Folks stroll by an indication for COP29, the United Nations Local weather Change Convention, in Baku, Azerbaijan, Tuesday, Sept. 17, 2024. Related Press
The highlight is on Azerbaijan because the small petrostate within the South Caucasus hosts the U.N.’s greatest local weather convention.
Diplomats from internationally will descend on the capital Baku for the annual local weather summit, referred to as COP29, to debate the right way to keep away from rising threats from local weather change in a spot that was one of many birthplaces of the oil business.
It was in Baku the place the world’s first oil fields had been developed in 1846 and the place Azerbaijan led the world in oil manufacturing in 1899.
READ: Gasoline booming for UN COP29 host Azerbaijan
Sandwiched between Iran to the south and Russia to the north, Azerbaijan is on the Caspian Sea and was a part of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1991. Almost all of Azerbaijan’s exports are oil and fuel, two of the world’s main sources of planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions. President Ilham Aliyev described them in April as a “present of the gods.”
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Aliyev is Azerbaijan’s authoritarian chief. He’s the son of the previous president and has been in energy for greater than 20 years, overseeing a crackdown on freedom of speech and civil society. The Related Press was not granted permission by Azerbaijan’s authorities to report within the nation forward of the convention.
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Aliyev has mentioned it’s a “large honor” for Azerbaijan to host the convention. He has additionally mentioned he desires his nation to make use of extra renewable vitality at house is in order that it may export extra oil and fuel overseas.
In Baku, the indicators of fossil gasoline dependancy are in every single place
In metallic cages subsequent to Azerbaijan’s Aquatic Palace sporting venue are pumpjacks — an indication says they extract simply over 2 tons of oil a day. Others pump away elsewhere, sucking up oil in view of certainly one of Baku’s non secular and vacationer websites, the Bibi Heybat mosque that was rebuilt within the Nineties after it was destroyed by the Bolsheviks nearly 80 years in the past.
Aliyev mentioned he considers it “an indication of respect” from the worldwide neighborhood that Azerbaijan is internet hosting COP and a recognition of what Azerbaijan is doing round inexperienced vitality.
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A few of these plans contain growing hydropower, photo voltaic and wind tasks in Karabakh, a area populated by ethnic Armenians who fled to Armenia after a lightning navy offensive by Azerbaijan in September 2023.
Aliyev mentioned in a speech in March that his nation is within the “energetic section of inexperienced transition” however added that “nobody can ignore the truth that with out fossil gasoline, the world can not develop, at the very least within the foreseeable future.”
Mukhtar Babayev, Azerbaijan’s setting minister and former vp on the state vitality firm Socar, will function convention president of the talks. Babayev mentioned in April he desires to indicate how this “oil and fuel nation of the previous” can present the world a inexperienced path with its efforts to ramp up renewable vitality, particularly wind energy.
He mentioned he believes his nation’s COP summit should construct on final 12 months’s settlement to transition away from fossil fuels and pave the best way for nations to return collectively in 2025 on beefed-up and financed plans to clamp down on heat-trapping gases.
However loads of folks doubt these commitments.
A number of organizations say Azerbaijan’s dedication to the inexperienced vitality transition quantities to greenwashing – giving the impression that the nation is doing greater than it’s to fight local weather change.
Claims of greenwashing and civil society crackdowns abound
Whereas many nations together with america and the United Arab Emirates — final 12 months’s host — grapple with the challenges of transitioning away from fossil fuels, Azerbaijan has traditionally not been proactive in that regard, mentioned Kate Watters, government director at Crude Accountability, which screens environmental points within the Caspian Sea area.
Environmental monitoring in Azerbaijan is harmful, she mentioned, referencing a crackdown on civil society that has successfully snuffed out any actual opposition and seen folks detained.
There’s no efficient mechanism in Azerbaijan for locals to ring alarm bells about publicity to pollution from the oil and fuel business, Watters mentioned. She referenced well being points equivalent to rashes and illness that residents might expertise dwelling close to the Sangachal oil and fuel terminal simply exterior Baku however indicated that their considerations usually are not heard.
Azerbaijani authorities officers didn’t reply to quite a few requests from The Related Press for remark.
Babayev has pointed to Azerbaijan experiencing higher-than-normal temperatures and mentioned he desires states to return collectively to enhance plans to cease the emission of gases that contribute to international warming. However his nation has been criticized for failing to clamp down on precisely that.
Evaluation from International Witness, a nonprofit group, discovered the quantity of fuel flared at oil and fuel services in Azerbaijan elevated by 10.5% since 2018.
Gasoline flaring is a serious supply of soot, carbon dioxide and methane emissions that contribute to international warming. It occurs when vitality corporations burn off extra fuel as an alternative of capturing it when it’s launched whereas drilling for oil. It’s been blamed by human rights teams and investigative journalists for a few of Azerbaijanis’ well being points, together with across the Sangachal terminal.
“We’re heading right into a COP the place even the host isn’t bothering to do the essential features of local weather diplomacy,” Louis Wilson, head of fossil fuels investigations at International Witness, informed AP.
The Paris local weather settlement requires nations to submit plans to fight local weather change, with Azerbaijan’s newest replace coming in 2023. A bunch of local weather scientists rated it “critically inadequate” in September. It’s anticipated the nation will submit an up to date plan this 12 months.
Amid warfare, Europe turns to Azerbaijan for fuel
Azerbaijan owns one of many largest fuel fields on this planet, Shah Deniz, and BP introduced in April the beginning of oil manufacturing from a brand new offshore platform additionally within the Caspian Sea.
Baku is planning to hike its fossil gasoline manufacturing over the following decade and its pure assets have remodeled it right into a geopolitical participant.
Earlier than Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Moscow provided a few of 40% of Europe’s pure fuel via 4 pipelines however most of that was later minimize off.
That meant alternative for Azerbaijan, with the EU placing a deal later that 12 months to double its imports of Azeri fuel to twenty billion cubic meters a 12 months by 2027. However there are questions as as to if Azerbaijan can meet that demand and disagreements over the phrases of the deal.
“The extra renewable sources we’ve got, the extra pure fuel we are going to save,” Aliyev mentioned in March, noting the gasoline saved will probably be “a further contribution to the Southern Gasoline Hall,” which takes fuel from the Caspian Sea to Europe.
Azerbaijani officers have argued that it’s unfair to criticize Baku for producing extra fossil fuels when there’s a demand for them throughout Europe as nationwide governments endeavor to maintain gasoline costs low for residents.
Azerbaijan’s internet hosting of COP will flip the highlight on the nation which makes most of its cash from promoting fossil fuels however it could additionally spotlight Europe’s — and the world’s — persevering with dependence on them.
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For a lot of local weather consultants, the query for Azerbaijan is whether or not the nation that noticed the beginnings of the fossil gasoline business is severe about internet hosting negotiations targeted on shifting the world towards inexperienced vitality.
