Catch up with the latest news from our team in Dubai.
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Welcome to our live coverage of the COP28. Keep up to date with the latest news from Dubai from the 3rd day of the UN climate conference.
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World Climate Action Summit draws to a close
COP28 is definitely in full swing, with 198 countries hashing out policy in Dubai and a raft of new climate commitments.
Today, 117 governments pledged to triple the world's renewable energy capacity by 2030 and reduce fossil fuel use, while 50 fossil fuel firms signed ambiguous net zero and methane pledges.
Financial pledges are also pouring in, with Norway announcing a $25 million (€23m) contribution to the loss and damage fund, the US promising $3 billion (€2.76bn) for the Green Climate Fund, and private institutions earmarking $1 billion (around €920,000) for climate and health. But experts have warned of the need to honour these pledges in the long term.
While developing nations and Pope Francis took aim at the Global North, Middle Eastern leaders took the opportunity to highlight the environmental impact of ongoing conflict with Israel.
“The climate crisis is but the latest chapter in a long history of hypocrisy and lies,” said Bolivian Vice President David Choquehuanca. “The gap between the opulent few and the masses of the poor has never been so abysmal,” Pope Francis added in a letter delivered by Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin.
Thanks for following our COP28 coverage today. Join us tomorrow for what is sure to be an action-packed fourth day of COP28.
And if you need a refresher on all things COP, we’ve got you covered in our explainer here: What is COP28? Everything you need to know about the UN climate summit in Dubai this week
Spain's Díaz calls for international climate court
Spain's Second Deputy Prime Minister Yolanda Díaz has spoken out against the large companies that "are poisoning the planet". She called for the creation of an international climate court to clarify their responsibilities and stem the proliferation of fossil fuels.
Her remarks were made before a meeting analysing COP28 challenges with environmental groups, including Ecologistas en Acción, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and WWF.
These pods are an installation by British artist Michael Pinsky at COP28.
Three of the pods carefully simulate the type of air pollution in three different cities: Beijing, New Delhi and London.
They reproduce the amounts of ozone, particulate matter, nitrogen dioxide and carbon monoxide that pollute these cities. Walking through, you can smell, feel and taste what the air is like for the people who live in these cities.
As a Londoner, breathing the air in the London pod felt pretty familiar! It replicates the diesel pollution problem the city is trying to solve with its Ulta Low Emissions Zone.
With over seven million premature deaths a year from air pollution, the installation - which is supported by the Clean Air Fund and Breathe Cities - aims to highlight the interconnected nature of climate and health issues.
The fourth pod showcases a range of solutions to clean up the air we breathe.
50 fossil fuel firms sign net zero and methane pledges
50 oil and gas companies representing more than 40 per cent of global oil production have committed to cutting emissions from their operations.
The group - which includes 29 national oil companies - have pledged to cut the release of methane to near zero by 2030, reduce carbon emissions from their operations to net zero by 2050 and stop the routine flaring of natural gas.
But it could be controversial as it only covers emissions from the production of fossil fuels - not burning them. That means the emissions the companies produce while drilling and processing the oil and gas.
The targets aren't binding and allow companies to increase fossil fuel production in the short term as long as it is reduced by 2050.
COP28 President Sultan Al Jaber called the pledge a "great first step".
"I know that they and others, can and need to do more. We need the entire industry to keep 1.5C within reach and set even stronger ambitions for decarbonisation," he added.
117 countries agree to triple renewable energy
117 governments have pledged to triple the world's renewable energy capacity by 2030 and reduce fossil fuel use.
"This can and will help transition the world away from unabated coal," said COP28 President-designate Sultan Al Jaber.
The pledge was led by the European Union, the United States and the UAE. It is part of a plan to cut fossil fuels from the world's energy system by 2050.
Although China and India have showed support for the initiative, they did not back the overall pledge today.
Lebanon and Syria highlight environmental impact of conflict with Israel
Lebanon's Prime Minister Najib Mikati used his Leaders Summit statement to highlight where the "challenges of climate change intersect with wars".
In particular, he said "Israeli aggression is... causing an intense environmental impact".
