0:00

Hello and welcome to The Energy Gang, coming

0:02

to you again from the COP28 climate talks

0:04

in Dubai. I'm Id Crooks, and

0:06

I'm delighted to be joined by three of the

0:08

world's leading energy experts, I think it's fair to

0:10

say, all gathered here together in the same room.

0:13

It's very nice to see you all in person,

0:15

be able to have this discussion with you in

0:18

real life as opposed to virtually, which is unfortunately

0:20

the way we often have to do The Energy Gang. It's a great

0:23

pleasure to welcome back Energy Gang regular Melissa

0:25

Lott, who is the director of research at

0:27

Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy, and

0:30

also a professor at Columbia's Climate School.

0:32

And also we have two newcomers, great

0:34

pleasure to welcome them both to The

0:36

Energy Gang today. Julio Friedman, who's the

0:38

chief scientist at Carbon Direct. Thanks very

0:40

much for joining us. My pleasure. And

0:43

also Morgan Bazilian, who is the director

0:45

of the Payne Institute at the Colorado

0:47

School of Mines. Thanks very much for

0:49

coming. Lovely. So here we are at

0:51

the COP. We're on day nine, talking

0:53

on the afternoon of day nine. COP's

0:56

been more than two thirds over. Morgan,

0:58

you've only just arrived. Do you want

1:00

to talk a bit about that? Why are you here? Why are you

1:02

coming so late? What's the point of coming here when there's only four

1:04

days left? I am putting him on

1:06

the spot. But I think it's not a crazy question,

1:08

because I think it actually reveals something pretty interesting about

1:11

the way that COP's work. But go ahead, tell us

1:13

about it. Yeah, sure. Well, first I'll say,

1:15

you know, I'm a longtime listener, first

1:17

time caller to the show. So that's something

1:20

to start with. I've been

1:22

to quite a lot of COP's.

1:25

I have never counted, but on the order

1:27

of a dozen or more. And

1:29

I used to come here, or to

1:32

the COP's solely for negotiations.

1:34

So I would negotiate on

1:36

behalf of the European Union,

1:39

the European Union bloc negotiates

1:41

together, which is not always

1:44

known or might not be known to

1:46

all your listeners. So the individual countries

1:48

come together and make their decisions. And

1:51

so I'm very used to being

1:53

here for negotiations

1:55

and not the festivities.

1:57

And those festivities have

2:00

have grown considerably over the years.

2:02

And so if the ratio used

2:04

to be, let's say,

2:06

one government negotiator to one or two

2:09

observers or advocates or

2:13

other groups, and now I'm sure that

2:15

ratio has changed rather dramatically. So

2:18

I just arrived last night. I'm part

2:20

of the Irish delegation, which is then

2:23

part of the EU delegation. And I'm

2:25

here to sort of help those people,

2:27

and the Irish delegation in particular, so

2:30

the Minister for Energy and Climate, on

2:33

what's happening in the real talks.

2:35

That's not to say, so just to add to that,

2:37

it used to be, as I said, the ratio was

2:40

in that one to one or one to two or

2:42

one to three ratio. Now, a

2:44

lot of the most important work happens outside

2:47

of those negotiations, of course. And so things

2:49

like the Global Methane Pledge is

2:51

a good example. That's not

2:54

in the negotiation room. That's not in the

2:56

negotiation text. And a lot of the more

2:58

important things are not. OK,

3:00

sadly, I'm here for the rather

3:02

more dry bits of

3:05

text that are bracketed

3:07

and then argued over, and

3:10

people speaking their third language coming in

3:12

on grammatical errors and things like that.

3:15

That's what the nature of those negotiations

3:17

are. Yeah, I'm pleased to say I'm

3:19

not. I'm part of the Caravanserie that

3:21

surrounds the COP now. This is my

3:23

seventh consecutive COP, actually. And I have

3:26

a theory of change around what the COPs are

3:28

for and how they're going and so forth. But

3:30

really, now, as Morgan just said, a lot of

3:32

the central work is not done in the negotiating

3:34

room. It has done in advance of the COP.

