Hello!
Welcome to another week of COP29 updates.
This year's U.N. climate summit in Baku, Azerbaijan, is struggling to focus minds on the health of the planet with turbulent geopolitics.
Diplomatic tensions over global warming spilled over into the G20 summit negotiations in Brazil this week, with sources saying the 20 major economies reached a fragile consensus on climate finance that had eluded U.N. talks in Baku.
On Saturday, discussions of a G20 joint statement in Rio snagged on the same issue.
European nations are pushing for more countries to contribute. However, developing countries such as Brazil are pushing back, diplomats close to the talks told Reuters.
Negotiators did agree to a text mentioning developing nations' voluntary contributions to climate finance, stopping short of calling them obligations, according to two diplomats.
The G20 of it all
So, what exactly is going on at the G20 summit around climate change and what is the difference?
While the COP29 summit is tasked with agreeing a goal to mobilize hundreds of billions of dollars for climate, leaders of the Group of 20 major economies half a world away in Rio are holding the purse strings.
The U.N.'s climate chief Simon Stiell penned a letter to G20 leaders to send a signal of support for global climate finance efforts in Rio to help trigger a deal at COP29 talks in Baku.
He said they should support an increase in grants and loans, along with debt relief, so vulnerable countries "are not hamstrung by debt servicing costs that make bolder climate actions all but impossible".
Another factor hindering progress in the talks could be the dwindling numbers of participants at this year's COP29.
In all, about 50,000 people registered for COP29 – far fewer than the record 80,000 who thronged last year's splashy, expo-like COP28 held in Dubai.
Fossil fuel lobbyists
Despite these low numbers, the fossil fuel industry showed up, with the heads of Exxon, BP, Total, and Saudi Aramco. The activist coalition Kick Big Polluters Out said it counted at least 1,773 fossil fuel lobbyists present.
Juan Carlos Monterrey, Special Representative for Climate of the Ministry of Environment of Panama, said people in Panama were dying from burning forests and rising seas while COP delegates wasted millions of dollars debating footnotes and attending cocktail receptions.
"For some nations, fossil fuel production may be a blessing, but for us, it's a curse and a death sentence," he said.
This comes as the fossil fuel industry is actively rolling back its clean energy progress.
Almost five years ago, BP embarked on an ambitious attempt to transform itself from an oil company into a business focused on low-carbon power.
The British company is now trying to return to its roots as a big oil and gas player with a growth story to match rivals, revive its share price and allay investor concerns over future profits. Rivals Shell and Norway's state-controlled Equinor are also scaling back energy transition plans set out earlier this decade.
