Category: Previous Issues Articles

Hey, movers and shakers! Heard the rumours? They’re saying today is “Official Youth Day.” But let’s set the record straight: every day is children and youth day. 
Young voices are not just flashy side acts, they deserve a spot and say at these negotiations. Youth aren’t just social media trendsetters, they hold internationally recognized rights. 

Let’s address the elephant in the room: global injustice and the triple planetary crisis. This mess is a result of inequality, colonialism, burning of fossil fuels and exploitation. The most vulnerable bear the brunt of the climate crisis’ impacts, despite having the least hand in causing it.

Here’s the scoop from ECO.  Fixing this imbalance needs more than a one-hit wonder—it’s an ongoing orchestra! Youth participation and engagement has to come from the youth themselves, not as a top-down process. They should have the reins in choosing where and how they contribute. Self-organized and democratic youth movements and organizations show what this looks like. 
Children and young people are already showing with great commitment and effort what they want. For example, the YOUNGOs Global Youth Statement (GYS) unites over 700,000 voices from 150 countries. Let’s listen and take action based on what children and youth ] demand!
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His Holiness and representatives don’t often descend from the Vatican to get involved in the scrappy detail of SBSTA-SBI negotiations at COPs.

The Pope himself was scheduled to join the Leaders’ Summit at the opening of COP28, but was sadly held back by health issues. Undeterred, He sent his representative to one of the most critical issues at COP28, affecting billions of people around the world.

Indeed, the Pope’s person felt moved to share His Holiness’s views at the closing contact group of the Sharm-el-Sheikh Joint Work on Implementation of Agriculture and Food Security earlier this week.

And apparently one of God’s biggest envoys on Earth is not impressed.

Agriculture negotiations were unable to come to any agreement on the process to take forward the work, nor on the workshop topics to dive into in the years to come.

With 2.4 billion people – largely women and residents of rural areas – lacking access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food, and that number growing every year, it is unacceptable that Parties prefer to play with procedural conclusions, instead of proactively progressing productive outcomes.

With agriculture outcomes delayed for yet another year, the agribusiness corporations that are fuelling the climate crisis, starving the world and feeding their shareholders, continue business as usual.
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ECO heard some very concerning words at a high level roundtable on Tuesday. There seemed to be confusion about what we should be talking about here (hint: full fossil fuel phaseout) and instead we heard nothing but dangerous distractions from large producers. In case you missed it, here’s what ECOheard. 

Yo, it’s John Kerry, let me lay it down straight,
Carbon Management Challenge, it’s our clean slate.
We’re the world’s oil and gas giant, no doubt,
Greenwashing it all, we’re taking that route.

1.5 degrees, that’s our North Star,
We gotta reach it, no matter who we are,
Carbon capture, storage, that’s the key,
To a greener future, you and me, you see?

(Chorus)
Green business is the plan, don’t you know?
CCS may falter, but we put on a show.
We invite nations to join in this dance,
Carbon Management Challenge, give it a chance.

We launched a challenge, at the White House we met,
Carbon Management Challenge, our best bet,
Tax credits, legislation, it’s all in the mix,
Occidental’s in, DAC, a sustainable fix!

We’re the top dogs in the oil and gas game,
Selling worldwide, building our name.
CCS might stumble, but we’ll paint it just fine,
As long as it’s profitable, we’ll toe the line.
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Today’s winner managed to outshine their peers and earn the rare honour, or should we say dishonour, of being a subnational government getting a fossil of the day. The province of Alberta, Canada has come to COP with one mission, to sabotage the negotiations. 

Premier Smith, in particular, has had her name added to the black book. Her previous work as a fossil fuel lobbyist was good experience for disrupting Canada’s stance on the fossil fuel phaseout debate at COP. But she can’t take all the credit, she had the support of an extensive delegation of oil and gas representatives. 

This is COP28, there is no space for climate change blockers and deniers, or for governments who, for months, let toxic tailings leak into the drinking water of Indigenous communities without even bothering to inform them. 

This past summer wildfires raged across the province of Alberta; attention Smith, the truth is catching up. It’s time to end support for the oil & gas industry and stop blocking federal regulations that could finally allow Canada to meet its climate target, including a much-needed cap on the massive emissions from the fossil fuel sector. Clean energy solutions are here, they are sustainable investments, so stop blocking renewable energy development.
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It bears repeating: the first Global Stocktake (GST) is a report card on the progress of global climate action and a key guidance for the implementation of the Paris Agreement. 

Countries have gone into this process well aware of the gaps between what is needed and what is being done with respect to all subjects on the report card, knowing how the shortfalls are compromising our global agreement and causing climate devastation around the world. But simply restating this well-known dismal reality is insufficient to meet the intended purpose of the GST.

As discussions turn to the Guidance and Ways Forward, ECO’s expectations are high. How these ‘ways forward’ are articulated could make or break the first GST. In turn, the GST outcome will make or break our ability to limit temperatures to 1.5°C. 

And so ECO is very concerned how far Parties are from a consensus when it comes to putting this down on paper.

Firstly, all countries should have begun the process of determining their 2035 targets within climate plans that meet their fair shares. However, this cannot focus solely on developing and delivering upcoming NDCs for 2035. On top of that, all countries should agree to bring revised NDCs for 2030 showing increased ambition.
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ECO is up to its ears in statements about carbon markets saving us all from climate armageddon. Even the COP presidency managed to graciously find some time in its busy schedule to organize a roundtable on scaling up voluntary carbon markets.