3:37

Sothon Al Jabbar said that 95% of

3:39

the agreements were

3:41

settled before arrival, actually, which is really

3:43

important work. And again, it's not about

3:46

the specifics of Article 6.4 or

3:48

something like that. The Methane Pledge, the

3:51

$30 billion Abadabi fund, this new carbon

3:53

management challenge, all of these things are

3:55

sort of done in advance, and the

3:57

COP itself has become sort of a

3:59

forcing function. for higher ambition and

4:01

greater action. One of the things

4:03

that I think is different about this exact

4:05

COP is actually represents a pivot from one

4:07

of those to the other. The

4:09

past seven COPs have been about raising ambition,

4:12

making a stronger NDC, having

4:15

a national target, and that the stock take

4:17

process has been part of that. This is

4:19

the first global stock take, so it's a

4:21

very different COP compared to the rest. But

4:23

now the pivot is towards fielding solutions. How

4:25

do we actually go from 1.7 trillion dollars

4:27

to 4 trillion to 8

4:29

trillion? How do we actually start

4:31

fielding and building infrastructure? These questions

4:33

are now the work of the COP, but

4:35

that doesn't take place in the negotiating room,

4:37

it takes place in the rest. And so those

4:40

numbers, what the 1.7 trillion to what was

4:42

it 2.4? What's that money represent?

4:44

Lovely question. The International Energy

4:46

Agency estimated that last year

4:49

the world spent 1.7 trillion dollars

4:51

on clean energy deployment, 1 trillion

4:54

dollars on conventional energy deployment. They also

4:56

estimated that for their one and a

4:58

half degree scenario, that needed to be

5:01

4 trillion by 2030. One

5:03

of the harsh realities of climate arithmetic is

5:05

that the longer it takes to do that,

5:07

the actually more money you need. So if

5:10

we delay a year or two, it'll be

5:12

5 trillion dollars by 2030. But the sums

5:14

of money that are required here are kind

5:16

of astonishing. This is another thing that's different

5:19

about this COP compared to prior ones. There

5:21

is a lot of private sector engagement. They

5:24

have a climate finance pavilion, that's a

5:26

first, and the banks are

5:28

here for real. They didn't throw the C team

5:30

out, just like, hey, like put up the

5:32

kiosk and hand out tchotchkes. Like, no, the leaders are

5:35

here and they're cutting deals

5:37

and they're making progress through that

5:39

finance. And this pivot to solutions is

5:41

really, I think, and y'all tell me if

5:43

you see it differently, a reflection of where

5:45

we are with the technology and the conversation.

5:47

IPCC, climate change is worse than we thought

5:49

it was, it's happening faster. The technologies, they're

5:52

cheaper, that's not the problem. They're ready to

5:54

deploy. We don't have the policies, regulation, permitting,

5:56

da da da da, ability to finance in

5:58

place. So what is the practice? path

6:00

way forward. What's the solution? We know we want to

6:02

solve this, we need to solve it fast. How are

6:05

we actually going to do it? And it's a very

6:07

different feel to some previous ones, or

6:09

as you said Julio, we were defining what the ambition

6:11

was. Is it net zero? Is it 50%? Is

6:14

it something else? I'm not sure. Is it global?

