Azerbaijan Calls For $1 Billion Fund To Tackle World Warming – Is This A Joke? – CleanTechnica – Uplaza

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Azerbaijan, the host nation for the following world local weather assembly — COP 29 — is asking rich nations and fossil gasoline corporations to contribute to a $1 billion fund that may assist poor international locations address the accumulating horrors of an overheating planet. The Local weather Finance Motion Fund will take monetary contributions from fossil gasoline producing international locations and firms and use the cash to spend money on tasks within the creating world that cut back greenhouse gasoline emissions and assist construct resilience to the impacts of maximum climate.

Yalchin Rafiyev, the chief negotiator for the COP29 presidency, stated, “Traditional funding methods have proven to be inadequate to the challenges of the climate crisis, so we have decided on a different approach. The fund will be capitalised with contributions from fossil-fuel countries and companies and will catalyse the private sector. Any developing country will be eligible [to receive money from] the fund.”

Contributions to the fund shall be voluntary and no mechanism is proposed to require the international locations and firms most accountable for greenhouse gasoline emissions to pay into it. Local weather advocates odor a rat and say the proposal by Azerbaijan falls effectively in need of the levy on fossil fuels that some campaigners have been calling for.

Bronwen Tucker, the general public finance lead on the marketing campaign group Oil Change Worldwide, instructed The Guardian, “This is a dangerous distraction from the strong new climate finance goal and national plans that COP29 must ensure for a fair, full and fast fossil fuel phase-out.” Harjeet Singh, the worldwide engagement director on the Fossil Gas Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative, added, “While the announcement of a new fund for developing countries echoes the long standing demands for holding the fossil fuel industry accountable, it must not serve as a free pass for continued extraction of gas, oil and coal. The fossil fuel industry has caused the climate crisis and must be adequately penalized to pay for the transition and climate damages.”

Organising the fund at COP29 does symbolize a primary try throughout the UN local weather negotiations to hyperlink fossil gasoline producing international locations and industries — which produce the majority of the world’s greenhouse gasoline emission — with a accountability to assist poor international locations pay for the implications they face from the local weather disaster. Azerbaijan is looking for a minimal of $1 billion from at the least 10 international locations and massive corporations to capitalize the brand new fund. It will likely be headquartered in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, and its overseeing board shall be made up of representatives from the contributors. It’ll function independently of current multilateral growth banks because the World Financial institution and the Worldwide Financial Fund.

Bronwen Tucker stated, “Polluters must pay for their climate crimes on the scale of trillions, not with a $1 billion voluntary fund that gives Big Oil decision making powers. Fossil fuel interests have knowingly and systematically blocked, delayed and undermined necessary climate solutions and shouldn’t have a seat at the table.” Azerbaijan has not but been particular about its personal contribution to the fund, although it has pledged to make one. No different international locations have but signed as much as contribute to the fund.

The fund is not going to spend money on any fossil fuels, together with gasoline. Any earnings generated by the fund, reminiscent of from investing in renewable power, shall be plowed again into the fund so there shall be no alternative for profit-taking by non-public sector traders and governments. Bob Ward, a coverage director on the Grantham Analysis Institute on Local weather Change and the Atmosphere on the London Faculty of Economics, warns, “The Climate Finance Action Fund could be regarded as climate washing if it is intended to alleviate the pressure to phase out oil, coal and gas.”

Simon Stiell, the UN local weather chief, who has been visiting his dwelling in Grenada the place the homes of family have been severely broken by Hurricane Beryl, known as on all international locations to supply stronger plans to chop emissions, and to help the poor international locations worst hit by the local weather disaster. “The significance of this [COP] process is that it is humanity’s best hope of solving the climate crisis, achieving decarbonization and building climate resilience. This process does deliver results, as we have seen.”

Azerbaijan & COP 29

Actually, Simon? The endless string of COP conferences over the previous 28 years have made no extra distinction to the battle to maintain the Earth liveable for people than a pisshole in  the snow. They usually appeal to extra fossil gasoline shills and lobbyists than delegates and wind up being a celebration of an oil and methane financial system that threatens us all. And to not put too tremendous a degree on it, Azerbaijan itself is a shining monument to the harmful energy of fossil fuels. The Caspian Sea — as soon as a pristine physique of water — is now a festering sinkhole of sludge, because of a long time of fossil gasoline extraction. Having Azerbaijan observe Dubai because the host nation for this 12 months’s COP is an insult to everybody who needs to see actual motion taken to restrict world overheating.

Why can we even trouble with these COP conferences that are themselves little greater than greenwashing? After COP28 in Dubai, response was decidedly pessimistic. Writing within the Washington Put up, Shannon Osaka stated, “The problem with every country’s promise to phase out fossil fuels is that nobody is really planning for a fossil fuel phaseout.” In different phrases, everyone seems to be paying lip service to the concept expressed by the delegates in Dubai, whereas speeding full velocity forward to extract each molecule of coal, oil, or methane that also lies hidden beneath the Earth.