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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now, our climate story of the week, which we've been doing every Tuesday on the show all this year. Today and next Tuesday we'll be talking about developments at the COP28 Climate Conference now taking place in Dubai. COP stands for a Conference of the Parties. That's the parties to a 1994 UN framework convention on climate change. This is the 28th follow-up conference, Conference of the Parties COP28. It started last week and runs through next Tuesday. We're going to start today's climate story of the week in a different way than usual.

The biggest controversy at COP28 so far is something the president of the conference said. He is Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber of the United Arab Emirates, also the head of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, as well as president of COP28. He said, "Phasing out fossil fuels isn't scientifically necessary and would send humanity back into caves." Interesting, given his role as president of the conference obviously. He later said he'd been taken out of context and sought to put it differently.

We're going to give you plenty of context, partly because it's so interesting to listen to. Maybe you've heard a brief snippet of his remarks on the news, but we have the luxury of time on this show. We're going to play for you four minutes of the remarkable exchange that made these headlines. This is from a COP28 session with Sultan Al-Jaber and the former president of Ireland, Mary Robinson, who's attending the conference. Mary Robinson speaks first.

[audio playback begins]

Mary Robinson: I think one urgent message has come through in the entire day of the summit. I've heard it at every session I think. That is that we're in an absolute crisis that is hurting women more than anyone, women and children, the elderly, and those with disability, et cetera, and those most vulnerable. It's because we have not yet committed to phasing out fossil fuel. That is the one decision that COP28 can take under your presidency.

In many ways, because you are head of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, you could actually take it with more credibility by saying, I now recognize we have to phase out fossil fuel with just transition for the workers and their communities, and just transition into renewable accessible, affordable clean energy. It's not going to happen overnight as you say. It'll be orderly, but urgent. I didn't hear the word urgent enough in your voice when you spoke earlier that's why I interrupted.

Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber: I said fast-track. I'm not sure what urgent means, but fast-track is [unintelligible 00:02:54]

Mary Robinson: Fast-track can be more of a managerial term. Urgency is crisis mode.

Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber: We can always play with words here. You are a good politician and you know how to use words better than I do. I'm a businessman. I am centered around delivery and actions.

Mary Robinson: Will you lead on phasing out fossil fuel with just transition as I've said, from all the [crosstalk]

Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber: You can take the lead. I'll make sure I put you as an item on the agenda and I'll adopt it. Someone has to take the lead. You come from a developed country, developed countries, I'm sure can take the lead like they always do, and lead by example. You can lead by example. Like I said from the beginning, I accepted to come to this meeting to have a sober and a mature conversation.

I'm not in any way signing up to any discussion that is alarmist. I am here factual and I respect the science, and there is no science out there or no scenario out there that says that the phaseout of fossil fuel is what's going to achieve 1.5. 1.5 is my north star, and a phaseout of fossil fuel in my view is inevitable. It is essential, but we need to be real serious and pragmatic about it.

Mary Robinson: The real serious and pragmatic doesn't take into account that we are in-- I respect that you've done a lot of hard work preparing for this COP, and that you've listened to the science. The science is very acute now. We don't have any time. They say six or seven years, we've got to peak by 2025 latest in fossil fuel. [crosstalk] new fossil fuel, and your company is investing in a lot more new fossil fuel. That's going to hurt women.

Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber: Ma'am, you've just accused me of something that is not correct. I'm sorry, I don't take it. Now, I ask you to prove to me how--

Mary Robinson: I read that your company is investing in a lot more fossil fuel in the future.

Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber: Yes, ma'am. You're reading your own media, which is biased and wrong. I am telling you. I am the man in charge and it is wrong, ma'am. You need to listen to me, please. Please, for once.

Mary Robinson: I'm very pleased to hear it.

Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber: It is wrong. You guys write a lie and you believe it. I'm sorry, I do not accept it.

Mary Robinson: I only follow what I see--

Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber: I am not accepting this. I'm sorry. I am sorry, I respect you and I do not accept any false accusations. I've been very clear about my position. This is wrong. You're asking for a phaseout of fossil fuel. Please help me, show me a roadmap for a phaseout of fossil fuel that will allow for sustainable socioeconomic development. Unless you want to take the world back into caves. Show me.

