It’s 13 December 2023. Excited reports of a “landmark” global climate agreement reverberate around the world from the COP28 climate summit in Dubai.<\/p>\n
At around 11am, weary diplomats with circles under their eyes from fierce, all-night negotiations cheer, cry and hug.<\/p>\n
The US’s climate envoy John Kerry throws his arms around German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock. There\u2019s a round of applause for Tina Stege, a fierce representative from the Marshall Islands who had fought among the hardest for the pledge.<\/p>\n
They and more than 190 other countries have just agreed to “transition away from fossil fuels” – the culmination of a fraught two weeks of talks at the UN conference.<\/p>\n
This may not sound very “historic”, given burning fossil fuels is the number one cause of climate change, and these annual talks had been going on for almost 30 years.<\/p>\n
But no pact had ever even mentioned the words “fossil fuels” before – not even the historic Paris Agreement<\/strong>. It had always faced opposition from economies that rely on fossil fuels, like Russia and Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n This was the first time these countries could stomach such a commitment – and it was hard won.<\/p>\n Several countries had fought tooth and nail to keep such words out of the final agreement, now known as the “UAE Consensus”.<\/p>\n They had also battled over a pledge to triple renewable energy by 2030, but that cinched its way into the pact too.<\/p>\n Fast forward to this year, as we approach COP29 in Azerbaijan in November, it\u2019s now possible to tell whether countries have stuck to their pledge – or whether it was all hot air.<\/p>\n And there is something surprising going on.<\/p>\n The good news<\/strong><\/p>\n Let\u2019s start with what\u2019s going well: an explosion in renewable electricity.<\/p>\n The world\u2019s leading energy authority, the International Energy Agency, recently produced its annual report tracking energy trends.<\/p>\n Sky News analysis of this data finds the amount of renewable power forecast for 2030 has jumped by 13%, compared with last year\u2019s forecast.<\/p>\n Power generated by renewables like solar and wind is on course to soar from around 4,250 GW today to nearly 10,000 GW in 2030.<\/p>\n That\u2019s not quite a tripling, but an increase of 2.3 times at least.<\/p>\n How\u2019s the ‘transition away from fossil fuels’ going?<\/strong><\/p>\n You would think the growth of renewable electricity would mean a drop in the amount of fossil fuel power.<\/p>\n But, to the dismay of some analysts, the amount the world is forecast to use in 2030 has shown no improvement in comparison with last year’s forecast.<\/p>\n And projected coal use in 2030 has actually increased since that pledge.<\/p>\n We’re now likely to burn 10% more coal in 2030 than anticipated this time last year.<\/p>\n So although coal, oil and gas are still on course to peak before 2030 – that’s good – their decline looks slower than expected.<\/p>\n That means emissions of greenhouse gases, which are about to peak, will also be higher for longer.<\/p>\n Countries for whom this may be matter of life and death, such as low-lying island states, are enraged by the paltry progress.<\/p>\n “Small island states despair that we are waiting in vain to see the sharp decline in fossil fuel production that was heralded,” said Samoa’s Dr Pa’olelei Luteru, who represents a vulnerable group of small island nations known as AOSIS.<\/p>\n “Alas, saying something is one thing and actually meaning it is quite another.”<\/p>\n But why haven\u2019t all these renewable power plans made more of a dent in projected fossil fuel use?<\/p>\n The problem of our ‘insatiable demand for energy’<\/strong><\/p>\n Although renewables are exploding in many parts of the world, so is our energy demand.<\/p>\n Dave Jones from energy thinktank Ember said what “got me” in the report was that the world is “continuing to use more total energy than anyone was really expecting”.<\/p>\n In 2035 the world\u2019s electricity demand is going to be a significant 6% higher than anticipated last year, the IEA said as it revised up its forecast.<\/p>\n That means the surge in renewable electricity just can’t keep up.<\/p>\n This should be “a wake-up call”, said Jones. “Are we going to be able to change that trajectory of our rising, insatiable demand?”<\/p>\n Of course, some of that increase was expected.<\/p>\n Camilla Born, who has advised various COP presidencies, including the UAE last year, said demand increase was “always going to be there” as countries develop.<\/p>\n Also, it’s an indication of the different industries we’re moving into, like electric heat pumps and cars.