As we wait for more reaction to the text it is worth catching up with this piece on Saudi Arabia and its role as the biggest blocker of climate action – even while its population wrestle with the devastating impacts of the climate crisis.
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Reaction to the draft text issued overnight is starting to come in as Belem wakes up – and it is far from positive.
Bronwen Tucker, public finance lead at Oil Change International, is not holding back:
This is outrageous. We came here to secure a COP 30 package for justice and equity. The Presidency has presented a shamefully weak text that fails to mention fossil fuels, fails to deliver accountability towards rich countries’ finance obligations, and only makes vague promises on adaptation. The Belém Action Mechanism for a just transition needs to be protected at all costs in the final hours. But let’s be clear, we need all of these pillars to work together in one package: the just transition, public finance, and planning for a fair fossil fuel phaseout.
A large group of countries have been vocal in their support for a roadmap to transition away from fossil fuels, but rich parties are still refusing to deliver the debt-free public finance on fair terms that is key to make it happen. Until they stop blocking efforts to address the systemic barriers developing countries face to phasing out fossil fuels, any roadmap will be a dead-end.
On Bluesky the World Wildlife Fund said:
The latest draft text from COP30 is extremely disappointing. Vested fossil fuel interests and big agriculture must be celebrating the lack of any roadmaps to transition away from fossil fuels and to stop deforestation. We call for substantial improvements to stay on a pathway to a 1.5C world.
Greenpeace said the text “fails to raise ambition, protect forests, deliver finance”
Tracy Carty, climate politics expert, Greenpeace International added:
2035 emission targets are wildly off track and this Mutirão text might as well be blank as it does so little to bridge the 1.5°C ambition gap or push countries to accelerate action. There is no option here but for countries to reject it and send it back to the presidency for revision.
She said hopes had been raised by initial proposals for roadmaps both to end deforestation and fossil fuels, “but these roadmaps have disappeared and we’re again lost without a map to 1.5°C and fumbling our way in the dark while time is running out.”
COP30 has shown rising support for a roadmap away from fossil fuels, so the Belem outcome must include it to ensure we end the burning of oil, gas and coal as quickly as possible. Reports and more talks are not enough. We need a global response plan.
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Updated at 06.28 EST
Good morning, Matthew Taylor here and I will be hosting the blog for the next few hours on what is supposed to be the final day at Cop30. It is likely to be a fascinating – and hectic – phase of the negotiations.
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Damian Carrington
The dramatic scenes on Thursday of the global climate summit going up in flames were too obvious a metaphor for anyone to miss. Thankfully no-one was seriously injured, although 13 people were being treated for smoke inhalation.
“Today’s fire felt symbolic of the world we’re living in – a reminder of how quickly things can fall apart when we move fast and without care,” said Gunjan Nanda, co-founder of the Entertainment + Culture Pavilion, one of those most damaged by the fire.
“We are reminded that millions of people living on the frontlines of the climate crisis are already living with the loss that comes with wildfires, extreme heat, and abnormal weather patterns,” Nanda said. “If anything, this moment strengthened our conviction: the work we do – bringing culture, community, and justice to the centre of climate action – is more urgent than ever.”
Whether the fire has brought added urgency to the national negotiators resuming their talks today remains to be seen. It is the last scheduled day of Cop30, but most Cops run over time, and the delay caused by fire suggests this one is now certain to.
The last two weeks have seen an extraordinary range of theme days, which shine the spotlight on key issues. Health, jobs, education, human rights, workers, industry, transport, tourism, forests, oceans, children and food and farming were among the more than two dozen themes. It shows that the climate crisis now impacts every facet of human life and nature.
But we are now down to the wire, as the UN secretary general António Guterres told delegates on Thursday. He was blunt about the stakes: the yawning gap between today’s climate action and that needed is a “death sentence for many”.
The biggest fight is about developing a road map for a transition away from fossil fuels. It is objectively extraordinary that it took 28 years of Cops for the root cause of global heating to even be mentioned in a final Cop decision, in Dubai in 2023. The reason is that Cops make decisions by consensus, meaning small groups of fossil-fuel-heavy states effectively have a veto.
Sources told the Guardian on Thursday that some petro states, including Saudi Arabia and Russia, and some large fossil fuel consuming countries, including India had rejected the road map and the proposal had been stripped from the main draft negotiating text.
But overnight, my colleague Fiona Harvey revealed more than two dozen countries that back a roadmap, including Colombia, France, Mexico, Palau and the UK, fighting back, saying they would not accept a deal without one. More than 80 countries gave their support to a roadmap on Tuesday, though this included few major fossil fuel producers.
Early this morning, the draft texts dropped. The key text contains no road map and no mention of fossil fuels. The diplomatic skills of the Brazilian hosts of Cop30 face a severe challenge.
Developing a road map for a transition away from fossil fuels, which all acknowledge will vary from one country to another, may not sound like a very radical move. But the power of Cop decisions, to which all 196 countries put their name, is the signal they send to the world beyond Cop.
When the Paris agreement was signed in 2015, founded on voluntary national actions, the world was on track for 4C of global heating – Armageddon territory. Today, climate action has cut that to 2.6C, still far too high, but significantly lower. A road map further strengthens that signal – that the fossil fuel era is over – giving society the confidence to move past it.
However, the feat Brazil has to pull off is far more complex than just a single issue. There are a multitude of crucial and interlocking decisions that have to be agreed. Can the adaptation finance from rich nations needed to protect people who have done little to cause the climate crisis be trebled? The draft text “calls for efforts” to do so.
Can a plan to ensure that a new green economy is fair for all – a just transition – be clinched? Countries may yield a little in one area if they gain in another, creating a multi-dimensional puzzle to be solved.
In the aftermath of the fire, Mohamed Adow, a Cop powerhouse and director of think tank Power Shift Africa said: “Even in a moment of chaos, one thing stood out: people from every corner of the world, different nations, creeds and affiliations, looked out for one another.”
“When faced with a crisis, cooperation wasn’t a slogan, but a human instinct in its rawest, truest form,” he said. “That spirit is precisely what climate action demands. If we can respond to the planet’s emergencies with the same unity shown in that tense moment, Cop30 might yet be remembered not for an incident, but for a turning point.”
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