – a world away from these observations.
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“China doesn’t want to lead alone on climate policies, senior adviser warns
Exclusive: A top official in Beijing’s Cop delegation says China is committed to clean energy – but US’s absence is a problem”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/19/china-doesnt-want-to-take-lead-on-climate-policies-alone-senior-adviser-warns
Possibly worth a read, but this is what jumped out at me:
...Wopke Hoekstra, climate commissioner for the EU, said China needed to take more responsibility for cutting carbon, adding: “China is by far the world’s largest emitter; according to the UN it is an upper middle income country. It is responsible for more than 30% of global emissions.
“So at the moment China is not doing what science expects it to do – that has effects way beyond China itself. That is why we would hope to see more Chinese ambition going forward.”... [My emphasis].
Did he speak clumsily in English? Did he speak in his native language and were his words clumsily translated? Or does he really believe that science expects anything to happen. Is science now to be the subject of anthropomorphism? I know that “the science” is being politicised, but dear, oh dear, oh dear.
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I didn’t have this on my bingo card:
“COP30 climate talks evacuated after fire breaks out“
Let’s hope everyone got out ok.
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Jit – I also hope everyone is OK, sounds like it from the article.
Wonder if Boitatá (this creature is a huge fire serpent that appears and attacks against those who harm the forests and animals of the Amazon) has been awoken – Boitatá | Myth and Folklore Wiki | Fandom
At least “A number of country delegations were forced to take shelter outside under the roof of a petrol station, a member of the UK delegation told the BBC.”.
How ironic.
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From the Guardian this morning:
Cop30 draft text omits mention of fossil fuel phase-out roadmap
Exclusive: Summit leadership releases new text despite 29 nations threatening to block progress without commitment
An extract:
In other words, the talks are getting nowhere. So, as always at COPs, negotiations will continue until a meaningless compromise is achieved. Or maybe this time the whole thing will collapse. Maybe.
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Yes Robin,
It looks as though COP30 is set to be an even more inglorious farce than usual:
“‘A lot of fighting’: Fossil fuel row breaks out at UN climate summit”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0q5ewew4geo
Obviously they’ll come up with a fudge at the last minute, because they always do, but surely it should be dawning by now on the people who attend these things that they’re utterly pointless.
Meanwhile, in La-La Land:
…Speaking to journalists outside the negotiating room, Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero Ed Miliband said the UK was determined to keep “alive” at the talks a plan to take further action on fossil fuels.…
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You have to wonder what other countries “Energy Security” delegates make of Ed?
Bananas springs to mind for some reason.
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dfh: I think it’s likely that some countries e.g. Russia and especially China will be delighted to see that Britain is determined to undermine its economy and thereby to play into their hands: LINK
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“Miliband urges Cop30 to find ‘creative’ routes to roadmap on phasing out fossil fuel”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/nov/21/miliband-cop30-creative-routes-roadmap-phase-out-fossil-fuel
He should be careful what he wishes for. How would he flown (twice!) to Belem without fossil fuels? What on earth will Starmer do? He seems to be in the air more than he’s at home.
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The fudge has landed. From the Guardian just now:
End of fossil fuel era inches closer as Cop30 deal agreed after bitter standoff
An extract:
So the talks didn’t collapse after all and there was a ‘deal’. And that included a ‘small step’ to ending fossil fuels. And small it was: no more than a voluntary agreement to begin discussions about one of those much loved ‘roadmaps’. In other words, regarding the dreaded fossil fuels, nothing of the slightest importance was agreed. And that was all the fault of those dastardly Arabs.
The whole debacle was well summarised by Carolina Pasquali, executive director of Greenpeace Brazil:
In other words, this absurd conference was an utter failure.
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But wait – the BBC reports that the conference might not be over after all as the final meeting has been suspended. This results from Colombia’s representative objecting to the weak deal on fossil fuels, claiming that her earlier point of order was ignored. She said:
She claims that the final text “does not capture the full breadth of positions expressed throughout the negotiations“.
The BBC says that a round of applause broke out when she finished and comments:
Oh dear.
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Well it seems it is all over. And the BBC’s Matt McGrath offers a summary of the conference:
Except of course there’s never been any consensus on what to do about global warming. Far from it.
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Also from the BBC’s rolling coverage:
…French Environment Minister Monique Barbut said yesterday that the deal was being blocked by “oil-producing countries – Russia, India, Saudi Arabia, but joined by many emerging countries”.
The reasons are obvious. These countries either have huge reserves of fossil fuels or rely heavily on them to power their economies.