<\/p>\n But there is something else disrupting forecasts.<\/p>\n The rise and rise of air conditioning and AI<\/strong><\/p>\n Power-hungry air conditioning has absolutely boomed in the last year, as both incomes and temperatures rise, especially in emerging economies like India and China.<\/p>\n India has been baked by severe heatwaves for the last three years in a row, with one this year lasting a record 24 days.<\/p>\n By 2035 global energy demand for air conditioning is due to rise by an amount greater than the entire Middle East\u2019s electricity use today.<\/p>\n The problem is not necessarily that people need to stay cool in a hotter world, but that many are buying units that use double the amount of energy than they need to – something that can be improved with the right policies.<\/p>\n But it’s not just about emerging economies, it’s actually “an everywhere story”, said Jones, with demand now growing more again in developed countries too.<\/p>\n On top of this, as our use of artificial intelligence proliferates, a “substantial increase in electricity consumption from data centres appears inevitable”, said the International Energy Agency (IEA).<\/p>\n Another goal from last year, to double the rate of energy efficiency improvements, has the potential to lower emissions by 2030 by more than anything else, said the IEA.<\/p>\n But in a damming indictment, that pledge “looks far out of reach under today\u2019s policy settings”, it said.<\/p>\n Jones said we should be trying to work out “how we can go through this transition less wastefully than we are today”.<\/p>\n An alternative way to measure progress on that pledge is by investigating what impact countries’ current climate plans will have on greenhouse gas emissions, which cause climate change.<\/p>\n These plans will see emissions in 2030 just 2.6% lower than in 2019, the UN\u2019s climate body (UNFCCC) found in October. Last year forecast a 2% fall.<\/p>\n It\u2019s “marginal” progress, but nowhere near the 43% reduction that scientists say we need. New plans are due by February and will also test the pledge, but some countries are already rowing back.<\/p>\n Saudi Arabia has claimed it was actually just one option on a “menu”, while G20 members have argued about whether to include it in their own agreements this year.<\/p>\n So did the fossil fuel pledge mean anything?<\/strong><\/p>\n But Born said the agreement at COP28 in Dubai was a “reflection of where we were already” as the shift off polluting fossil fuels had already begun.<\/p>\n “It just is very evident how bumpy and challenging that transition away is going to be.”<\/p>\n And countries wouldn’t fight so hard over pledges if they meant nothing.<\/p>\n Before the historic Paris Agreement was struck at COP21 in 2015, the world was on course for around 4C of warming. Now it\u2019s between 2.6-3.1C – still extortionate, but better. Since then, the global pipeline of coal power plants has collapsed by 72% and the cost of solar has plummeted by 90%.<\/p>\n Born said although that’s still not enough, “the fact that [the transition] is happening, rather than being just forecast to happen at some point, is a very different story that we’re telling these days”.<\/p>\n What\u2019s next?<\/strong><\/p>\n The next summit, COP29, starts in Baku, Azerbaijan, on 11 November.<\/p>\n A test of ongoing backing for the “transition away” pledge will be whether it makes it into this year\u2019s final agreement.<\/p>\n Host nation Azerbaijan – a major oil and gas producer – seems keen to gloss over the hydrocarbon conundrum.<\/p>\n Its lead negotiator Yalchin Rafiyev recently told journalists: “We want to have a balanced [agreement], but at the same time\u2026 Each COP has some main expected deliverables. This year it\u2019s finance.”<\/p>\n And it\u2019s true, COP29 has been dubbed the “finance COP” because its primary aim is to agree a new fund – aka the New Collective Quantified Goal – to pay for climate measures in developing countries.<\/p>\n The more money, the faster poorer nations can afford to ditch fossil fuels.<\/p>\n Tasneem Essop, of Climate Action Network which represents more than 1,000 global environmental NGOs, said: “Developing countries are not receiving the critical support they need, and this is why COP29 must deliver an ambitious climate finance goal.”<\/p>\n She added: “The time to act is now. Our future depends on it.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It’s 13 December 2023. Excited reports of a “landmark” global climate agreement reverberate around the world from the COP28 climate summit in Dubai. At around 11am, weary diplomats with circles under their eyes from fierce, all-night negotiations cheer, cry and hug. 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