Just as negotiators at the United Nations COP30 climate talks in Belém, Brazil, girded Thursday for the fiercest debate of the gathering—how to address fossil fuels—their phones buzzed with an urgent alert: the place was on fire.
Panicked delegates rushed for exits as flames from one of the hastily constructed wooden pavilions licked at the tent-like roof of the COP30 structure.
As metaphors go, a giant flame destroying the protective layer at global climate talks is, well, a bit on the nose. A Hollywood screenwriter would be deemed a hack for such a scene. But as emissions of planet-warming pollution continue to rise even as we near the end of yet another extraordinarily hot year, the truth of our climate crisis is stranger than fiction.
Consider this strangeness: After three decades of U.N. gatherings on climate change, the COP negotiators are just beginning debate on whether to include a “road map” to phase out fossil fuels, the main source of the greenhouse gases causing climate change. Even now, the idea is not yet part of the official final agreement under discussion.
The COP process is slow by nature, with final agreements requiring consensus among all countries involved. Critics argue that the U.N. climate system set up under the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is made even slower by the flood of fossil fuel industry representatives who attend. Climate activists said that by their count about 1,600 official COP30 participants, nearly one of every 25, are fossil fuel lobbyists of some kind.
Despite that lobbying presence, the road map idea has steadily gained traction over the course of the two-week COP30 talks. The idea is to begin to put into practice the hard-fought language from the COP28 final document that came out of Dubai in 2023 calling for a “just and orderly transition” from fossil fuels.
...Colombia, a substantial oil producer itself, has been a leader on the issue, hosting sessions at COP30 on the urgent need for an energy transition. By Friday morning, more than 80 countries supported the idea. The list represents a cross-section of global north powers such as Germany and the U.K. and climate vulnerable nations in the global south such as the island nation Vanuatu.
“We came here to Belém to see the UNFCCC adopt a clear road map for transitioning away from fossil fuels,” Vanuatu representative Ralph John Regenvanu said at a Friday morning press conference. “We need to build this group of states that is going to make this happen.”
At the same press conference, representatives from Colombia and the Netherlands announced the first international conference on a just transition away from fossil fuels will take place in April 2026, in Colombia.
In a speech early Thursday at COP30 U.N. Secretary General António Guterres urged countries to “ensure that the Belém outcome operationalizes a just transition” that aligned with the targets of the Paris Climate Agreement.
“It is a climate necessity and a test of economic stability, energy security and responsible governance,” Guterres said. “We must end market distortions that favor fossil fuels, we must address disinformation aimed at delaying the transition.”
Some business interests also endorsed the road map. The We Mean Business Coalition (WMBC), which works with businesses and trade groups to build momentum for an energy transition, had more than 130 signatures on a letter calling for “a robust, credible road map.”
The WMBC said the road map would help businesses “shift to clean energy, strengthen energy security and reduce costs for consumers,” while providing “much-needed clarity for investment.”
Names on the letter include some major multinational companies, such as Unilever, Volvo Cars, French construction materials giant Saint-Gobain, Ingka Group (the largest IKEA franchise holder), and global engineering and design firm Buro Happold (creators of the High Line linear park in Manhattan).
Major U.S. companies, however, were notably absent from the list, and few major U.S. CEOs made the trip to COP30. That may be partly due to the logistical challenges of travel to the Amazon, but it also reflects the cautious corporate stance on climate action since the election of Donald Trump.
Trump is scrapping domestic support for clean energy, pulling the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement and, for the first time in COP history, the U.S. has no official delegation at COP30.
Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, perhaps the most consistent and clear voice for climate action in Congress, arrived in Belém last week, making him “the entirety of the U.S. delegation here,” he said in a briefing with reporters.
Whitehouse warned of “thuggish” efforts by the Trump administration to impede climate action not just in the U.S. but by pressuring other nations as well.
The Trump administration has pressured countries to abandon energy transition plans and instead purchase more U.S. fossil fuel exports, and a proposal to cut emissions from international shipping failed after U.S. opposition.
The road map for a fossil phase out will be on a collision course with Trump.
As of Friday morning, draft documents for the final COP30 agreement did not include phasing out fossil fuels.
Vanuatu’s Minister Ralph said that regardless of the outcome in Belém, the growing coalition of countries behind the road map will continue to press for ambitious action. His island nation is already suffering loss of land due to sea-level rise and stands as an example of what is to come with further warming.
“For the citizens of the world, we are the future for everybody,” Ralph said. “Eventually you will all be facing what we are facing now.”
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