Some developing countries argue they should be allowed to exploit their reserves as other countries have done in the past….
These reasons haven’t just emerged, nor have they just become obvious. It has always been so. Why, then, did anyone expect any other outcome? And if the COP has basically achieved nothing, what’s the point?
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More than 80 countries supported a transition away from fossil fuels
Then let them make an agreement amongst themselves.
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An extraordinarily downbeat assessment from the BBC. Perhaps it’s all over:
“COP30: Five key takeaways from a deeply divisive climate summit”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp84m16mdm1o
Then again, the people who attend these things love COPs, the whole process. They don’t seem to care about the CO2 emissions associated with an ongoing project that never achieves anything. I expect to see just as many people, and just as little progress, in Turkey next year.
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Yes Mark, the BBC’a senior climate journalists, Justin Rowlatt and Matt McGrath, seem almost to have given up on the whole process. And I’m less sanguine than you about the viability of COP31 in Turkey. We’ll see.
For me however the most interesting item in the BBC report was a comment by Li Shuo from the Asia Society, described as ‘a long-time observer of climate politics‘, who – referring to the hopelessly muddled position of the EU – said this:
That shift (referring to the West and not just the EU) is precisely what I chronicled in the 2020 essay which I cited in the header article. Note its subtitle: ‘How developing countries took control of climate negotiations and what that means for emission reduction‘.
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Is he on the same planet as the rest of us?
“We delivered a clear message at Cop30: the delayers and defeatists are losing the climate fight
For all its flaws, the Brazil conference underlined the wish by a global majority for clean energy and climate action – and the UK will keep leading the way”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/nov/23/cop30-ed-miliband-climate-change-brazil-conference-clean-energy
….The message coming out of Belém was clear: despite the noise, clean energy and climate action remain the foundation on which the global economy is being remade and rebuilt. We are up against the march of time and massive global forces that would slow down or stop action. In the face of this opposition, multilateralism is our best hope. For all its flaws, Cop has reaffirmed the belief of the vast majority of the world in this ideal. Those who would deny or prevent action are not winning the argument, they are losing.
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This is an utterly absurd view on the outcome of COP30 where the final ‘deal’ didn’t even mention fossil fuels. It would be amusing if he was not responsible for Britain’s energy policy. But he is – and this attitude will reinforce our descent into economic ruin.
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Ed says – “We went to Cop because working with other countries to tackle the climate crisis is the only way to protect our home and way of life. We know the UK produces just 1% of emissions, which is why, as the prime minister said in Belém, our government is “all-in” on working with others to reduce the remaining 99%.”
What a deluded statement, at what cost to “protect our home and way of life” in the UK & what evidence that a few degree’s warming will cripple UK households Ed?
He has to go, unhingEd.
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On the front page of the Guardian:
“World still in the fight on climate – UN Chief”
We’re not winning the fight, but we’re still in the fight, Simon Stiell said, or words to that effect.
2nd paragraph begins:
So Carrington and the other Guardian dreamers thought there might actually be a chance that COP30 would “bring the curtain down on the fossil fuel age”? I thought journalists were supposed to be hard-nosed and realistic?
When I typed “Simon Stiell” into my search bar, this is what popped up. Note the date:
It looks like it’s all over in 7 days.
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An interesting mix of realism and fantasy on display in this Guardian article:
“Another Cop wrecked by fossil fuel interests and our leaders’ cowardice – but there is another way
The fingerprints of Russia and Saudi Arabia are all over the decision text in Brazil. But a group of nations led by Colombia and the Netherlands offer hope”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/nov/24/cop30-wrecked-fossil-fuels-russia-saudi-arabia-brazil
…It seems clear that the petrostates, led by Russia and Saudi Arabia, fought against fossil fuel phaseout and won.…
…But what of China? Isn’t China becoming the world’s first electrostate, stepping into the role of global climate leader with the US embracing fossil authoritarianism? Well, China seems to be ambivalent too, at least for now. China did not block the text on the roadmap to fossil-fuel phaseout, but neither did it fight to make sure it was included. Despite its dominance in solar, wind and electric vehicles, China acts less as a climate leader and more as an “all of the above” energy powerhouse, devoted first and foremost to its own economic development.….
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Although there is a finite chance that AP used a 2-year old photo to illustrate a new speech. I can’t be bothered to check, but I should poke a potential hole in my gotcha at the outset.
