HASAfter years of avoiding any reference to the root cause of climate change, COP28 negotiators [réunis à Dubaï, aux Emirats arabes unis] have finally reached an agreement in 2023 for a “Transition away from fossil fuels”. This long-awaited “UAE Consensus” was the collective response to the Global Stocktake, a “global assessment” of the progress made under the Paris Agreement, which showed that we are heading towards global warming of almost 3 °C. [par rapport à l’ère préindustrielle]which would have disastrous consequences.
The Global Review thus confirmed what is increasingly obvious: the climate crisis is worsening everywhere. The cost of inaction continues to rise and misinformation, no matter how strong, cannot hide this reality.
The Dubai deal has been met with understandable skepticism, given past broken promises. Like many others, I stated that your success would depend on action, not words.
So where are we a year later? The good news is that renewable energy is booming and global capacity is growing at a remarkable rate. The strong economic momentum makes it unlikely that other countries will follow President Donald Trump if he withdraws the United States from the Paris agreement. Today, countries know that their future prosperity depends on the availability of abundant clean energy and the technologies that make it possible. China has focused on leadership in green technologies and has acquired enormous excess production capacity that it needs to export. All over the world, economic logic trumps ideology.
Financial markets are very often hostile
For now, however, renewables are adding to, rather than replacing, fossil fuels: according to the International Energy Agency, the latter will cover two-thirds of the growth in energy demand by 2023. And even if fuel use fossil en Reductions are expected to peak in 2030, but will still be too slow to reach the 1.5°C or even 2°C targets.
Countries now have the opportunity to demonstrate that their commitments in Dubai are sincere. If they are serious about phasing out fossil fuels, they must use their new climate change plans, due in 2025, to present concrete strategies to achieve this. This is no small feat: it requires a fundamental transformation of energy systems in a short period of time.
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