Cop30 is in Belem, Brazil, running for two weeks, starting on Monday. It’s the latest climate change summit. Trump won’t be there as he says climate change is the biggest scam ever. One wonders whether he actually believes that all the climate scientists across the world are in a conspiracy to fool the rest of us. My belief is that he has extensive oil interests, and so self interest has determined his mindset. Drill, baby, drill is his joyful cry. Though for the planet, it’s a destructive mantra. We are beyond 1.5 degrees of warming, and the President of the United States exhorts the world to burn more oil, gas and coal. This is not simply Nero fiddling while Rome burns, but pouring oil on to the flames.
Trump won’t be at the Cop, but fossil fuel interests will be, diluting and negating any statements that come out of the conference. Over 5000 oil, gas and coal lobbyists have come to these climate summits in the last four Cops. Their role is to kill declarations to cut fossil fuels. And so we get nowhere as climate change bites. Island states like Vanuatu will be flooded with rising sea levels. Warmer oceans feed hurricanes. Big as the recent hurricane Melissa was that devastated Jamaica, the ones coming in future years will be even more powerful and destructive. It’s the old old story; the rich countries use most of the fossil fuels that cause climate change, but poor countries suffer most of the consequences. Salah Ahmed Jama, at the pre-conference in Belem said that although his country was only responsible for 0.01% of greenhouse gases, it was among the nations most affected by floods, drought, and other extreme weather conditions.
50 degrees Celsius is no longer a freak temperature in Africa and the Middle East. Spain is suffering extensive drought, Italy and Greece baked last summer with temperatures in the high 40s. Climate change is happening, and at current rates we could hit 2.5 degrees of warming or more.
In 2009, I went to Cop 15 in Copenhagen. I actually thought Cop was short for Copenhagen, until I was told otherwise. It stands for Conference of the Parties and is held every year. The first was in Berlin in 1995. I went by train to Copenhagen, we weren’t going to fly. The train had been hired by a Belgian environmental group. I was with the Campaign Against Climate Change and they invited us to join their train, and help them pay for it. So we took the Eurostar to Brussels and picked up the train that went through Germany and down Denmark to Copenhagen.
I recall the march through the city, the banners and the chanting. I recall the disillusionment. Nothing much came out of Copenhagen. And 16 years later, where have we got to? When it comes to climate change, we see capitalism at its worse. The oil rich states want to stay rich, nay get richer, and so do their best to kill any declarations to take action against fossil fuels. And if they can’t, then mute them to uselessness.
In 2024, Cop29 was in Baku, Azerbaijan, which could have been a joke if it wasn’t so disheartening. Oil is Azerbaijan’s biggest export; it’s like holding a vegetarian conference in a corn beef factory. Cop28 was in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, another major oil producer. At the former, the hosts were actually touting for business at the Cop.
Recently there has been an increasing consensus that climate change is real and must be addressed. Then along came Trump and he has given licence to all the nay sayers. In this country, we have Reform parroting Trump. If they get into government, then green changes will be reversed.
Ed Miliband is at Cop30 for the UK. He has been Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero since July 2024, and has been campaigning on green issues for 15 years, so he’s more knowledgeable than many. I wish him well, but it is outside such beanfeasts that real change is made.
Rereading this blog, am I being unduly pessimistic about Cop30? But it appears to me that fossil fuel interests have got their claws into the Cops. They should never have been allowed to be there, but having got there they won’t let go.