COP28 Spotlight: Advancing Solar Power for a Greener Planet
Updated December 7, 2023
By Morgan Pierce
Former U.S. Vice President turned climate activist, Al Gore, rode into COP28 Dubai like a righteous sheriff. Gore ridiculed the UAE’s decision to hand the COP28 presidency to Sultan al Jaber – also the CEO of one of the world’s largest oil companies – as “absurd. It is totally ridiculous.”
Then Gore got tougher. “There is only one measure of success for COP28: will it include a commitment to phase out fossil fuels or not,” he said. “If it does include such a commitment, it will be a smashing success; if it does not, it will be a failure.”
COP (which stands for Conference of Parties) is an annual climate change summit held under the auspices of the UN. The first COP was held in Berlin back in 1995. The 28th meeting of the COP began in the UAE on November 30 and will run for the next two weeks.
COP21, held in France in 2015, resulted in the historic Paris Agreement, an internationally binding treaty, under which 196 nations agreed to limit the rise in global temperatures to 1.5°C by the end of the century.
As we noted last week, the latest figures from scientists show that goal is in real danger of slipping beyond reach. Existing government pledges to tackle climate change are just not enough to do what is needed. Without more concerted action, the world faces a rise in temperature of between 2.5°C and 2.9°C above preindustrial levels – rises at which the planet risks passing beyond “several catastrophic points of no return,”
That’s why what happens at COP28 really matters. To have any hope of staying under the 1.5°C limit, leaders at this COP will have to deal with the twin challenges of boosting the transition to renewable sources of energy, such as solar energy, and phasing out fossil fuels.
Fossil Fuel Focus at COP28
It’s the matter of fossil fuels that has generated the “fox in the hen house” buzz about holding COP28 in one of the world’s leading petrochemical states. Mr. Al Jaber has already had to deny reports, published by the BBC last week, that the UAE intended to work on the side-lines of the meeting to strike fossil fuel deals with some participant states.
That little side hustle notwithstanding, the UAE’s presidency of COP28 presents a bigger obstacle.
Though previous COP agreements have accepted the need for the gradual “phasing down” of fossil fuel use, the idea of “phasing out” fossil fuels has drawn stiff opposition from major oil producing states, as well as China and India. Earlier this year, for instance, members of the G7 agreed to the “phasing out” of fossil fuels, but the G20 – which includes China and India – stuck fast on the wordage “phasing down”.
It was an experience that led observers to expect similar jousting at COP28. They have been proven right.
More than 100 countries represented at COP28 have suggested they would support an agreement to “phase-out” fossil fuels. US Climate Envoy John Kerry and UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, are among those strongly backing such an agreement. “Not reduce. Not abate. Phase out,” Mr Guterres said.
In his own speech in Dubai, Taoiseach Leo Varadker, called only for “the reduction in the use of fossil fuels,” wording some environmentalists slammed as “evasive”.
In the end, Ireland will have to be unequivocal. Under UN guidelines, all members of the COP have to agree to the text of any agreement, and it is clear there are still countries – Russia, China and Saudi Arabia – who would be reluctant to sign an agreement that would call for the end of fossil fuel use.
In his seat at the head of the table, Sultan Al Jaber presents a sizable risk to such an agreement. In a testy interview with Mary Robinson, the former Irish President who also served as an UN special envoy for climate change, Al Jaber claimed there was “no science” to indicate that a phase-out of fossil fuels is needed to restrict global heating to 1.5°C.
“Show me the roadmap for a phase-out of fossil fuel that will allow for sustainable socioeconomic development,” Al Jaber added, “unless you want to take the world back into caves.”
“This is an extraordinary, revealing, worrying and belligerent exchange.” Bill Hare, the chief executive of Climate Analytics, told The Guardian: ‘Sending us back to caves’ is the oldest of fossil fuel industry tropes: it’s verging on climate denial.”
Steps to Solar Energy at COP28
With that kind of push back from the fossil fuel giant leading the summit, is COP28 doomed? Not necessarily.
The UAE boasts the fourth largest solar power plant on earth, and delegates arriving in Dubai’s futuristic airport walk past a billboard reflecting the country’s ambition to erect a vast solar array across the desert. “We are not shying away from the energy transition,” Al Jaber said, countering critics. “In fact, we are running towards it.”
Boosting solar energy may be a key area in which Al Jaber and other national leaders may actually all be running in the same direction. By the second day of the summit, 118 governments – led by the UAE, the US and the EU – had pledged to triple the world’s renewable energy capacity by 2030. They’ll need to bring the rest of the 200 nations in attendance on board to get such a commitment into any final agreement emerging from COP28.
Having taken crucial steps to ensure that 2023 would be the year for “the rapid roll-out of solar power” at home, Minister for Climate and Energy Eamon Ryan arrived at the summit beating the drum for the transformative potential of solar energy for the world’s poorest nations.
“There are more solar panels in the Netherlands than the entirety of Africa, which has 60% of the world’s solar radiation. This is not fair. This has to change, and not just for climate reasons. If we invest in Africa, we are immediately supporting countries most affected by climate and least responsible for its causes. We can support development in countries where some of the worlds’ most intractable conflicts are taking place. Finally, this shift to energy equity can help manage forced climate migration — one of the greatest challenges we face.”
The build-out of renewables like solar energy has surged among developed countries – where government initiatives – like Ireland’s solar PV grant, elimination of VAT, and feed-in tariffs – have fuelled consumer interest in solar energy and created a vibrant environment for business.
The same is not true in the developing world. Africa, for instance, has received just 2% of global investments in renewable energy over the last two decades. To meet the global milestone of generating 10,000 gigawatts of renewable energy by 2030, Minister Ryan suggests radical changes must be made to “the world’s financial architecture” by “reducing currency risks, ensuring regulation and transparency, and ensuring there is the capacity and skills available in developing countries to build the infrastructure and grids needed.”
Cop out or cop on. The choice is that stark. We are in the ‘make or break’ decade to avoid an irreversible fossil-fuel fed environmental disaster.
Former Vice President Al Gore gets it.
“If there were a decision here to surprise the world,” he said at the weekend, “to say: ‘OK we get it now, we’ve made enough money, we will get on with what needs to be done to give young people a sense of hope again, and stop as much suffering as possible, and start the phase-out of fossil fuels’, it would be one of the most significant events in the history of humanity”
As they say in UN speak: “Mr. Al Jaber, Excellencies, Prime Ministers, Presidents, and Delegates, the tools for a transition to a just and sustainable energy future are there to be had. Surprise us.”
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