As the world wobbles on climate, Australia doubles down

Australia has doubled down on its promise to cut greenhouse gas emissions in line with the Paris Agreement goal of keeping global warming to 1.5 degrees and on its bid to host United Nations climate talks in 2026.

A protester speaks at COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, where climate negotiators fear little progress.Credit: AP

“Two years ago, I told you Australia was back,” Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen said during a speech at the COP29 climate talks in Azerbaijan, which have been bogged down over finance and rattled by backsliding from powerful nations.

“But this year I am here to tell you how Australia is accelerating our transformation to lock in our place as an indispensable part of the global net zero economy, to help other countries decarbonise,” Bowen said on Tuesday in Australia’s national address to the COP29 talks in the oil-rich nation’s capital, Baku.

As he spoke, negotiators continued wrangling over the meeting’s final text, which is expected to include a plan for wealthy nations to deliver up to $US1.3 trillion ($2 trillion) in climate funding to developing nations to decarbonise their economies and cope with climate change.

Bowen said Australia supported the effort not only because of the potential household and economic benefits of the transition from fossil fuels but also to help protect the region from the catastrophic consequences of unchecked warming.

“That’s why we are bidding to co-host COP31 in partnership with our Pacific family, and grateful for the strong support we’ve had for our bid so far,” he said.

‘Maybe they’ve been emboldened by Trump’s victory, but they are acting with abandon here.’

Alden Meyer, senior associate with E3G.

But as expected, Bowen did not announce what emissions reduction targets Australia would pursue for 2035. By convention, these targets would be announced to the world by February next year, but Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has signalled that the government may not reveal them before the next federal election.

“Next year, when we bring forward our next NDCs [nationally determined contributions], we must all strengthen efforts and deliver our highest possible ambition,” Bowen said in his address. He said Australia would become the world’s sixth-largest contributor to the UN’s Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage with a $50 million contribution.

Other nations, such as the United Kingdom and Brazil, announced their targets as part of a push to invigorate the negotiations.

Bowen also signed a side agreement with his British counterpart, Ed Miliband, to increase Australia’s and the UK’s co-operation on renewable energy and hydrogen.

The Azerbaijan talks have been overshadowed by Donald Trump’s election victory, which is expected to cause the United States to pull out of the Paris accord when he takes office, and a staged walkout by negotiators from Argentina, which is being read as a tribute to Trump by that nation’s far-right president, Javier Milei.

Inside the talks, Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil exporter, is being accused of seeking to undo the agreement forged at last year’s COP that the world should transition away from fossil fuels.

“Maybe they’ve been emboldened by Trump’s victory, but they are acting with abandon here,” Alden Meyer, a senior associate with London-based climate research organisation E3G, who is at the talks in Azerbaijan, told The New York Times. “They’re just being a wrecking ball.”

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