6:16

Is it mid-century, etc. But

6:18

to your point then, as you say, about not

6:20

having the policies in place, doesn't that actually put

6:22

the burden really back onto the kind of work

6:25

that Morgan's going to be doing? And

6:28

that activity in those small, I was going to call them the

6:30

smoke-filled rooms. I'm sure they're

6:32

not actually smoke-filled anymore, but metaphorically smoke-filled

6:34

rooms. The rooms behind the

6:36

scenes where those officials are

6:38

meeting, actually isn't that the thing that

6:41

actually drives this whole other

6:43

kind of superstructure of everything that goes on in

6:45

the private sector. So I'm going to say one thing,

6:47

and then I'm curious how much y'all disagree with me, which

6:49

is that I think that what's happening in this room is

6:51

important. Absolutely important. Absolutely important to

6:53

have these targets, to have these goals, to

6:55

put words to these concepts. But what's happening

6:58

outside of those rooms is equally

7:00

critical. And I'm going to say equally, it might

7:02

be more. I know, I was about to say

7:04

more, Julio. But this is how I'm

7:06

thinking about it. If you don't have one or the other,

7:08

you end up in really bad spots. We

7:10

need both. If you don't catalyze

7:13

private sector finance, we know that we are not getting

7:15

anywhere. So that one, absolutely, that's even more important. But

7:17

that's how I'm thinking through it. Tell me where y'all

7:19

disagree. I don't disagree with that. I

7:21

think most of the more significant things coming

7:23

out, as I've said, are outside

7:26

of the negotiations. So things like

7:28

the Global Methane Pledge and the

7:30

other acronym-heavy pledges and announcements and

7:33

funds that are stated. There's two

7:35

issues that I think about in

7:37

those. One, not everyone

7:40

is really all that focused on climate change. And

7:43

there's very few countries here who

7:45

have climate change as an actual

7:48

political or economic priority in

7:50

their own country, outside of

7:52

a few outliers that are

7:55

mostly island nations that are

7:57

sinking. So that's one. Despite

8:00

this build up and the use of the

8:02

term ambition and action and all the rest,

8:04

this is sort of the

8:06

definition, especially with the Pope being here, of

8:09

speaking to the choir. So

8:13

that's one thing. I think the other

8:15

is that while those announcements

8:17

and those pledges are very important

8:19

and they take on that same

8:22

voluntary genre that the

8:24

Paris Agreement took on, and

8:26

that's great, many of

8:28

them die without anyone doing

8:31

very much about them. So there's an

8:33

awful lot of effort on pledges

8:37

and side events and

8:39

reports and careful acronym

8:42

definitions that

8:44

are cute and could do good

8:46

things, but in a lot of

8:49

cases simply fade away. So I

8:51

rather strenuously think, actually,

8:53

that we are past the point

8:55

now where the climate negotiations contribute

8:57

anything substantial. So

9:00

the Paris Agreement was a seminal

9:02

change that really was liftoff. That

9:05

got us off the ground and literally

9:07

that changed from the circular firing squad

9:09

that was the Kyoto Protocol to a

9:12

weight loss club where everybody gets to play.

