Breakthroughs to bend the climate curve at COP28
We’re one week into a momentous COP28 with breakthroughs on key CATF priorities and a host of disruptive dialogues pushing the conversation in a more productive direction.
As negotiators reached agreements on Loss & Damage and continue to hammer out the details of the Global Stocktake, our experts have helped to drive major announcements, force hard conversations, and propose innovative solutions outside of the negotiating rooms. From nuclear energy ambition to methane mitigation to oil and gas decarbonization, our work to encourage world leaders to reckon with the full scope of the climate challenge – and to take the urgent actions we need to meet it – is paying off.
Nuclear energy breaks through as a surprise early-COP winner
Following years of neglect in climate dialogues at the annual COP, nuclear energy has re-emerged at COP28, with a groundbreaking commitment by more than 22 countries to triple global nuclear energy capacity by 2050. CATF was on hand to commend leaders on the new initiative, and then rolled up its sleeves to work with them on what it will take to turn that ambition into action and from pledges to plans. Teaming up with partners EFI Foundation and the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI), we released our new global playbook that outlines pathways for the effective development of new nuclear energy projects in embarking countries, and a second CATF report on the changes we need to make to scale nuclear energy around the world.
As CATF Executive Director Armond Cohen noted, “nuclear energy has the potential to provide millions of people all around the world with carbon-free, firm energy — helping reduce greenhouse gas emissions while boosting energy access and energy security. But the ecosystem countries rely on to develop and deploy nuclear energy is fundamentally flawed. This new playbook provides an overview of the routes embarking countries may take to navigate this ecosystem and develop nuclear energy fleets of their own — and contributes to a global push for new pathways toward a world in which nuclear energy plays a meaningful role in global decarbonization.”
We launched the playbook alongside the governments of Ghana, the Philippines, Romania, and the UAE, as well as Ernest Moniz, former U.S. Secretary of Energy, President and CEO, EFI Foundation and Co-Chair & CEO, NTI – reminding the world leaders that the ambition to triple nuclear energy is laudable, and there is much we must change to make its achievement possible. The playbook was also featured at the first-ever COP Nuclear Ministerial, through a fireside chat between CATF’s Senior Director in Europe and the Middle East, Lee Beck, and Secretary Ernest Moniz, underscoring the potential of nuclear energy.
Momentous methane: Finance, regulations, innovation, and a call for more
Another major breakthrough at COP28 has been on the methane front, with a series of significant steps forward building on progress since the launch of the Global Methane Pledge at COP26. These points of progress were catalogued at a CATF-hosted Global Methane Pledge Ministerial this week. In collaboration with U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry, European Commissioner for Energy Kadri Simson, and other leaders, ministers celebrated the rollout of robust U.S. methane regulations, powerful financial commitments to fund methane mitigation, a new platform to better track waste methane emissions in cities around the world, and new proposed Canadian methane regulations.
In closing remarks, Jonathan Banks, CATF’s Global Director for Methane Pollution Prevention, commended leaders for their progress, and urged them to come back next year with even more.
“While everything you have heard announced over the first few days of COP28 and here at the ministerial is worthy of celebration,” he said, “we must suffice with only a brief congratulations. After all, announcements don’t reduce emissions.”
Jonathan challenged countries to incorporate methane mitigation into their climate goals under the Paris Agreement, develop methane action plans, and report on progress regularly. He also urged banks and investors to prioritize methane projects and push their clients to take action as well.
“What we are trying to do is the single greatest action we can take to finally start bending the curve on climate. All the money raised, the new commitments and new partners will mean nothing if we don’t go forth from here to develop and implement actions and policies that start cutting methane today.”
Watch a recording of the ministerial here.
Coming up in week 2: Geopolitics, fusion, and implementation
During week 2 of COP28, CATF will highlight the importance of incorporating geopolitics into clean energy transition planning, as well as incorporating effective planning principles into climate action and commercializing what could be a transformative climate solution: fusion energy.
Week 2 will also push the UNFCCC process back into the limelight, as the draft COP agreement will be handed over to the COP Presidency to lead negotiations to a final position. We expect the impact of week 1’s breakthroughs to be felt in negotiating rooms as COP draws to a close, with broader recognition around the importance of cutting methane emissions, developing a broad portfolio of climate solutions, and allowing for region-centric approaches that work within the realities of energy security and energy access.
