Essay by Eric Worrall
Climate campaigners are concerned Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber may not put his heart into wrecking his own national oil company.
Climate change: UAE names oil chief to lead COP28 talks
By Matt McGrath
Environment correspondent
The head of one of the world’s biggest oil companies has been named to lead the COP28 global climate talks in Dubai, later this year.
Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber is currently the chief executive officer of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company.
He is also the minister for industry and advanced technology for the COP28 hosts, the United Arab Emirates.
Campaigners say he must stand down from his oil business role while president as it is a clear conflict of interest.
They believe someone steeped in the oil industry may not push countries to rapidly reduce their production and use of fossil fuel, which scientists say is critical to avoiding dangerous climate change.
…
Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-64240206
Don’t underestimate Sultan Jaber’s negotiating ability. The Emirates were founded centuries ago by people who turned a formerly worthless desert into a thriving trade pit stop, by the power of their ability to negotiate and attract business, so negotiation is kind of their national specialty. They survived and mostly retained their independence, even during the imperial age, because all their larger neighbours were strangely too busy fighting each other to conquer their little corner of the desert.
I’m sure Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber is a competent organiser and skilled negotiator, and will do a good job, but the fact its unsure if he’ll even step down from his oil company while running COP28 shows what a farce the climate talks have become.
Going by COP27, COP28 will just be a global aid money talking shop, a place for informal political negotiations – kind of like a state funeral.
Nobody expects politicians to return from a state funeral with significant geopolitical victories. Like state funerals, expectations for COP conferences are also very low, so this makes COP conferences an excellent opportunity for politicians to hold informal discussions about global affairs when nobody has died. Politicians can attend COP conferences without the weight of national expectations for a significant geopolitical gain. When nothing is achieved, they can blame everyone else for not cooperating enough.
COP27 will also be a money making opportunity for Dubai’s tourist industry, if they set hotel minimum nightly charges, like Egypt’s COP27 hosts allegedly did.
Given this context, the CEO of a cash rich government owned oil company, a potential donor and skilled negotiator, is the perfect person to lead COP28 talks.
They should have one of these in China soon. They will call it ‘COP This’.
Oh, hold it in India. India is even better at socialist bafflegab than the Chinese, who tend to regard it as undignified. It would be the same result, anyway.
The Indians would call it ‘COP This Please’
A Glaswegian would say Cop this, Jimmy before headbutting their nose.
China are to be commended for ensuring atmospheric CO2 levels are increasing, plants, crops etc love it – it will feed the growing population better
COP’s are going the way of the Olympics…a host country tourism booster and showcase…a bunch of people getting medals or other notoriety amongst their peers, a few with good press agents becoming world famous. Actual effect on the world…only a bigger more expensive COP next time…
The double standard in conflict of interest accusations will be on full display. As nobody has thought to call out the self-evident conflict of venture capitalists, with their appointed academic and political salesforce, when they’re out preaching about global energy transition as a moral cause…
Wouldn’t that be like Iran chairing some global women’s rights committee?
No. That honour is reserved for Afghanistan.
“Wouldn’t that be like Iran chairing some global women’s rights committee?”
or a nuclear proliferation conference.
Non-proliferation, surely?
Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber
Education
BSc in Chemical Engineering from the University of Southern California
PhD in business and economics Coventry University
MBA California State University at Los Angeles
so never had a job then?
Looks like his job is to count the money, which he will continue to do at COP 28.
CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company.
CEO = Consider Every Option (or something like that) 🧑🎄
Stangely, I’m not a huge fan of Oil Sultans and Arabian Princelings.
But I guess that Jaber will struggle to be more idiotic than the UK’s very own Alok Sharma, who headed up COP26.
We can look forward to plenty of the usual jabber, jabber no doubt.
But he seems much more likely to keep in touch with reality and be aware of the absolutely essential contribution that oil makes to decent society and will continue to do so for decades to come.
So likely to be far better also than the UK’s very own Lord John Browne, who successfully turned British Petroleum into “Beyond Petroleum”.
What a twerp. Talk about the ‘enemy within’.
Don’t forget that it was the Royal Navy that imposed order, crushed slavers and set up
the Trucial States. Hence.
Don’t forget the Asante….
Fear not. The British at least will commit economic suicide
“They believe someone steeped in the oil industry may not push countries to rapidly reduce their production and use of fossil fuel, which scientists say is critical to avoiding dangerous climate change”
Everyone is steeped in the oil industry whether they like it or not.
The elites gathering at the WEF show at Davos don’t care where the money comes from, as long as it keeps coming – these facades like MM climate change, nut zero etc are just deceits to keep it flowing
I think it makes perfect sense to hold it there. All the cop pledges serve to do is increase oil and gas consumption, I’d be shocked if this guy wasn’t funding anti nuke and anti coal activity.
This is right in his wheelhouse, infiltrate the process and turn it even more towards their own benefit.
Besides, this is where the money is which is the primary focus of the process