9:15

And so it's a very different way of

9:17

doing business, but it is hugely transformational because

9:19

everybody could do something and that brought all

9:21

the countries into a collaborative space. Now

9:24

that has been the booster rocket that

9:26

got us into orbit. It's not going

9:28

to get us to Mars. Like we

9:30

need a completely different set of actions

9:32

and engagements. And frankly, if article 6.4

9:35

collapses, it won't stop the national

9:37

commitments that are made. It

9:40

won't stop the policies in Europe and

9:42

these other sorts of things. I really

9:44

think that as a forcing

9:46

function, the COP is useful, but the actual

9:48

negotiations don't deliver the thing that needs to

9:50

be done. Okay, I was twitching until that

9:52

last statement, which I totally agree with. It's a

9:54

forcing function. It makes us all be here. So

9:57

nothing else is gravitational pull that gets all the

9:59

private sector people. here and and you

10:01

died Two other

10:03

things that I think are really important though about

10:05

the cop I was like we don't need to

10:07

do these every year anymore Like we get and

10:09

a bunch of people smack me back and they

10:11

were like, that's not true But one of them

10:13

is that actually a lot of small nations. This

10:16

is their only platform They don't really weigh in

10:18

at Davos. They don't really weigh in at Newport

10:20

climate week This is actually the one place where

10:22

the whole world comes together at a company like

10:24

Papua, New Guinea has a voice like and that's

10:26

hugely Important. It's actually hugely hugely important and I

10:28

don't want to discount it So

10:30

modest proposal what you do is you

10:32

shut down all the intergovernmental negotiations None

10:34

of that happens And you just keep

10:37

the festival aspect of things and you

10:39

keep the kind of the climate Coachella

10:41

and all the private sector and all the

10:43

Long-term governmental organizations and all the civil society

10:46

groups I'm

10:49

not sure that would work that's the risk is if

10:51

you pull the The pituitary grind out

10:53

of the animal that stops growing like like

10:55

I would be nervous about that outcome And

10:58

this is actually really organized by ministries of

11:00

foreign affairs, which are important in most government

11:02

So if you're totally told the diplomats like

11:04

you don't got a job anymore I think

11:06

they would be like well, wait a second

11:08

then what's all this about like they would

11:10

they would retreat But

11:13

I think it is also the case

11:15

though that especially in the media context like

11:17

reporting on like what's the final state of

11:19

the Negotiations like now you're missing the lead

11:21

here like the leader actually all the other

11:23

things that Morgan talked about that are really

11:25

delivering change Morgan, what do

11:27

you think? They

11:29

were let them continue that

11:34

Well, yeah, all right, go back to

11:36

something you said earlier about depends on where we are

11:39

Yeah, like I actually meant that quite

11:41

literally not just like in time like Dubai

11:44

is a different kind of place So

11:46

but so them to algebra is very serious about

11:48

business and he said like like

11:50

I want this to be a business focus I

11:53

wanted to do these things not only

11:55

that but the concentration of wealth the

11:57

concentration of fossil fuels it really

11:59

adds a different cast to this

12:01

whole thing. So I think the physical

12:03

location of this cop will

12:05

see at the end of the day, but

12:08

I think that it's really, again, it's changed

12:10

the tenor of the way that business is

12:12

done here. So Morgan, you tried to stay

12:14

out of this conversation earlier, but I do

12:16

want to try and drag you back in

12:18

on this specific point, which is, what

12:21

is the continuing value in

12:23

the intergovernmental negotiations, the final

12:26

statements that come out? Is

12:29

this something you think that is

12:31

worth continuing to put

12:33

a lot of effort into and have a lot

12:35

of focus on? Is it the thing which, despite

12:38

everything we've been saying about how much

12:41

valuable work happens outside those central negotiations,

12:43

there is still something

12:45

that's really useful that's being done

12:48

in that diplomatic work and those

12:50

statements that are made and

12:53

the agreements that countries reach here? I've

12:55

worked in the UN system for quite a

12:57

while at both the UN itself and then

13:00

at the World Bank. And when

13:02

I started at the UN, I was

13:04

told by an old hand at the

13:08

UN, Morgan, you

13:10

really seem to be very focused

13:12

on doing

13:14

things and deliverables. And

13:17

that's a big mistake. What

13:20

you should

13:23

be focused on is process. And

13:26

I think, you know, it

13:28

took me quite a long time to

13:30

understand what I was being told and

13:32

how to put that in practice because

13:35

I'm fundamentally very practical. And

13:37

I'm still not sure, I fully get it.

13:39

But I think there is

13:41

something just

13:43

in the process of

13:46

diplomacy on this topic

13:49

with a table of 199 countries

13:52

or whatever it is now that is

13:55

fundamentally important outside of the delivery and

13:57

outside of the agreements that come in.

13:59

And so the agreements always come in at

14:02

the very last hour, and they tried to

14:04

change that here with this sort of nice,

14:06

cute agreement on loss and damage on the

14:08

first day. Great. I

14:10

don't think that's the important part. I think the

14:12

process is the important part. And I think it's

14:15

actually more important now than

14:17

it has been in the past.

14:19

And I say that for an

14:22

entirely non-climate reason, which is that,

14:24

in my view, the United Nations

14:26

itself has at

14:29

least one or maybe two

14:31

existential problems that it's facing,

14:34

the most obvious being that

14:36

Russia is on the Security

14:38

Council, as

14:40

if for the—actually, not for the

14:42

first time, for the third or

14:44

fourth time—invades another sovereign state and

14:47

keeps a seat permanently on the

14:49

Security Council. So when you have

14:51

something like that that should be

14:53

existential to an organization, and yet

14:55

are able to continue

14:58

fostering diplomacy on another topic,

15:00

that has some use, that

15:02

has some value to the

15:04

international community. And so as

15:06

a committed internationalist, even though

15:08

I can't stand the fact

15:11

that somehow they cannot reform

15:13

the United Nations Security Council

15:15

after 40 years and trying about 500 times,

15:18

we still have this, and it's

15:20

civil, and we sit there. And

15:23

what you wouldn't have seen if you don't

15:25

go into the negotiations is—so I used

15:28

to walk in as Ireland, or

15:30

as part of Irish

15:32

delegation. So in

15:35

the English alphabet, that

15:37

is Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel.

15:41

In French, it's a slightly different

15:43

one, but in English, you

15:46

have that. So we would walk in,

15:48

and I would always watch, especially as

15:50

a young diplomat, the minister of

15:52

foreign affairs sort of get quite a lot

15:54

of joy saying, which way are you going to walk

15:57

in? From the left

15:59

or from the left? on the right to get

16:01

to your seat. In other words, you're walking this way or

16:03

that way. And so just

16:06

by the fact that it exists and

16:08

that the process exists, there's

16:10

some validity to it, especially again,

16:12

as I said, during

16:14

this really huge crisis

16:17

in confidence at the UN. I

16:19

will say I've been reflecting on a comment that

16:22

along these lines that Michael Weber made a

16:24

couple of days ago when we were recording, and I

16:26

took it with me when I went into my UN

16:28

discussions about what we're doing in this next bit to

16:30

prep for the next COP. And

16:32

so the idea of what did he say, Ed? The

16:35

super emitters have to look, low

16:37

income economies in the face, the ones

16:39

who are facing the worst impacts of

16:41

climate change and have a discussion. You

16:43

sit next to each other, you walk

16:46

in together. And there is value in

16:48

that. There is value in having that

16:50

conversation and having a communication pathway. Because

16:52

when communication breaks down, that's when I

16:54

really get worried. When we can't have

16:56

a conversation, even to air differences and

16:58

disagreements. And in terms of

17:00

climate, and it's a global action, it's collective

17:02

action. If that stuff starts breaking down, we

17:04

have bigger problems, which is why I go back to, I

17:07

don't know if I wanna say equal because they're not the

17:09

same and that implies maybe the same. I don't wanna say

17:11

one is more important than the other. I think they're actually,

17:14

what is it, a symbiotic relationship? You need both and

17:16

they actually need each other to thrive? I

17:19

think that's how I think about COP. Now,

17:22

from a financing perspective, I'll repeat what I said

17:24

before, which is the money, this is not gonna

17:26

be paid for all by governments. You have to

17:28

have massive private capital mobilization. You have to have

17:30

massive private sector actions that come from all this.