For regular COP28 updates from our team on the ground in Dubai, please sign up here.
Week 1 Roundup: Featured Events
Spotlight on African voices
Africans are spearheading solutions to address both climate change and energy access challenges. And at COP28, Clean Air Task Force hosted panels to explore how we can better listen to and better tell African stories, highlight locally led innovation in the climate and energy space, and reshape Africa-Europe partnerships for effective climate action.
Solar Sister’s Olasimbo Sojinrin, Ghana Climate Innovation Center’s Rukayatu Sanusi, and Basi-Go's Jit Bhattacharya joined CATF’s Lily Odarno to discuss how to approach designing programs and engaging communities with climate innovation.
“The stories we hear will highlight indigenous climate innovation in Africa,” Lily Odarno said, “stories that are not heard often enough around the world.”
CATF and the Africa Policy Research Institute also brought together experts from Africa and Europe to discuss opportunities for sustainable prosperity within the Global Gateway Strategy. The panel explored how Africa-Europe relations can be restructured to encourage true mutual benefits that can benefit energy and climate goals across both continents.
Read more on climate action in Africa.
Tackling the hard realities of decarbonization
To kick off CATF’s engagement at COP28, CATF Executive Director, Armond Cohen, sat down with The Economist’s Global Energy and Climate Innovation Editor, Vijay Vaitheeswaran, to discuss the importance of grounding our climate ambition in reality and acknowledging hard truths around finance, timing, political will, and competing priorities.
“There are hard realities that we need to face in order to level set and have a real conversation at COP28. I don’t mean to pour too much cold water, but we’re not where we need to be and we need a new approach so that we’re not having the same conversation at COP50,” CATF’s Armond Cohen said.
Later in the week, CATF’s Director of Insights and Integration Strategy, Kasparas Spokas, led a panel in the Zero-Carbon Future pavilion on global finance barriers to the net-zero transition. To achieve net-zero global emissions by midcentury, we must invest roughly $4.5 trillion per year in the energy sector, roughly double what we are currently investing in energy. For emerging and developing economies, investment must quadruple by 2030.
Experts discussed the breadth of challenges relating to financial markets and a net-zero transition to better identify the risks, opportunities, and limiting factors of which we should be aware to inform decarbonization, climate management, and future policy and research work.
And finally, oil and gas and the question of its role in a zero-carbon future is inescapable at any climate summit – particularly one hosted by the United Arab Emirates. At CATF, we know that we must eliminate emissions from the global oil and gas sector – which means phasing out unabated fossil fuels and, crucially, phasing in carbon-free energy sources like wind, solar, nuclear energy, geothermal, and zero-carbon fuels. It also means requiring maximal mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions from any fossil fuel production that remains – both upstream methane and CO2 mitigation and point source carbon capture and storage.
That’s why we’re exploring pathways to cut oil and gas emissions while spurring the long-term changes needed to transform our energy system at COP28 – including through private convenings and public panels. This week, we hosted an event focused on the responsibilities of National Oil Companies and International Oil Companies within a shifting global energy landscape, and how that responsibility should be shared between producers and consumers. Moderated by CATF’s Energy Transition Director in the Middle East and North Africa, Olivia Azadegan, the panel featured representatives from OPEC, Occidental Petroleum, the United Nations Environment Programme, the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative, and more. You can watch a recording of the event here.
Charting a new vision for European climate action and leadership
Europe has long been seen as a climate pioneer, but shifting geoeconomics and geopolitics put energy security and economic security on top of the agenda, and climate policy must adapt.
This week at CATF’s Zero-Carbon Future pavilion, Iceland’s Minister of the Environment, Energy and Climate, Gudlaugur Thór Thórdarson, Poland’s former Minister of Climate and Environment and COP24 President, Michal Kurtyka, Sweden’s State Secretary to the Minister for Climate and the Environment, Daniel Westlén, EU Commission DG Clima Policy Officer, Johanna Schiele, and Romania’s State Adviser on Climate and Sustainability, Alexandra Bocșe, joined CATF's Senior Director in Europe and the Middle East, Lee Beck, to discuss what a renewed vision for European climate action should include.
With representatives from the EU Commission and three EU Member States, the panel explored how decision-makers and policymakers can change their approach to tackling climate to reach the ambitious goal of climate neutrality by 2050.
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