[audio playback ends]

Brian Lehrer: There you go. Former president of Ireland, Mary Robinson, with Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber of the United Arab Emirates. Also the head of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, as well as president of COP28, the climate summit now taking place in Dubai. The exchange was first reported by The Guardian. With us now live from COP28 is Nina Lakhani, senior Climate Justice reporter for The Guardian US. Nina, thanks for some time for us while you're over there in Dubai. Welcome to WNYC.

Nina Lakhani: Thank you very much, Brian. Nice to be with you.

Brian Lehrer: What happened there? What's the buzz on that exchange and what Al-Jaber was really trying to say now that it's a few days old?

Nina Lakhani: I think the reason everybody's so angry and upset about it is the fact that he clearly says in that, there is no science behind the phaseout. He's basically trying to claim that there is no science between we needing to phase out fossil fuels in order to keep the hope of 1.5 alive, and that is just factually incorrect. All of the science tells us, and there is a mountain of it that for us to have any hope in avoiding absolutely catastrophic climate breakdown, we have to curtail global heat into 1.5, and that we don't have much time left to do that.

The only way to do that is to stop extracting and producing, and burning fossil fuels. That's it. The fact that he said that and was caught saying that has obviously caused a huge scandal, and rightly so. I think things he said either side of that have some merit, and we can talk about that. In a way, I think for many people who have obviously been following the planning and the process that goes to get into the COP itself, people weren't really very surprised. A lot of his language has been in the-- The framing has been-- He's been trying to, I guess, mold the language a little bit, muddy the waters and talk about things like abatement.

Which the US, by the way, is very, very fond of talking about as well, and just trying to make the move towards this phase-down, and maybe we can just keep burning fossil fuels and capture all the emissions. Really, I think what that conversation did, and my colleague Damien and Carrington that broke that story, did is that it just put everything out in the open. There is no hiding behind language. There's no pretending that you're a man of science, which he has, and continues to claim to be. What he was saying was just factually incorrect. By the way, could he have been more patronizing to the former Irish Prime Minister [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: Oh, that.

Nina Lakhani: Oh, that. Exactly. They were talking at a gender meeting, but it had just to be ironically.

Brian Lehrer: A gender meeting?

Nina Lakhani: Yes, gender and climate.

Brian Lehrer: Which was her starting point there, that climate change has mostly taken women and children as its victims. For you as a climate justice reporter, is that your understanding, or what's your understanding of her argument?

Nina Lakhani: Absolutely. The fact is what we know is that the climate crisis is a risk multiplier. For those, it exposes and exacerbates risks that already are present so that-- in any type of crisis, in any type of disaster, when it comes to poverty, when it comes to housing, for all of these different social economic issues and problems that there are, women and children are almost always, if not always the ones that are most likely to suffer. Your last item was about the war on Gaza. Exactly the same situation. Then on top of that, the climate crisis exacerbates and exposes those.

That's what she was talking about. A failure to phase out fossil fuels, and a failure to curtail global heating will have the most impact on the countries and the communities, and women and children in other vulnerable groups at a much higher level and much greater scale than it will for everybody else. The thing about the climate crisis, Brian, is that we are not all in this together. We didn't all contribute to the climate crisis in the same way, and we are not all being impacted by it in the same way. I think that's what she was trying to get at at the beginning of the conversation.

Brian Lehrer: Al-Jaber did say, in addition to saying there's no science out there that says, a phaseout of fossil fuels is necessary to stay within that 1.5-degree Celsius of warming limit, he did also say, a phase-down and phaseout is essential, and seemed to indicate at the end of the clip that it's a matter of how. I'm going to read some of those words again. He said, "Please help me, show me the roadmap for a phaseout of fossil fuel that would allow for a sustainable socioeconomic development, unless you want to take the world back into caves." That's a pretty aggressive way of putting it. I'm a little confused about his position. Is he saying the phaseout is essential, it's just a matter of how quickly we can do it to not deprive developing countries of energy right away?

Nina Lakhani: I'm not going to defend what he said, because going back to caves was just diabolical, the phrasing of that. That part of what he said about-- and earlier he also said about rich countries, developed countries leading by example. If he had been better at words, what he would've talked about then would've been a just transition. A just and equitable transition away from fossil fuels to a clean energy economy, to clean [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: Which was Mary Robinson's own language. Right? She started by saying talking about justice, a just transition.

