Theatrical Climate Change Concern

Dubai 2.22pm

National leaders trooped into the lavish expo building in the middle desert and cement factory this week to take part in what’s become an annual rite of penance — apologizing for historic bad behavior on climate and pledging to eventually become pure, but not yet. Global climate talks are big and complex, marked by an array of actors with often competing agendas. As hold presidency COP28, UAE will launch a clean energy investment fund at COP28.

At the opening two days of the two-week COP28 U.N. climate conference in Glasgow, more than 100 leaders took to the summit pulpit [PA / Palestinian Authority President Abbas no longer on speaker's list at COP28 leaders' summit —- of course 7.5 hours ago Israel resume the genocide in Gaza, MBS + Herzog did not hold their speeches as skedded, and the Iranian delegation is reportedly walking out over the Israel-Hamas war. A deal between Germany and the UAE hosts to stump up US$100m each for a new climate damage fund suddenly jammed China and made the US look stingy. In DC, Democrats grouse about House Republican plans for COP28. After IRA act, some paradox: can a green grid coexist with industrial surge?

War, money squabbles and political headaches are already crowding the fate of the planet from the agenda. This is going sideways— many to say how they plan to atone for their carbon sins, while countries being hit with the impact of climate change called for penance in the form of greater financial flows and steeper emissions cuts.

John Kerry's ‘gamble’ — trusting an oil baron to save the planet. Can UAE be both a climate leader and a major oil and gas producer? Sultan Ahmed al-Jaber CBE (سلطان أحمد الجابر), UAE renewable energy chief & oil company CEO, takes over the UN climate presidency COP 28. Two people who aren't expected to be there, OF COURSE, Biden [still busy about Gaza] and Xi Jinping. The US and China recently released a surprise deal that may provide a boost to the climate talks in Dubai — but the two powers remain at odds in several areas.

Despite the regular observances, U.N. boss António Guterres said it was an "illusion" that commitments being made were enough. Some question if it will actually compel any new policy. Words matter, others say. Meanwhile, there's opposition from big polluters. Even UK and US are wobbly.

We already have a globally agreed climate deal that deals with the need to "transition from fossil fuels". The *internationally-approved* summary for policymakers of the last IPCC climate science report that was signed of by every nation, including Russia, Saudi Arabia etc.

OPEC publishes a second communiqué itemising the “voluntary” cuts of **some** of its members. Note Brazil, which joins the group in 2024, isn’t participating. Note that the 1m bd from Saudi is already in place, and part of the Russian one isn’t new either. Brazil joins the OPEC+ group in 2024 — but again no details on what it means in terms of oil output. Pledge by Saudi Arabia to reach net-zero by 2060 was “crazy” and that, in negotiations with the Saudis in Paris in 2015.

Others believe the signal at this COP is vital. The EU and others have made it the defining goal of the talks. “You can't have 1.5 [degrees] without addressing fossil [fuels], and the Pacific doesn’t have the future we need without 1.5,” said Tina Stege, Marshall Islander.

Or ….. literally 2.8 degrees.

The leaders' often dull speeches are less about leading than following. The global climate system doesn't impose any sanctions for missing emissions targets or not pledging to do enough to keep warming in check, rather it relies on moral suasion — the sense of shame of leaders before their peers if their countries are seen as laggards. The idea is to keep presidents and prime ministers coming back again and again to such events, each time squeezing out higher commitments.

“We have to repeat and repeat. It's just awfully boring, awfully long, but absolutely necessary,” said Laurence Tubiana, a former French diplomat who is one of the architects of modern climate politics. 

The goal, Tubiana said, is to build a sense of inexorable progress, “the expectation that this will happen, it’s just inevitable … then you have the fear that if you are out of the loop, if you are not bandwagoning with the movement, you will be left on the side of the global economy.”

That explains why some of the most powerful men and women in the world were on stage in Dubai, despite many not having anything decisive to offer.

Even by giving banal speeches, the leaders were “keeping the Paris prophecy alive,” said Stefan Aykut, a professor of sociology at the University of Hamburg. A reminder that zapping the use of unabated fossil fuels is implicit in the 2015 Paris climate pact. There is no way to meet the temperature goals agreed there without phasing out, nay, ending coal, oil and gas emissions.

Stefan Aykut coined a term for this style of diplomacy — “incantatory governance” — with the idea that rituals reinforce certain behaviors or change perceptions of reality.

The effort to stave off disastrous climate change is based on “a belief in magic … almost like a kind of hypnosis,” he said. This is “a social practice that is used in many social contexts and traditional societies” but also in the business world.  

No worship experience would be complete without the collection plate.

Rich countries have long promised poor countries that they will pay for the original sin of their early industrialization, which brought climate change to the world, by delivering money to help poor countries develop using fewer fossil fuels. The aim is to supply $100 billion a year in climate finance — a goal rich countries aren't meeting, and which poor countries want dramatically raised.

Biden has taken a lot of heat, both from developed and developing countries, for the level of U.S. support for poor countries. The U.S. gives a lot less when compared to the size of its economy, but this failure is a collective one.

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please keep talking about Palestine.

Even amid I can writing a lot of issue, up again about this issue. Plestia Bosbos Alaqad, very well known as symbol of Gaza and her tireless reporting about heinous Israel in Gaza, beg to you, to keep talking about Palestine, especially because genocide by Israel started again 7 - 7.5 hours ago,

I know a lot of high-ranking media, such as New York Times, Guardian, Anadolu, BILD, Spiegel, Financial Times, Strait Times, Washington Post etc subscribed my substack. Plestia ‘Bosbos’ Alaqad ready to be your Stringer inside Gaza under bombing by Israel. Plestiaa2011@gmail.com

Toddler with Plestia, before war, living in Northern Gaza and they evacuated to Southern Gaza. Since Friday, Oct 13, when Israel announced to every Gazans from northern move to southern, more than 5,000 killed in southern, not counting barbaric bombing in northern Gaza. Northern Gaza is being depopulated, while even residents in the south are ordered to evacuate as the israelis implement their ethnic cleansing. Refugee literally fulfilled Israel warning, and still killed with barbaric bombing by Israel. Documentation by Plestia Alaqad

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