17:33

But you need this entire organism to

17:35

be healthy and to be functioning. I

17:38

will say my own discussion with private

17:41

institutions has been they are ready to

17:43

go. They have capital. They

17:45

have clear ideas about how they

17:47

wanna invest in infrastructure or clean

17:49

energy projects in the developing world,

17:51

whatever. They also need governments.

17:54

They need governments to help reduce the risk, to

17:57

create larger frameworks for them to act.

18:00

So I don't want to give the impression either that

18:02

somehow I believe that like you can just lop off

18:04

the top of this organization and we'll all be fine.

18:06

I think that's also inaccurate. But

18:09

to the extent that there are barriers to

18:11

those kind of capital flows into decarbonisation, the

18:14

barriers are not really to do with there

18:16

not being enough international agreements, right? They're to

18:18

do with what happens at the individual national

18:20

level. It's governments who, for

18:22

instance, don't want to fossil fuel subsidies

18:24

or whatever. They have their own political

18:27

imperatives. Well, and you're starting to see

18:29

that happen. You're now starting to see

18:31

this manifested that climate solutions, progress on

18:33

climate is actually manifested through bilateral agreements

18:35

now between, say, Japan and Chile.

18:39

As a or through, you know,

18:42

Denmark to Kenya, that

18:44

there's these smaller countries that

18:46

are taking larger action and

18:49

are laying these platforms actually. And

18:52

in a very different context, you're seeing much larger

18:54

efforts through, say, the Belt and Road, which

18:57

is a whole series of bilateral agreements between

18:59

China and other nations. Not

19:02

clear that's going to deliver climate

19:04

abatement. Well, nobody's changed a lot, right?

19:06

I mean, right. The focus of the

19:08

Belt and Road initiative, which

19:10

was very much involved in

19:13

coal, has turned away from that in a

19:15

very short way, right? In the past few

19:17

years, there has been a very dramatic shift

19:19

in China's strategy there. But most of these

19:21

are not multilateral actions. They're bilateral actions. It's

19:24

government to government as opposed to ten nations

19:26

pooling together. So we'll see how

19:28

this all plays out. I am prepared to be

19:30

wrong and humble about all of this. But

19:33

I do sense this rather

19:35

different sensibility about deal flow and

19:37

fielding solutions and rolling up your

19:39

sleeves and getting into it. In

19:42

the last six cups, it hasn't

19:44

quite been that way. But I feel that this

19:46

cop. So looking specifically

19:49

at COP 28 then, as I say, we're

19:51

in the afternoon of day nine here. What's

19:53

the most interesting thing that you've seen here

19:55

so far, the most significant thing? What are

19:57

the things you think people should really be?

20:00

paying attention to? I

20:03

think the first week I was

20:05

just paying attention from my office

20:07

in Colorado and it seemed we

20:10

work a lot on methane emissions and

20:12

there's certainly an enormous amount of effort

20:16

on methane emissions at the

20:18

very high level of pledging

20:20

and saying that there's

20:23

going to be funding and things like that. So

20:26

that builds on other COPS. So that builds

20:28

on COPS a couple of years ago and

20:30

a global methane pledge

20:32

going up from 50 countries to 100 countries to 150 countries,

20:36

whatever it is today. So, you

20:38

know, I think that's one of the really exciting ones. The

20:42

issue I have just going back to what you

20:44

were talking about before on finance because if

20:46

you ask the average person

20:49

here who's well versed in the vocabulary of

20:51

a COP and say what am I watching?