"The ongoing violations, which include the use of prohibited weapons such as white phosphorus, have caused the martyrdom of civilians and caused irreparable damage to more than five million square meters of forests, agricultural lands, and thousands of olive trees," he said.
Syria's PM Hussein Arnous added that the cutting of trees and burying of hazardous waste in the Israeli-occupied Syrian Golan Heights "is a clear violation of international law".
US climate envoy warns time is running out to avoid 'worst consequences of climate crisis'
"We're not asking anybody to give up the quality of life," said US climate envoy John Kerry at a COP28 forum, while calling for cuts to "poisonous" greenhouse gas emissions.
"We're asking you to actually embrace a better quality of life. If you're not dying because the quality of air sucks, then you've got a better quality of life.
"When you're not being sent off as a young person to fight a war to protect the sources of your energy - where energy is now being weaponised - you've got a better life. In fact, you even have a chance of staying alive."
$1bn in funding for climate and health
More than 120 countries have signed a declaration acknowledging people's health needs to be protected from the impacts of climate change.
It commits them to meet and collaborate on addressing climate-related health impacts such as extreme heat, air pollution and infectious disease.
COP28 President Sultan Al Jaber said that climate change is "increasingly becoming a health challenge".
"Governments have now rightly recognised health as a crucial element of climate action," he added.
A total of $1 billion (around €920,000) in financing for climate and health was also announced this morning in Dubai. It comes from organisations like the Asian Development Bank, Global Fund and Rockefeller Foundation.
And tomorrow will see the first-ever health day at COP. Ministers of Health and senior representatives from around 90 countries and the EU will come together for the COP Climate-Health Ministerial meeting.
"For COP28 to go down in history as the first ‘Health COP’, it will be necessary for governments to sustain this focus on health throughout the negotiations, and to take real action to protect people’s health - including the phase-out of fossil fuels, additional finance to address the impacts of climate change, and making health a fundamental measure of our progress and success on climate action," says Dr Jeni Miller, Executive Director of the Global Climate and Health Alliance.
"President Obama in 2014 pledged $3 billion, out of which $2 billion has been delivered so far," says Ani Dasgupta, President and CEO, of World Resources Institute on the $3bn pledge from the US to the Green Climate Fund.
"During the current replenishment cycle, peer countries like Germany, France and the United Kingdom have dug even deeper relative to the size of their economies."
Dasgupta says today's announcement could be a step forward in delivering on President Biden's commitment to provide $11.4 billion (€10.5 billion) a year to developing countries by 2024.
US pledges $3 Billion to Green Climate Fund
The US will put $3 billion (€2.76bn) into the Green Climate Fund, Vice President Kamala Harris said today as she arrived in Dubai. The UN fund aims to help developing countries adapt to and mitigate climate change.
"The United States did not fully meet its previous GCF pledge and continues to fall behind other nations that have ramped up their pledges this year," says Dr Rachel Cleetus, policy director at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS).
"By living up to its global responsibilities, the United States can help unlock greater ambition from other countries and help build the goodwill and trust it will take for nations to confront this pressing challenge together."
Czech Republic joins in other nations in swearing off coal power
The Czech Republic has committed to the phaseout of coal power plants.
It is one of 10 new members who have joined the Powering Past Coal Alliance (PPCA).
“The Czech Republic stood alongside Germany and Poland as one of the three big coal laggards in the EU,” says Alexandru Mustață, campaigner at Beyond Fossil Fuels.
“Today’s announcement shows that like most European nations, it is looking to a future beyond coal that is more secure, more economic, and above all: more sustainable.”
Solar and wind currently accounts for less than 4 per cent of the country’s power but holds “immense potential” Mustață adds.
The US, Kosovo, Cyprus and Norway was also among the countries that joined the PPCA, which calls on members to stop building new coal plants and to phase out existing plants.
Message from Pope Francis hails 'alternative vision' free from 'self-interest in nationalism'
"The gap between the opulent few and the masses of the poor has never been so abysmal...
“The poor are the real victims of what is happening: we need think only of the plight of Indigenous peoples, deforestation, the tragedies of hunger, water and food insecurity, and forced migration,” the pope’s letter said.
