COP28 in Dubai: A Crossroads of Rhetoric and Reality

In a recent article by Tilak Doshi on Forbes, the convoluted saga of climate negotiations is meticulously unraveled, shedding light on the dichotomy between rhetoric and reality as the world gears up for COP28 in Dubai. Doshi’s article, rich in analytical insights, serves as a beacon of clarity amidst the fog of climate alarmism that often shrouds such global congregations.

Doshi begins by questioning the tangible outcomes of nearly three decades of COP negotiations, a pertinent inquiry that echoes the sentiments of many who seek objective assessments over alarmist narratives. He states,

Another year will soon pass, another ‘Conference of the Parties’ to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (“COP”) will convene. This time the 28^th COP will meet in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates during 30 November – 12 December. Doubtless, the legacy media will soon be inundating us with wall-to-wall coverage of yet another attempt at the UN concert of nations to ‘save the planet’. Now that we are three years short of three decades of COP negotiations to handle an asserted “climate emergency” allegedly caused by human-driven greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, what progress have we made?

https://www.forbes.com/sites/tilakdoshi/2023/10/16/cop28-in-dubai-climate-negotiations-at-a-crossroads/?sh=1a84ad00562b

The article delves into the intricacies of the “settled science” narrative propagated by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), highlighting the demonization of fossil fuels and the oil and gas industry that has been a recurring theme in previous COP meetings. Doshi meticulously outlines the palpable rhetoric against fossil fuels, citing instances such as the exclusion of oil and gas industry executives from climate talks and the vilification of the industry by climate activists and certain sections of the media.

Since the first COP was convened in 1995 in Berlin (and held annually since, except for 2020), the rhetoric against fossil fuels has ramped up. The demonization of the oil and gas industry at COP26 held in Glasgow in 2021 was palpable. Oil and gas industry executives were ‘not invited’ (coal, of course, being beyond the pale). Royal Dutch Shell’s CEO stated that the company would be absent from the climate talks after being told it would not be welcome. Teenage climate icon Greta Thunberg, whose tirades always go viral on social media, tweeted “I don’t know about you, but I sure am not comfortable with having some of the world’s biggest villains influencing & dictating the fate of the world.”

In a striking revelation of the complexities and contradictions that characterize climate negotiations, Doshi highlights the leadership role of Dr. Sultan Al Jaber, the COP28 President-Designate, who is also the chief executive of ADNOC, the national oil and gas company of Abu Dhabi. This, he notes, has elicited criticism and expressions of concern from various quarters, underscoring the contentious nature of the discourse surrounding the involvement of fossil fuel industry stakeholders in climate negotiations.

In August 2022, the UN Secretary-General António Guterres slammed the “grotesque greed” of oil and gas companies and their financial backers. “It is immoral for oil and gas companies to be making record profits from this energy crisis on the backs of the poorest people and communities, at a massive cost to the climate.” And again, last month, Mr. Guterres – no stranger to hyperbolic rants, from “code red for humanity” to “an era of global boiling” — warned that humanity had ‘opened gates to hell’ by letting the ‘climate crisis’ worsen. In a ‘lacerating attack’, he blamed “the naked greed of entrenched interests raking in billions from fossil fuels” which are “embarked upon a ‘shameful’ attempt to stymie the [energy] transition.”

What could go wrong? Well, COP28 President-Designate Dr Sultan Al Jaber is also chief executive of ADNOC, the national oil and gas company of Abu Dhabi. In a long article published last week on Dr. Al Jaber’s appointment to lead COP28, Fiona Harvey of The Guardian asks how can the man — an oil and gas guy, and hence the root cause of the problem — even attempt to deliver humanity’s salvation from the climate crisis? Furthermore, Dr. Al Jaber’s company, the world’s 11th largest oil and gas producer, announced late last year that it plans to invest $150 billion through 2027 to expand the emirate’s oil and gas production capacity.

Doshi’s article also brings to the fore the evolving political landscapes in various countries, noting shifts in political alignments and policy stances that reflect a recalibration of priorities and approaches towards climate policies and fossil fuel use. He observes,

As COP28 gets underway next month, much has changed within the political establishments in the West that have been leading the charge on the “decarbonization” and “net zero by 2050” imperatives at the UN COP negotiations. Political cracks have begun appearing across ‘environmental left’ governments in Europe and the UK, and “peak green” is much in evidence.

Over a third of the EU’s member states have witnessed “right wing” political forces gaining influence, hewing towards a common agenda against uncontrolled mass immigration and “putting the brakes on those pesky EU laws that demand radical changes in lifestyle to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050” as put by Alessandra Scotto Di Santolo of UK’s Daily ExpressEXPR +1.8%. Among the countries where the environmental left has lost political advantage are Sweden, Italy, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands and Spain. Just this past week, the populist backlash against green-left policies played a role in the fall of incumbent governments in Luxembourg and New Zealand.

In conclusion, Tilak Doshi’s article serves as a profound exploration of the crossroads at which climate negotiations find themselves, marked by a confluence of rhetoric, reality, political dynamics, and the enduring question of the tangible impacts of decades-long deliberations and declarations. It invites a discerning evaluation of the narratives, actors, and agendas that shape the global climate discourse.

According to the UAE government, COP28 in Dubai will welcome “over 140 heads of state, senior government leaders, over 70,000 participants and more than 5,000 media professionals.” One can imagine the carbon footprint of the international travel of the delegates involved, although Britain’s UCL has made available a handy calculator for this. Will the grand jamboree prove to be a farce, as many of the delegates from the West now report to new governments that are backpedaling from their own previous net zero commitments?

With what conviction can the chief German representative at the conference instruct his counterparts from around the world to pursue “net zero” policies as his or her own government approved earlier this month putting lignite-fired power plants back online for German households to keep warm this winter? Will the Netherlands and New Zealand delegates be holding up their anti-agriculture climate policies for emulation by the world’s nations, now that such policies have likely been consigned to the dung-heap of history by their own citizens?

The economist John Kenneth Galbraith once remarked, “meetings are indispensable when you don’t want to do anything.” It is likely that apart from grand-sounding communiques, more breast-beating by the climate NGOs and alarmist headlines by the legacy media, nothing much of practical significance will come out of the 28^th Conference of the Parties in Dubai. And Dr Sultan Al Jaber, President Designate of COP28 and CEO of ADNOC, will do just fine.

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