20:53

What am I looking at the typical journalistic

20:55

question? They will all

20:57

point out something about finance. The

21:00

difficult part is getting funds to countries

21:03

that are poor and do

21:05

not have the administrative capacity

21:08

in general or institutional

21:10

capacity to in

21:12

all cases to handle those funds and

21:14

yet the bulk of

21:16

their citizens are living in poverty

21:19

and getting large financial institutions to

21:21

get down to that place and

21:23

even getting places like the World

21:26

Bank that should be in

21:28

my view almost solely focused on what

21:30

they would call the IDA countries or

21:33

least-felt countries remains

21:35

hugely difficult. We

21:37

know why that's difficult for the organizational reasons,

21:39

for the forex reasons, for the cost of

21:42

capital reasons, on and on. They're very easy,

21:45

relatively easy to discern what the problems

21:47

are. The solutions are

21:50

still lacking and that really should

21:52

be the focus of the finance piece. Do you have

21:54

a sense of what the solutions could be? What are

21:56

the potential ways forward for that? Well,

21:59

you know You know, over

22:01

the last years, certainly at the

22:03

World Bank, there's been a shift

22:05

in the funding to a certain

22:07

extent from middle income or emerging

22:09

economies who have access to

22:12

the Chinese Development Bank, who have access

22:14

to the Brazilian National Development Bank, who

22:16

have access to capital markets, to

22:19

not need or not want that funding

22:21

because, well, quite frankly, it's a hassle

22:23

for them, where you want

22:25

to see the IDA countries, as the

22:29

bank calls them, the last developed

22:31

countries, really become the bulk of the,

22:33

say, $60 to $100

22:35

billion lending

22:37

portfolio that goes out, and even that

22:39

lending can be excused in a lot

22:41

of cases. That's

22:44

one. There needs to be an awful lot of

22:47

focus on guarantees, different kinds

22:49

of guarantees, sovereign guarantees, risk

22:52

guarantees, partial guarantees, et cetera.

22:55

There are places that can do that, even at

22:57

the World Bank, at

22:59

its so-called MIGA, and then finding different ways

23:06

to fund the risk of

23:08

foreign exchange, cost of capital, et

23:11

cetera. And look, those

23:13

are well-known things. They're just very,

23:15

very difficult to put in practice,

23:17

and private sector players

23:21

do not almost ever have the

23:23

risk appetite or the time to do that

23:25

kind of stuff. I

23:28

don't disagree. I agree with pretty

23:30

much everything you said, but there's

23:32

things that show change. Let's put

23:34

it this way. Among them, the

23:36

Bridgerton Initiative, led by Barbados and

23:38

Mia Motley and her team of

23:40

advisors, they've already gotten, for example,

23:43

the pause clause into these

23:45

things, which is great. The pause clause

23:47

says, hey, if your country has been

23:49

devastated by a natural disaster, your

23:52

debt is suspended for two years. That

23:54

was hugely transformational. It took a long

23:56

time to organize, but that's one example.

23:58

Similarly, the Bridgerton Initiative, that is focused in

24:00

a very real way on the foreign exchange risk and

24:03

how to manage and reduce that. And I think they're

24:05

making progress. I would also add that there's

24:08

begun to be a recognition by the

24:11

global South or developing nations that

24:14

debt forgiveness doesn't help them. So

24:16

a lot of rich countries are like, hey, we forgive you your

24:18

debt and they're like, we've already paid it three times. Why? Like

24:21

it doesn't help us. They actually need investment.

24:24

I would call out actually a friend in

24:27

Kenya, James Wongie, who says,

24:29

well, if this is not something that

24:31

nations, other nations will do

24:33

to Africa, they will not do it for Africa,

24:35

it will all be done by Africa. We

24:38

just need the investment. Give us the coach, give

24:40

us the ball coach. Like that's what they're saying.

24:43

The risk appetite is exactly the crux

24:45

of the biscuit, but that

24:47

ends up opening up roles for

24:49

regional banks, multinational banks. And they

24:51

haven't had that focus quite this

24:53

way before, in part because

24:55

we haven't had net zero as a

24:57

framework for that long. We haven't had this sort

25:00

of recognition that we are far behind

25:02

and falling farther behind. That growth

25:05

of ambition over the past seven cops, I think

25:07

is starting to force some of these institutions to

25:09

try different things in

25:11

a very real way. So you're not wrong, but

25:13

I'm pretty optimistic about where we're going. And

25:16

what else are you thinking about then, putting to you the

25:18

same question as I've put to Morgan, what have you seen

25:20

through these nine days that's been most interesting to you? So

25:23

there's been some big sectoral changes that make

25:25

me happy. I try

25:27

to find in previous cops a serious

25:29

discussion about nuclear energy. This is a

25:31

nuclear cop. And again, it's part because

25:34

Dubai and the Emirates are kind of

25:36

interested in nuclear energy, but that has

25:38

become a big theme of the discussion.