Nina Lakhani: Yes. He just started mansplaining stuff to her, which he definitely has a pattern of doing. I think just in terms of he's not wrong about developed countries and in the context of the negotiations that are going on now, the fossil fuel phaseout is being discussed in this big process known as the global stocktake. Just very briefly, the global stocktake is the assessment of where we are as a world collectively in doing and implementing what we said we would do in the Paris Agreement from 2015.

Where we are collectively, what we're failing on, what we're doing well on. Each country is contributing to that. Where we go from here, what happens over the next few years. The fossil fuel phaseout is being discussed in that. I think with the divergence of opinion among many countries, you can't just say it's developed versus developing because lots of developing countries have oil and gas as well, and lots of developing countries now have all of the industry.

All of the industry and the factories that made countries like the UK and the US rich many years ago. That now move to developing countries. I think what is really key though, and what is being hashed out and negotiated very, very strongly right now is that yes, there has to be a fossil fuel phaseout, but it can't be the same timeline for the US as it is for India or for Columbia, or for the Philippines, because that would not be fair and it would not be equitable.

Brian Lehrer: Which is in a certain way what he was saying?

Nina Lakhani: Honestly, if I'm being really kind and generous, and not being cynical like my tendency is to be, I think at the beginning and end of that conversation is what he was saying. You have many countries that like the UAE and like many-- I was talking to the environment minister of Oman yesterday, for example, where the fossil fuels are 80% to 90% of their national budget. You can't talk about phaseout without talking about help, funding for diversification. Then you have other countries, say for example, Malaysia, where its national oil company contributes 20% of its national budget.

You can't talk about phaseout for Malaysia without talking about, where's the help coming for us to actually have sustainable development? Just to finish that thought about the global stocktake, what developing countries are absolutely pushing for is a fossil fuel phaseout that is fair, that it's funded, that it's fast, and that it's forever. The four Fs is what everyone's talking about here to look out for. That is not what the US is talking about. The US is not talking about that at all because that requires acknowledgment of its historical responsibility of where we're at now. It also requires to contribute a fair amount of money to help countries to transition, which it does not want to do.

Brian Lehrer: This is a difference, I think, between let's say the Biden administration and the Trump administration in this country. You tell me if you think it's less of a difference than meets the eye. When Trump was president, he would say that global warming policy, the Paris Agreement, which he pulled the US out of, is a scam because it asks the US to give money to India, for example, and also let them phase out fossil fuels more slowly than we would be required to phase out fossil fuels. Which he argues is them getting over on the American taxpayer and the American quality of life.

The way the developing countries argue it, as you've just been explaining, is that, no, we're poor, we're just starting out. We can't develop as quickly away from fossil fuels in order to take our people out of poverty at the same time. This is a big issue at COP28, as I understand it from your reporting and others. Maybe they're finally going to make some progress on getting the developed - overwhelmingly high percentage of the climate pollution that's ever been emitted and is still being emitted - countries to help those developing countries in the way you've been explaining, that maybe they're actually going to get to it this time. Do you think so or do you not think so?

Nina Lakhani: I think there is there's movement-- the fact that we're talking about a fossil fuel phaseout at all, and it's in the draft text that was published this morning from the first line of negotiations, it's like a Christmas miracle. That even three years ago wouldn't have been there. The fact that we have loss and damage funds set up, and now that details of that being worked out, again, the US and the EU, and other countries have been stopping that and blocking that for 25 years or more. The fact that that was achieved in Egypt last year and is making progress this year is a huge step. Absolutely. The start of your question, you asked about the difference between the Democrats and the Republicans.

Brian Lehrer: Yes.

Nina Lakhani: I did a story last year exactly looking at that, and whole bunch of different people. People who have been at these negotiations 28 years. People have been coming and coming again. What they said, Trump was a wrecking ball, in every sense of the word, in every area of policy absolutely. From a climate negotiations perspective, they say it really doesn't matter who's in the White House.

I was just talking to an expert before I came onto the phone about where we're at now. Every conversation I have with people here from civil society, from developing countries, the US, the UK, the EU are absolutely considered to be bad faith actors. Does it matter who's in the White House when it comes to domestic policy? Absolutely. Would we have got the IRA with Trump in the White House? No. That has an impact then obviously globally. When it comes--

Brian Lehrer: That big climate bill.

