Consensus solution: the end of fossil fuels is removed from the final COP30 text and will be a separate proposal

BarcelonaThe president of COP30, Brazilian André Correa, explained this Saturday morning to the Amazonian media outlet Vox that a consensus solution had been reached in the climate negotiations, which continued throughout the night to conclude the UN summit in Brazil. Finally, the roadmap for phasing out fossil fuels has been removed from the summit's final text. MutirãoBut it becomes "an initiative of the presidency." Correa explained this without giving many more details, pending consultations from all countries before giving their approval to the final text. It is understood, however, that the issue of fossil fuels, which has been the major stumbling block in the final COP30 negotiations, will be addressed in a separate document, and the Brazilian government—which holds the presidency of the UN climate forum until November 2026—has committed to working on and developing it from now on.

"It's 8:10 a.m. and we've been locked in a room since 3:30 a.m.," he explained in the COP30 corridors, after an intense night of negotiations in which, according to sources close to the matter, there were tense moments precisely because of the fossil fuel issue. Shortly afterward, the final draft of the Mutirao which, indeed, no longer includes any reference to fossil fuels. Likewise, the European Commissioner for Climate Action, Wopke Hoekstra, admitted that they would have "much preferred more" to the outcome of COP30, but that they accept it because they acknowledge the difficulty of getting so many countries to agree – "the world is what it is" – and because the agreement does include "some things that are important for the most vulnerable countries" that others might not.

"There are many things we would have liked to include because climate change needs much more action, the world needs more. But seeing what's on the table, we think we should support it because at least it's a step in the right direction and because we must stand with the friends of the poorest nations, and that gives them a good result in the corridors of the summit."

Triple adaptation funding

The new text published this Saturday at midday includes a commitment to "triple adaptation funding by 2035," a key demand from the least developed countries, which are the ones most urgently needing to adapt to the new climate situation. It also incorporates and "urges" compliance with the agreement reached at the last summit, COP29 in Baku, to mobilize $1.3 trillion in public and private funds by 2035, and to secure $300 billion in direct government-to-government aid for the poorest countries in the same year.

However, "the roadmap is not" [in the text], Correa said, alluding to fossil fuels, and added: "We will announce that the roadmap will be an initiative of the Brazilian presidency. It wasn't included in the text, but the Brazilian presidency has just begun and we have months ahead of us. Brazil has presided over this summit and has assumed the presidency of the UN climate change program for one year, until next November when it hands over the reins to Turkey, which has been chosen to host COP31."

Reuters has also confirmed, from two of its own sources, that this fossil fuel roadmap will be "a separate document." But among the dozen or so documents on different agreements published this Saturday morning at COP30, this one on fossil fuels was not yet included.

However, according to the summit president's explanations, everything points to the fact that The petition, signed by 82 countries, called for the UN to establish "a roadmap for a transition away from fossil fuels.""It will become a separate initiative, a document that will likely involve the creation of a working group, and which the Brazilian government is committed to advancing in the coming months. The mention of this roadmap, which appeared in the first draft of the final COP30 text, will ultimately not appear in this document." Mutirão -what does it mean community effort In Portuguese.

Many countries, including Spain, but also the entire European Union and the United Kingdom, threatened to block any final COP30 agreement that did not include the demand to promote a roadmap for "a transition away from fossil fuels," a reference that was already included in C2, but was reiterated in the final agreement of last year's summit in Azerbaijan. The reluctance of oil and gas producing countries—despite the absence of the world's leading exporter, the United States—has once again blocked a clear agreement on this point. But the Brazilian presidency has sought a consensus solution by promoting a separate initiative on the matter.

The issue, in fact, has generated a lot of tension in recent hours within the negotiation rooms, according to sources familiar with the matter. And Brazil's own president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, had committed to this "roadmap" to phase out oil, gas, and coal, so failing to reach an agreement on that point would have been a failure. However, Brazil's commitment contrasts sharply with its policies, which continue to prioritize opening oil fields in the Amazon. "I think a very good result has been achieved," said Correa, who congratulated himself on having been able to "bring 195 countries to an agreement"—all those present at the summit, which includes all the countries in the UN climate change program except for the United States under Donald Trump, which did not participate in the ACIMERA summit in Paris.