Climate activists welcomed Brazil's stance of making the UN Cop 30 summit a "turning point" for real climate change commitments but criticized the presidency's letter for turning a blind eye to fossil fuels' leading role in global warming.
The summit's president Andre Correa do Lago released on Monday a letter addressing the event's goals and outlooks, which includes boosting climate financing to $1.3 trillion/yr from the target stipulated at Cop 29 of $300bn/yr.
"Lago calls on foreign countries — especially the US — to leave individuality and irresponsibility behind in exchange for cooperation and our planet's future," scientist Karin Bruning — a graduate of the University of Heidelberg and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology — said. "However, the letter has no use if Brazil does not pull its own weight."
Bruning recalled Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's public feud with the country's environmentalist watchdog Ibama regarding the exploration in Brazil's equatorial margin region.
"A country with so much renewable energy available cannot look at past solutions such as exploring and pushing for fossil fuels," Bruning said. She also highlighted the importance of respecting technical and scientific decisions on matters such as oil exploration.
Environmental concerns have always been at the center of the equatorial margin debate, as it stands near a freshwater barrier reef. State-controlled Petrobras has long been trying to explore the area's Foz do Amazonas basin — which holds an estimated 10bn bl of crude, according to energy research bureau Epe — but has struggled to receive the environment licenses to do so. Ibama last denied the company a request to drill in the area in May 2023.
Brazilian climate think tank Observatorio do Clima called the letter "inspiring," but added that it "excludes the elephant in the room." It recognized the letter as a "relief for giving the Paris Agreement negotiations to professionals who understand the gravity of the moment" but bashed it for keeping fossil fuels' gradual stoppage out of Cop 30's priorities list.
Still, Correa do Lago's letter recognized "the scale of the challenge and the urgency of response," according to climate change think-tank E3G's associate director Kaysie Brown.
Holding on to past pledges
Correa do Lago's letter focused on progressing previous decisions regarding developing countries and increasing financing for them, which has long been one of the Brazilian government's priorities.
This includes working on a roadmap to reach $1.3 trillion/yr in climate finance from all sources by 2035, as agreed at Cop 29 in Baku.
But previous Cop agreements and the conclusions of the first global stocktake in Dubai (GST) — a five-yearly checkpoint agreed upon in the 2015 Paris accord — on energy were ignored and pushed back against in Baku's final text.
"We do have pending issues to solve at Cop 30, notably the UAE dialogue on implementing the GST outcomes and the just transition work programme," Correa do Lago said. "The GST is an invaluable legacy that unites us. We must all continue to subscribe to it as the ultimate benchmark for climate implementation."