Nina Lakhani: Sorry. The historic climate bill that Biden signed last summer. Does it matter in this international climate diplomacy negotiating space? The overwhelming view is, no, not really. If I can just give you one example--

Brian Lehrer: With Nina Lakhani, senior climate justice reporter at The Guardian US, she's joining us live from the COP28 Climate Conference in Dubai. Yes, we will take a few phone calls for her on our climate story of the week at 212-433-WNYC. Kevin in Belmar, be ready, you will be first. Nina, go ahead and finish that thought. I apologize.

Nina Lakhani: No, not at all. I was just going to say as an example, so the loss in damage fund, which was agreed upon last year in Egypt, and which has been operationalized on day one here, is such a huge, huge victory for developing countries and frontline communities all over the world. Just as an example, in the year that there's been since Egypt, there's been all these negotiations going on. One of the key sticking points was that where this money, where this fund would be managed. The US and the EU just pushed and pushed and pushed for it to be in the World Bank.

These developing countries were forced to accept that. The US's view, or what they kept saying is, for the scale of the money that's going to be needed, and the speed of the money that's needed, only the World Bank can do it. Developing countries didn't want that because the US has such a huge influence on the World Bank. Anyway, they had to accept it. This one gets set up on day one, it's they operationalize and countries start making pledges. 100 million from Germany, 100 million from Italy, 100 million from UAE. The US pledges 17.5 million.

That is 0.0001% - I might have even missed out a naught - of the of the damage caused by $1 billion of disasters in the US itself just this year. It is such an embarrassingly small amount of money. They insisted on it being in the World Bank, and then they just haven't delivered again. I think there is so little trust when it comes to the US and these negotiating rooms. Obviously Trump wouldn't have given anything, his government wouldn't have pledged anything. People get that. They're known for blocking, they're known for denying.

Brian Lehrer: It's almost the same thing but quieter.

Nina Lakhani: Yes. Exactly.

Brian Lehrer: Naught, naught, naught, naught, naughty, naughty, naughty, naughty. Kevin in Belmar, you're on WNYC. Hello, Kevin.

Kevin: Hello, Brian. Just curious how the president of the COP28 is a petrochemical president from a petrochemical nation. How did that even happen?

Brian Lehrer: Nina?

Nina Lakhani: The way that the presidency works is that it goes by UN region. Last year was Africa, and that one was in Egypt. Next year is meant to be, I think it's Eastern Europe. The year after is Latin America. This year it was Asia's turn. Countries have to nominate themselves or be nominated by their group, voted on. Part of the issue around that is that who can afford to hold these things? Because they're really expensive. There's 84,000 people registered to come to this conference. Everybody voted for him. Every country said it was fine.

The fact that he was nominated by UAE to be the president is obviously-- I don't know, I don't even have the words to to describe it. It's just he's head of the National Oil Company. He did start out in his career on solar, but he's been head of the National Oil Company for a long time. That was a decision, but everybody accepted it. Everybody accepted it. Obviously, it's been problematic, it is problematic.

Kevin, just to say one thing, we call UAE a petrostate, we call Saudi Arabia a petrostate. The biggest producer of oil and gas in 2023, United States of America. If we're going to call these countries petrostates, then let's be fair about it. The five countries in the world that are going to produce the most oil and gas from the operations that are already up and running between now and 2050; the US, the UK, Norway, Canada, and Australia. Yes, these guys are petrostates, but then, no one's producing more oil and gas anywhere in the world than the US at the moment.

Brian Lehrer: Tim in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC, with Nina Lakhani from The Guardian US, live from the COP28 conference in Dubai. Hi, Tim.

Tim: Hi. Good morning. That was absolutely condescending mansplaining. [chuckles] I think that should really be what outrageous--

Brian Lehrer: For people who've joined since we played that four-minute clip, by Al-Jaber, the president of COP28 and an oil company executive, to Mary Robinson earlier. Go ahead.

Tim: Yes, thank you. The content of his comments, if you really boil them down to when he's not talking down to her, are not wildly incorrect in the sense that, yes, we need to figure out how to do this. He agrees that it's a goal. I think the outrage is a bit misplaced. I think what's more outrageous and hasn't been talked about, and I hope your guest knows about it, the UN climate chief was negotiating petro deals at this thing. Am I correct on that? If so, that tells you that this thing is more of a farcical circus than his comments.