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The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change was enacted 33 years ago. Its objective (Article 2) reads as follows:
Since then global emissions have increased by 65% – and presumably GHG concentrations, far from being stabilised, have increased accordingly. There have been 30 ‘Conferences of the Parties’ (COPs) since 2000, all of which attempted – and utterly failed – to cut emissions. You’d think that by now all these ‘activists’ would have got the message: it’s not gonna happen. But no – they still live in their dreamland. And we’re all paying for it.
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With a little help from ChatGPT I’ve compiled a list of signatories to the letter to the COP30 President that threatened to block the planned deal unless a fossil-fuel roadmap was included:
Austria, Belgium, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Czechia, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Guatemala, Honduras, Iceland, Ireland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Marshall Islands, Mexico, Monaco, Netherlands, Panama, Palau, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom and Vanuatu.
In the end of course, as Paul Homewood has pointed out here, they humiliatingly climbed down, thereby avoiding a total COP collapse and making the much-vaunted ‘deal’ a possibility. Mad Ed who initially fought hard for the letter must be very proud.
FWIW these countries are the source of about 7% of total global GHG emissions.
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From the intro (summary cribbed from Wind Energy’s Absurd, with thanks):
There are five major lessons from COP 30. They are not the ones the climate community has highlighted, but they really matter and will shape the post-COP30 climate change negotiations.
First up is the realisation that it is no longer a European (and UK) game. The shifts in world political and economic power for the first time sidelined the Europeans. There was no UK “climate change leadership” to be taken seriously. It is India, China, Russia and the US that pulled the strings, whether present or not. Second, no major oil and gas producer or coal-burning nation wants to stop. Brazil set the tone: it announced that it wants to be the world’s fourth-largest oil producer, with drilling to start in the mouth of the Amazon. Third, no one wants to cut their carbon consumption, personally or nationally. The Brazilian carbon footprint includes the flights, the new road through the rainforest, the cruise liners for accommodation, as well as the commitment to its own fossil fuels. Fourth, the real action was on the bottom-up trade issues, notably the carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) and the emerging coalition of the willing with the extension of carbon pricing. The fifth lesson is that the temperature is going to go on rising: 30 COPs so far haven’t made a dent in the carbon concentration in the atmosphere, and another 30 COPs probably won’t.
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I find it funny that some people that could see how pointless these COP fiasco’s, were labelled “deniers/shills”. But now reality hits as other big nations don’t play, It’s almost as if the “deniers” applies to them now – “what goes around comes around” as the saying goes.
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Jit, Simon Stiell must have mis-spoke when he was reported as saying almost two years ago that there were just two years left to save the planet. There’s not much time, but thankfully, as always, there is still a small amount of time left. At least that’s what the Guardian says. Phew:
“The Guardian view on UN climate talks: they reveal how little time is left”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/nov/24/the-guardian-view-on-un-climate-talks-they-reveal-how-little-time-is-left
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Here is Roger Hallam’s tweeted response to the Guardian editorial that Mark linked to above (‘The Guardian view on UN climate talks’):
Bonkers.
But perhaps prison has helped him a little. He’s still obsessed with sex and death but at least he didn’t say this time that climate change will make young boys force you to watch as they gang-rape your mother, sister and girlfriend on a kitchen table then burn your eyes out with cigarettes. Progress!
(I wonder how much more progress could have been achieved if he’d served more than 13 months of his four-year sentence.)
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Vinny – as the Meatloaf song goes “you took the words right out off my mouth”. Just wish we had comedians like Monty Python era to make a sketch about “the life of Roger Hallam”. I hesitated to use that, so delete if deemed OTT.
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Paul Homewood has published a short and excellent summary of the outcome of COP30. As Mark comments, it unsurprisingly comes to a similar conclusion as his (also excellent) ‘Fiddling While Belém Burns’ article.
An important extract from Paul’s piece (titled ‘COP30 Leaves Net Zero Further Away From Ever’):
Note: Paul’s wrong about COP28 – see my comment HERE. However he’s quite right to observe that those opposing the pathetic UK/EU et al scheme consists of far more than those evil Arabs. The reality that ‘activists’ continue to be reluctant to face is that the world (essentially the non-Western world) is unconcerned about warnings of global apocalypse and it focused instead on economic growth.
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Matt Ridley has a remarkable piece in the Spectator this morning. Headed The great climate climbdown is finally here this is his opening paragraph:
Great stuff. But is he right?
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Hi Robin – when even the BBC hardly reported on this COP, that alone tells me that the glory days are over. But we have not heard from Greta yet, so to early to tell 🙂
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