The UAE’s Cop28 presidency has gone all Clint Eastwood this week, by asking The Good, The Bad and The Ugly to be involved in the climate talks.
Wearing the white hat on the new 31-member Cop28 advisory board are the likes of Hindou Ibrahim, a climate campaigner from Chad, and Saleemul Huq, who has called fossil fuel exploration a “crime against humanity”.
On the other side of the saloon are four fossil fuel executives including Bob Dudley. A new study shows his old firm BP owes $377 billion a year in climate reparations but that is definitely not on the agenda of Cop28 president Sultan Al-Jaber seeing as the company he leads (Adnoc) owes $318 billion a year.
Then there’s the downright ugly. The UAE’s ambassador to Syria issued a formal invitation to Bashar al-Assad. A Cop28 spokesperson said they wanted to “have everyone in the room”.
This week’s news:
- Study: Fossil fuel firms owe $209bn a year for climate damage
- Regulator blocks Brazilian oil drilling, sparking conflict within government
- UAE appoints fossil fuels execs and climate campaigners as Cop28 advisers
- Top German energy official sacked after favoritism allegations
- Regulators crack down on corporate carbon neutrality claims
- France proposes tax credits for green technology
- UAE invites Syria’s Assad to Cop28 in latest rehabilitation push
- US backs Indonesian oil refinery despite pledge to end fossil fuel finance
- Vietnamese anti-coal campaigner freed early from prison
- Local business group tries to keep South Africa’s coal plants alive
…and comment
As the big, rich nations gather in Hiroshima for the G7 this weekend, they’re likely to claim again that they have ended international fossil fuel finance.
But, back in the real world, the US’s Exim bank has just announced a $100 million loan to an oil refinery in Indonesia.
The bank claims it is not legally allowed to discriminate against the oil refinery sector and that the project will create US jobs and reduce Indonesia’s emissions.
It is considering backing an oil and gas field in Bahrain and a gas power plant in Guyana next.