The COP28 climate summit ended with a deal that finally named the main cause of climate change. Photo: JEWEL SAMAD / AFP
Analysis - The COP28 climate summit ended with a deal that finally named the main cause of climate change, calling on nations to "transition" off fossil fuels (as opposed to last time's mention of only coal), and talking about accelerating action "this crucial decade".
It wasn't the compulsory "phase out" many countries, including New Zealand, were looking for, but - incredible as it might seem - it was the first time in almost 30 years of holding these summits that the end deal said aloud that the solution was getting out of fossil fuels.
These deals are to some extent a lowest common denominator. The text is what every country, including petro-states and developing countries still financially reliant on coal and gas, can live with. It doesn't necessarily represent where most of the world is at.
Still, the wording was filled with what small Pacific nations described as a "litany of loopholes", for example, the reference to "transition away" from fossil fuels only covered energy systems, not transport or plastics. Although the next two summits may build on the wording, New Zealand observers have already noted these vulnerable islands can't afford to wait for the universally agreed text to catch up.
In a New Zealand context, the difference between energy and transport may be almost academic. The reason Climate Change Commission chairperson Rod Carr keeps pointing out that we need to build the equivalent of two large windfarms of renewable generation a year is because that's how much new clean energy is needed to power a switch from fossil-fuelled cars, trucks and trains to electric vehicles, e-bikes, electric trains and other cleaner forms of transport. In that sense, clean energy is clean transport.
Boosting renewables - as the government says it will do - will also create more capacity for coal- and gas-fired industrial boilers to switch to electricity, while keeping the electrical grid largely fossil-free.
The Climate Commission says we need to retrofit existing buildings so they use less power to heat and cool, to free up even more space for the big electrical switchover - something the government has arguably signalled an openness to to when it backed the summit's agreement to double energy efficiency in the next six years.
Speaking to Morning Report on Thursday from the summit, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts acknowledged more could be done, but said it was a "historic step" to get all countries to agree to the text on fossil fuels.
OPEC and its allies had lobbied against any mention.
"We now have consensus to build a world no longer reliant on fossil fuels, could more be done, yes but this is a significant step forward for a consensus decision," said Watts.
"The challenge now is implementation."
Implementation is going to be the minister's next big challenge. He spent many of his first media appearances as minister defending the decision to reopen oil and gas exploration, whilst supporting fossil phase-out at the summit.
Watts seemed buoyed by his time with major allies, who joined with New Zealand to push for a stronger deal, and spoke earlier this week about the "opportunity" for New Zealand from making the climate transition.
Simon Watts. Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
But New Zealand's pledge under the Paris Agreement relies on both cutting emissions inside New Zealand, and topping up by purchasing carbon offsets from other countries. The paths for doing both these things are, as yet, unclear.
Global talks on Article 6 - the part of the Paris deal that allows international trading in carbon offsets - did not reach agreement in Dubai. While New Zealand can go ahead and make bilateral deals (and officials document suggest the government is already exploring this, likely in the Asia Pacific), the part of the agreement that deals with rules for a wider, global carbon market are not yet sealed. That delay could limit New Zealand's options.
From bad to worse?
The other part of meeting the pledge is action at home.
While Watts was in Dubai, the government released the Climate Change Commission's latest advice on how that is going. It concluded the country is on track to be about 20 million tonnes of greenhouse gases short of meeting its carbon budgets during the five years to 2030.
Reality at this point is probably worse.
Several climate policies scrapped by the new government - EV discounts, scrapping funding to retire company's coal boilers, delaying pricing farm emissions - have not yet flowed into the analysis.
Aside from smoothing the path for developing renewables, the government hasn't committed to doing the items on the commission's various suggestions lists to date, from boosting walking and cycling, to broadening and introducing farming emissions pricing, to reforming the carbon market to lessen polluter freebie-credits and limit the role of planting pine trees.
Carr said on Tuesday that, although every part of society needs to be part of the transition, it is the government that is going to have to lead it.
Global responsibility
Meanwhile, all countries are being asked to increase their climate pledges in just over a year's time, a year ahead of the 2025 summit in Brazil.
Nations are being asked to do better, because the sum total of promises so far would leave the planet around 2.5C hotter - with devastating results for many in the Pacific, but also real, additional costs and health impacts here.
The government has a year to find an answer to the climate commission's advice and come up with a plan for 2026-2030.
The commission has made it clear that doing nothing isn't an option, and Watts has acknowledged that the ball is in the government's court.
How observers reacted to the COP28 outcome:
Compass Climate's Christina Hood, on LinkedIn, on the failure to agree on Article 6 or offset trading: "My experience in past negotiations is that failure to agree (eg. in Katowice, Madrid) can be high-integrity countries refusing to cave in to demands that would weaken collective ambition. There can be tremendous pressure to just "get a deal" including from the UN system itself. So thank you, ngā mihi nui, to those who are holding the line on integrity."
US climate envoy John Kerry, in a press statement, on the use of fossil fuels such as gas during the transition: "In particular, we would highlight that the use of any transitional fuels needs to be aligned with 1.5C, which means that they will play a limited and temporary role while we largely phase-out fossil fuels in our energy systems by 2050, with abatement technologies focusing on hard to abate sectors."
UN secretary general António Guterres, on X (formerly Twitter): "To those who opposed a clear reference to phase out of fossil fuels during the #COP28 Climate Conference, I want to say: Whether you like it or not, fossil fuel phase out is inevitable. Let's hope it doesn't come too late."
Greenpeace Aotearoa's Amanda Larsson, in a statement: "Despite the oil industry's best efforts, and after immense pressure from civil society, COP28 has signalled the end of the fossil fuel industry… the New Zealand Government has been left exposed as 'climate extremists' with their plan to bring back offshore oil and gas exploration."
University of Canterbury Professor Bronwyn Hayward, via email: "Despite a watered-down final COP text with a "litany of loopholes", as the Alliance of Small Island States described it, it is increasingly difficult for politicians, lobby groups and donors to benefit from business as usual. The next international climate negotiations will be in yet another oil state, Azerbaijan and will depend even more on publics around the world pressing governments as hard as they can for real, transparent, and lasting action."
James Renwick, professor of Physical Geography, Victoria University of Wellington, via the Science Media Centre: "I was pleased to see that the COP28 statement acknowledges the need to move away from fossil fuels (finally!), even if it is a pretty soft-shoe approach. A step in the right direction, let's hope it can turn into a stampede!"
Dalila Gharbaoui, Postdoctoral Climate Crisis research fellow, University of Canterbury, via the Science Media Centre: "This is a historic milestone and a major achievement inaugurating the beginning of the end of the fossil fuel era that wasn't reached in almost 30 years of climate negotiations which is significant. However, far more still needs to be done to achieve equity and climate justice for nations and communities across the world most impacted by climate change. Transitioning away from fossil fuels is incremental but phasing out fossil fuels would have been transformational. Some climate vulnerable countries simply cannot afford to wait another decade for complete phasing out of fossil fuels to be agreed upon in future COPs."
