THE GUARDIAN
Failure to agree a phase-out of fossil fuels at the UN Cop28 climate summit would push the world beyond the crucial 1.5C temperature limit and into climate breakdown, the UK’s former climate chief has warned.
Alok Sharma, who was president of the Cop26 summit in Glasgow, said it was vital that governments made a clear commitment in the next few days to eliminate coal, oil and gas.
“If you’re going to keep 1.5C alive, you’re going to have to have language on a phase-out of fossil fuels,” he told the Observer in an interview. “And you’re going to need to accompany that with a credible implementation plan.”
He urged governments to act. “We are running out of time. The window on 1.5C is closing fast, and unless we are willing to act now, with the urgency that this issue demands, we will lose that 1.5C,” he said. “We are literally in the last chance saloon to save our children’s future.”
More than 190 governments are meeting in Dubai for the final days of the Cop28 summit, which runs until Tuesday, with the question of whether to phase out fossil fuels at the top of the agenda. At least 100 countries are in favour of a phase-out, but some major fossil fuel producers – including Saudi Arabia, China and India – are opposed.
Sharma was credited with keeping 1.5C “alive” against the odds at the Glasgow summit he led in 2021, when he managed to forge a deal among more than 190 squabbling countries that focused on the goal of limiting global temperature rises to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.
Green campaigners are worried that countries will come under pressure in Dubai from oil producers to weaken any commitment from a “phase-out” of fossil fuels to a “phase-down”. In the final moments of Cop26, China and India threatened to derail the entire agreement unless a commitment to phase out coal was watered down in this way.
Sharma urged ministers to hold firm to the more stringent target this time. “The language needs to be unequivocal,” he said. “So that anyone who reads the agreed language completely understands that what we’re talking about here is a phase-out of all fossil fuels.”
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