25:40

There's been a huge discussion here about

25:42

sustainable aviation fuel. That's really

25:44

kind of new, but the ICAO

25:47

is pushing it, a

25:49

UN organization, the International Civil Aviation

25:51

Organization, their standards become mandatory

25:53

in four years. That's a pretty strong

25:56

forcing function. So everybody's like, holy cow,

25:58

if we built every sustainable. aviation

26:00

fuel plant that's been announced will fall

26:02

short by a lot. We need to

26:04

tie our shoes here guys, we need

26:06

to get going. That's been a welcome

26:08

conversation. As

26:11

a carbon management person, I'm thrilled to

26:13

see not only the carbon management challenge

26:15

come forward, which is I think a

26:17

substantive and real change, but

26:19

also this is the first cop ever to

26:21

talk seriously about CO2 removal. And

26:24

the arithmetic is in, we know we have to do

26:26

that. Nobody's serious is saying

26:28

you do that instead of reductions. Everybody's

26:30

begun to say, yes, we must do

26:32

very deep reductions and we must also

26:34

do substantial removals. That

26:36

has become sort of a

26:38

totemic aspect of this top cop, which is different.

26:41

Last thing I'll say is a lot of the favorites

26:44

of prior cops are also here.

26:46

Focus on youth and

26:49

gender, focus on indigenous peoples, the

26:51

need for oceans. These things are

26:53

perennials at the cop and they

26:55

haven't gone away either. But seeing

26:57

greater representation of the hard to

26:59

abate sectors, some of these really

27:02

difficult decisions is welcome. Thanks.

27:04

So Melissa, I think it's been about three days

27:06

since we last spoke all of that. You

27:09

mean three weeks. Yeah,

27:11

exactly. In that time, what

27:13

else other things have you seen or what have you been

27:15

most struck by? Yeah, so I won't go over what

27:18

we talked about last time. I'll add a couple things to

27:20

it. And to Julio's

27:23

last point, the number of times I've

27:25

been grabbing a tea in the run between

27:27

meetings and someone's talking about low carbon steel

27:29

or cement plugs on orphaned wells or something

27:31

like that, I've been a bit blown away

27:33

by it. It's just, I mean, I don't

27:35

think they're following me from the coffee shop

27:37

to the coffee shop. So I

27:39

think it's a representation of the number of

27:41

people who are here who are really focused

27:43

on these tricky to abate things. This all

27:46

the way to net zero stuff. We're not

27:48

stopping at 50 or 80 anymore. We're

27:50

going to net zero. What do we need to do today? The

27:52

other thing that I've been hearing and been engaged

27:54

in the past, I guess 48 hours, it's been

27:57

really around how the politics of the next elections

27:59

are going to. impact and are impacting the rooms

28:01

you're going to step into. So

28:04

yes, a practical pathway to net zero,

28:06

I'm thinking about the phase down, phase

28:08

out, where these different carbon removal technologies

28:10

come in, all of that. There's

28:13

what the science is saying, what the transition

28:15

pathways say, and then there what is

28:18

politically okay in a

28:20

lot of these situations. And those things are going

28:22

to play out in the negotiations. I'm super curious

28:24

where you're going to get to between those bands,

28:26

you know, in the words that are

28:28

actually ending on the page. And I do think

28:30

that politics piece of it will

28:32

be important and is important. Something somebody

28:34

said to me, if this carpet hadn't crystallized in

28:36

my mind until this person said it, there

28:39

are 50 major elections next year. Yeah.

28:42

India, the United States, like there are

28:44

50 major, that's a third of the

28:46

world just in nations. But I mean,

28:48

it is it is a it is

28:50

going to really change the way that

28:53

this happens. And it's consequential in a

28:55

way that has not been obvious before.

28:58

Yeah, I'm not sure I

29:01

find that quite as compelling. At

29:04

COP26, the

29:06

Russians came with a net zero

29:09

plan that they proudly produced

29:11

in front of everybody. Net zero, I

29:13

think they said by 2060. So it was

29:15

along the lines of, say,

29:18

South Africa, or since some developing economies.

29:21

And you know, at that point, they

29:23

were amassing troops in Ukraine,

29:26

Ukraine's border. It's very

29:28

easy to come up with announcements

29:32

that are utterly farcical,

29:35

not farcical from their perspective, but from all

29:37

the rest of ours. And so, yes,

29:40

I think, sure,

29:42

the politics plays into

29:44

these things. But the

29:46

strength of going with a bottom

29:49

up voluntary paradigm, which

29:51

you say is changing the

29:54

Paris was sort of gets

29:57

us a little bit out of. how

30:00

much can be affected by one or

30:03

50 countries' political changes,

30:06

especially if the big announcements and

30:08

the big actions and the big

30:10

acronym-filled organizations are happening outside of

30:13

the negotiations anyway. Mm-mm. Butts

30:15

in seats. Butts in seats

30:18

make a difference. It matters what butt is in

30:20

what seat. And imagine how this process

30:22

would have played out if we had had a

30:24

president gore as opposed to a president bush. Like,

30:27

it matters. The fact that Narendra Modi

30:30

is so bullish on climate

30:32

matters to the world, actually.

