The United Nations’ Climate Change Conference COP28 has concluded with the ‘United Arab Emirates Consensus’, the first agreement to mention fossil fuels in the three-decade history of climate negotiations. COP28 President Sultan Al-Jaber announced the agreement on Wednesday in the closing ceremony of the two-week summit, which took place in Dubai’s Expo City. “The world needed to find a new way,” he said, celebrating the deal that signals the eventual end of global economies’ reliance on oil amid a standing ovation. The agreement calls on signatory parties to take measures of “transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems, in a just, orderly and equitable manner, accelerating action in this critical decade, so as to achieve net zero by 2050 in keeping with the science”. It also calls for “tripling renewable energy capacity globally and doubling the global average annual rate of energy efficiency improvements by 2030”. Negotiations went into overtime in the early hours of Wednesday morning, with the closing panel being pushed for a day. “To those who opposed a clear reference to phase out of fossil fuels during the Climate Conference, I want to say: Whether you…
COP28 Ends with Historic Agreement to Transition Away from Fossil Fuels
December 13, 2023