European contributions to loss and damage: What we know so far
Norway - a nation of 5.4 million people - has announced a $25 million (€22.96 million) contribution to the newly-agreed loss and damage fund in 2024.
The UK has committed £60 million (€69.98 million).
Pledges from EU countries, meanwhile, may have already surpassed the “substantial” €225 million initial contribution to the fund promised from member states.
Yesterday Italian PM Meloni pledged €100 million, while French President Macron promised “up to” €100 million during a leaders’ event on climate finance.
On Thursday, Germany pledged $100 million (€91.68 million).
‘Hypocrisy and lies’: Developing nations take aim at the Global North
We need faith leaders to hold negotiators and politicians to account - UN High Commissioner for Refugees
"The climate crisis is also a humanitarian crisis. Our collective war on nature is compounding and creating conflict, punishing displaced people, and making solutions to climate change more difficult," says Filippo Grandi, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
"It is crucial that no one denies, distracts or shifts their gaze from this crisis, which is why we need all advocates to help us – especially faith leaders. All faiths have a deep sense of solidarity towards refugees at their core; reflected by the work faith communities are doing to help protect displaced people across the world."
Read more about the unique influence faith leaders have on negotiations at COP28 here:
US finalises regulations to cut 58 million tonnes of methane
Regulations to reduce methane emissions from the oil and gas industry in the US have been finalised, according to the US Environment Protection Agency.
The US said in Dubai that its new regulations should prevent 58 million tonnes of methane emissions between 2024 and 2038. That's the equivalent of around 1.5 billion tonnes of CO2 - almost as much as the US energy sector emitted in 2021.
"The finalization of these methane standards addresses a glaring regulatory gap," says Julie McNamara, the deputy policy director for the Climate and Energy Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists.
"For far too long, oil and gas companies have been allowed to spew methane and serious health-harming pollutants without any limits—all while shoving the towering costs of that pollution onto people and the environment."
McNamara emphasises that, despite being an important step, the regulations don't mean that fossil fuels in the US are now "clean".
Expect more on methane - the biggest contributor to climate change after CO2 - from COP28. China, the US and the UAE are jointly organising a summit on methane and other greenhouse gases today.
Is the UAE’s blue ammonia really ‘low carbon’? Experts aren’t so sure
“When I first started hearing about blue hydrogen, let alone blue ammonia, it seemed like a scam, quite frankly,” says Robert Howarth, Professor of Ecology and Environmental Biology at Cornell University. “In some ways, it is.”If we were a bit late to the blog today, it's because we were stuck in the massive queue to enter the COP28 blue zone. The wait this morning was around 2 hours from the metro station to the door of the venue.
22 countries call to triple nuclear power by 2050
Twenty two countries have launched a call to triple global nuclear power capacity by 2050.
US climate envoy John Kerry said "we are not making the argument to anybody that this is absolutely going to be a sweeping alternative to every other energy source."
"But we know because the science and the reality of facts and evidence tell us that you can't get to net zero without some nuclear."
He added that this was just the "scientific realities" - not politics or ideology.
The countries backing the call include European pro-nuclear nations like France, Finland, Czechia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Poland and the UK.
Good morning from Dubai on day three of COP28!
In case you missed it, here's a summary of what happened yesterday:
More than 150 world leaders descended on the Dubai conference. A few used their speeches to announce contributions to the newly-agreed loss and damage fund, including Italian PM Meloni. She pledged €100 million from Italy.
A less straightforward pledge came from the French president, who promised “up to” €100 million during a leaders’ event on climate finance. Macron also announced an initiative to target higher interest rates for coal projects - a rare example among the speeches of a new effort to cut emissions.
Another funding announcement came from the UAE. The COP28 hosts have created a new private investment fund geared towards climate solutions, starting the ball rolling with a generous $30 billion (€27.6bn).There was hesitant support from some, however.
And more than 100 countries vowed to include farming and agriculture in their climate plans. The Emirates Declaration says that "any path" to meeting the key 1.5C goal must involve food and agriculture.
Catch up on yesterday's coverage here:
