Climate delegates and activists live in their own reality

Baku, Azerbaijan

The COP 29 United Nations Climate Summit in Azerbaijan may as well be operating in another galaxy, and not because its physical location is nine time zones ahead of the east coast of the United States. Rather, completely divorced from reality and necessity are the climate “solutions” to somehow prevent the average global temperature from increasing by 1.5 degrees in 26 years, and the astronomical cost of their implementation.

Especially pretentious at this summit, as in every previous gathering, is the slog of “negotiations” and their utter meaninglessness. Yet, thousands of delegates and staff from nearly 200 nations travel thousands of air miles to reside in nearby hotels for a week or more to pour over pages of documents “negotiating” toward an agreement that will have less effect than a roll of Charmin.

Negotiations and agreements that call for hundreds of billions or even trillions of dollars from developed nations—meaning, the U.S. and European countries—have previously failed will never materialize. UN COP “negotiators” may think they are accomplishing something, but they have no say or ability to affect the implementation of any financial agreement. Regardless, the planet’s thermometer will continue to fluctuate all on its own. It’s called nature.

It’s not clear at all to me that the member nations of this summit even know how to proceed. For instance, during one working session I attended on “Adaptation” strategies under Article 9 of the Paris Accords (i.e., funding for developing nations to cope with extreme weather occurrences) there were long pauses of silence between speakers from the scores of participating nations sitting in an arena-size room.

Article 9 stipulates that developed countries “shall provide financial resources” to assist developing countries in climate mitigation (i.e., prevention of climate events) and adaption expenses. This requires “mobilizing climate finance” including the “significant role of public funds…[for] supporting country-driven strategies and taking into account the needs and priorities of the developing country.” In addition, Article 9 states that the provision of scaled-up financial resources should aim to achieve a balance between adaptation and mitigation.

In other words, richer countries must send poor countries billions of dollars annually for those poor countries to do with how they please, so long as there is “balance” between preventing and responding to climate events. That is the rub of these COP discussions: how much, who pays, and who decides how it’s spent.

During another “adaption” session of the delegates in which I attended, two comments were illustrative of this fatuous exercise.

The delegate from China, full of platitudes, called for “shared commitment” and “meaningful climate finance from north to south” and that “climate fairness” in the Article 9 implementation document under discussion was “unaddressed.” The imperviousness of Communist China is telling. It is China that refuses to be bound by the Paris Accords, robustly funds its military that intimidates regional countries, and leases other nations’ territories to extract resources. At COP29, however, China audaciously suggests others (such as the U.S.) ante up for climate action. We “need a balanced framework,” China’s delegate asserted.

Then there was the small Central American nation of Honduras, whose delegate, no doubt speaking for many comparable developing nations, sought $1.3 trillion in adaption, “not just mitigation.” She further emphasized that adaption funding should be used for “just transitions;” meaning, climate redistribution should address the “need to eradicate poverty.” Good for her saying the quiet part out loud: “Climate change” is the artifice for third world countries to extract billions in cash for whatever they choose from nations whose citizens have attained a higher standard of living.

Ultimately, such illusory climate “negotiations” over the implementation of Article 9 finance will resolve themselves next week behind closed doors in a much smaller room with many fewer, higher-ranking representatives from the handful of larger developed nations and those speaking for blocs of developing countries. They likely will iron out language and hoped-for dollar amounts.

As with COP summits of the past, UN leaders and delegates will all congratulate themselves at the celebratory conclusion, stress the urgency for action, believe they accomplished something, and say bon voyage until next year. By then, they will complain about a lack of follow-through on funding and hyperventilate about the world on the brink climate catastrophe.

Lather, rinse, repeat.