Brian Lehrer: It's a great point, and I was going to get there too. Tim, I'm glad you did. Just looking at some other things that The Guardian is reporting on the presence of fossil fuel lobbyists at COP28. There are more fossil fuel lobbyists than delegates from the 10 most climate-vulnerable countries combined. There are more climate lobbyists there, more than seven times the number of fossil fuel lobbyists than official indigenous representatives. I haven't heard a previous COP conference covered in this way. Is it always like this with a big presence of fossil fuel lobbyists at a conference that's supposed to be about fighting climate change?

Nina Lakhani: It's record-breaking. This is a third year that researchers have got the UN delegate list. The people who have been approved for access, it doesn't mean that all went, who got approved to go. Glasgow was the first year. That was about, I want to say-- what's the word? I haven't got an exact number, but to say it was 500 or 450, last year was 600, but this year, 2,500 almost. There has been an extra transparency rule put in, so until this year, nobody had-- When you apply to be accredited for COP, this is the first year when you were asked a question, who are you representing?

That wasn't asked before, so that might account for some of it. I think probably it's more likely that there were far more fossil fuel lobbyists there last year and the year before, but just we didn't know about them, because it wasn't disclosed. I think that it is particularly bare-faced and gross this year, I would say. I calculated one in 30 people walking around this place is a fossil fuel lobbyist, at least, but it didn't start here. I think the fossil fuel industry and other polluting industries have been capturing and have captured this process for many, many years.

I asked a question at a press conference yesterday, just about, is this the UN? Is this the UN that we need to hold to account? The UN enforces the rules that all the countries, the parties make, so it's up to the countries to not allow this, and actually many countries, including France, Italy, the EU, among others, actually have executives and representatives of big private oil companies like Total, like Shell, like Exxon Mobil, in their official delegation. It's like they're all there, they're all doing business. That story the listener just mentioned, I think my colleague, Damien also broke that story.

Was that it was being discussed, in the run-up to it, there was minutes, I think, for meetings that were leaked, which shows that they were being discussed. Again, I think it is particularly bad and particularly bare-faced this time, but I don't think this is the first time it's happening at all. We were talking about this, my colleague and I, yesterday, that we think, and we haven't got a final count yet, but we think there are more Republican lawmakers registered to come to this COP than Democrats, which also is quite telling, I think, about--

Brian Lehrer: Interesting.

Nina Lakhani: Exactly. Who thinks there's business to be done here. It is really bad. It's unbelievable. I think it's been happening, and this capture of this process has been creeping up and up. Actually, somebody made a good point today that, why are they out in such big numbers? Because the people have spoken, the science has spoken, and they are running scared because time is running out. They are doing everything they can to try and preserve their interests at this point.

Brian Lehrer: Desperation. We just have 30 seconds left, the COP28 conference runs through next Tuesday, a week from today. That's a long conference.

Nina Lakhani: Oh, God, yes.

Brian Lehrer: I guess you've got your marching orders for The Guardian, but where should people be focusing between now and next Tuesday?

Nina Lakhani: I think this global stocktake I mentioned is really, really important. We will try our best to try and explain it as simply as possible. This is where you will see the language around fossil fuels. Fossil fuel phaseout is the key phrase, equity and fairness is really important. Look out for the word "abatement". That is what the fossil fuel companies and many polluting nations are pushing for.

It's an undefined term, and it would give a huge amount of wiggle room for false solutions and to delay in further. We just can't afford to delay any further. I was reporting earlier this year, Phoenix had 600 people died in Maricopa County this year from heat. The fires, the floods, the hurricanes, the extreme heat, the drought, is impacting every corner of the world and we just can't afford not to have movement on the transition away from fossil fuels.

Brian Lehrer: All right, we will follow up on what the word "abatement" means in that context. Listeners, we will do our climate story of the week on the show next Tuesday, also on COP28, and what does happen between now and then, that will be the last day of the conference. For today, we thank Nina Lakhani, senior climate justice reporter at The Guardian US for taking time out from her reporting in Dubai, to join us. Thank you so much. We really, really appreciate it. Great job.

Nina Lakhani: You're welcome. Thank you.

 

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