Delegates, we must not be reading the right media articles. Because so far, 2023 has not been sunshine and roses, but instead it’s been quite apocalyptic for carbon markets, with countless scandals emerging. Overestimated emissions reductions, forced displacement, sexual abuse; the list goes on. It has been so bad that, when announcing the US’s new Energy Transition Accelerator (read: carbon offset market), the only positive example of an emission trading market Secretary John Kerry could cite in his speech was a system that (a) didn’t involve carbon offsets, (b) didn’t focus on GHGs, and (c) was implemented 30 years ago!

One big question that still bothers ECO: where is the money? The (self-interested) predictions of banks and consultants describe a market worth tens or hundreds of billions of USD in a few years. Who will actually benefit from this money? Could it be those making the predictions? ECO suspects that is a possibility.

In the voluntary market, intermediaries buy and sell credits with zero transparency.
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ECO has been waiting for the new Global Stocktake draft text like a child waits for their birthday presents. And finally, yesterday morning, the overly caffeinated and highly sleep-deprived co-facilitators ended our wait. The present ECO was hoping for was a decision to phase out fossil fuels and triple renewables. But ECO is not a spoiled child who always gets what it wants. Despite the disappointment, we can still help you with some constructive feedback to deliver a better gift before end of COP28.

Here are our seven key points on the GST draft text:

1. Getting the urgency memo: We need further action to accelerate the decline of fossil fuels. Not in 20 or 30 years, but in this decade.
2. Tripling to substitute: Great to see that you have language on tripling renewable energy by 2030. But let’s spice up the renewables language by not just tripling them, but also making it clear that renewables will replace fossil fuels while respecting human rights and nature.
3. Para 36 – Weak Sauce Alert on differentiation: The text should unequivocally state that developed countries must take the lead in phasing out all fossil fuels and tripling renewables.
4. Don’t be stingy: The energy package (FFPO, EE, RE) needs to include support language that makes it clear to developing countries that the transition will be enabled by grant-based public climate finance, in line with PA 4.5.

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Did delegates notice the collision of two worlds at the COP yesterday?  ECO saw an action by the Kick Big Polluters Out campaign at the entrance to the venue while recently released research showed that the number of lobbyists has increased to 2456 at this COP. This is four times the size that attended COP27.  This number of representatives of the fossil fuel industry is more than the combined number of delegates from the 10 most vulnerable countries! 

Meanwhile, TotalEnergies CEO Patrick Pouyanné was strutting around in the Blue Zone with an interesting badge. Guess whose badge he’s on? He was proudly wearing his party overflow accreditation from France. 

It is clear that what is meant by “the most inclusive COP ever” is that it is the most inclusive for fossil fuel lobbyists.

ECO knows it is no coincidence that the delegates are struggling to agree on a fast, fair, and funded fossil fuel phase-out in the GST. The fossil fuel lobbyists are polluting the COP space. 

ECO thinks it is outrageous to have the firestarters participate in a conference that has to extinguish the fires. 

ECO loves tripling — for instance clean renewables by 2030, efforts to protect the environment, organic and fair trade food, medical care for the poor, education efforts, time with family and friends, the consumption of delicious ice cream and the victories of our beloved football teams. 

But hang on…does that mean all tripling is good? For the 22 countries which agreed to triple nuclear power by 2050: the answer is no. 

The Nuclear Gang consists of the United States, Bulgaria, Canada, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Ghana, Hungary, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom.

This list contains all G7 countries, with the laudable exemption of Germany, and does not include G20 powerhouses like China, India and Indonesia. But the Netherlands, the country with likely the highest solar power share globally in its electricity mix? Or Ukraine, ECO asks? Any sad lessons learned from the super-dangerous attacks on existing nuclear power stations during the recent and ongoing war by Russia? Hungary, with autocrat Orban banking on support from Rosatom, the nuclear power manufacturer from Russia, is no surprise.

 ECO is struggling to understand the economic, technological and environmental wisdom of these 22 governments to embark on this risky endeavor, and here’s why:

Nuclear power presently has 10% of the global electricity supply. ECO insists
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ECO has had a long day and night, as Parties streamline the Just Transition Work Programme text. Which options will survive the (needed) simplification of the negotiating text?

Will inclusive, rights-based just transitions become a reality across diverse geographic, political and economic conditions? 

Just Transition will not happen only through the sharing of domestic experiences. We need a Work Programme which recommends decisions that lead to actual actions, and delivers what our workers and communities need. 

Just Transition will only happen if workers (both formal and informal, in sectors directly impacted by climate measures, and in those that are often invisible, such as care workers), their unions, and communities are at the centre.

Just Transition will only happen if rights – human, labour, gender, Indigenous Peoples – are respected and if rights-holders are explicitly recognised in this decision. 

Just Transition will only happen if we seize this unique opportunity to connect climate action with the pressing challenge of securing dignity for all, out of poverty, exclusion and oppression, and if we do it within the multilateral system, with international cooperation and support. 

In a few hours, ECO will read the outcomes of the informal conversations Parties have been holding behind closed doors.
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