30:35

And if he's not elected and somebody else comes

30:37

in, that will matter to the

30:39

world. And it may

30:41

not matter to the negotiations and it

30:43

may not matter to the process, but

30:45

actually I think these elections are going

30:47

to prove to be wildly consequential. If

30:49

Europe has a rightward tilt to populism

30:52

and five European nations start pulling

30:54

back from the European Commission around

30:57

climate, that will be consequential. So

30:59

I don't want to underestimate any of this. And

31:02

we have no time. We can't

31:04

overshoot the overshoot. We're already in overshoot.

31:06

We can't lose another five years to

31:09

politics. And so the

31:12

nervousness around elections around

31:15

the world, not just in the U.S.

31:17

but everywhere, is quite palpable here. My

31:19

first cop was in Marrakech. It was right

31:22

after Trump was elected. Everything was flapping like

31:24

wet hens. The sky is falling,

31:26

you know. To your point, it

31:28

didn't turn out as bad as people had

31:30

completely feared. But we

31:33

lost time and ground. And the elections matter

31:35

to how nations

31:37

engage. Well, I'll say two quick things. In

31:40

the second one, Ed, Preeti, who's going to be asking

31:42

you what you are saying. Same question you gave

31:44

us. I want to ask you. I'm going to be

31:46

a little bit cheeky and do that. But before

31:48

that, what I'm going to say is the feeling of

31:50

politics affecting the conversations that I am either directly

31:52

in or tangentially involved in is more

31:55

it's not even it's not already at the stage

31:57

of who gets elected next and what might it

31:59

look like. the process towards

32:01

that election? Like how is

32:03

that influencing what we're bringing to the table

32:05

right now? When we are concerned about our

32:07

position, when we're concerned about being reelected, we're

32:09

concerned about having power or not in the

32:11

future, and what does what we do here

32:14

impact in that process? And one reflection

32:16

I keep coming back to myself

32:18

is, wow, it

32:20

matters. I

32:23

don't know that we would have said that it mattered

32:25

to this degree in those kinds of conversations in those

32:27

elections 20 years ago. It

32:30

wasn't a deciding thing that people were worried

32:32

about. If I say draw down, phase out,

32:34

phase down, that's gonna matter enough

32:36

that maybe it'll affect of an election, a

32:39

lot of elections. Like I just

32:41

take a moment to just take that in. That's a big deal.

32:44

But Ed, I promised I was gonna ask you too.

32:47

So my reflection on that, what I've

32:49

been most struck by, I guess is

32:51

something less kind of globally significant, but

32:53

just personally significant to me, which is

32:55

that I've been really struck

32:57

by how valuable it's been to me

32:59

to be here, and how good

33:02

it has been for this podcast, the energy going to be

33:04

here, and to get to meet the people we've met and

33:06

to talk to people we've been able to talk to. I

33:08

think I was saying earlier, this is my first COP that

33:10

I've attended in person since 2009. So

33:13

it's been a long time I've been away. And

33:15

if this is really underlying to me, it's

33:17

been too long. As you say, just because of everything that

33:20

happens here, all the people who come, the

33:22

discussions that go on, and

33:25

that kind of, as you were saying,

33:27

more good, you're calling it the festival

33:29

aspect of what happens here is really

33:32

valuable. And it's probably valuable to, as I say,

33:35

to be personally to this podcast, to my company,

33:37

the company I work for, Wood McKenzie, which works

33:39

on research on energy and natural resources. We

33:42

can't really understand what we need

33:44

to understand about the industry and

33:46

about the way it's changing without being in

33:48

that old saying about 90% of life is

33:51

just turning up. And to

33:53

your point about the value of the negotiations

33:55

and being in people talking together in rooms

33:58

from very different backgrounds, very different countries. very

34:00

different sets of interests and so on, being physically

34:02

present in the same place has a real value.

34:04

I think that's something that was sort of underlined

34:07

actually in a pandemic when we couldn't do it for

34:10

a while and I think that's a

34:12

lesson which we're kind of relearning again and I

34:14

certainly do think that's very important. So I think

34:16

we're just about out of time unfortunately because I

34:18

know a lot of you have got other meetings

34:20

to get off to so we do have to

34:22

be wrapping it up just about. Sorry, Julio, there's

34:24

one thing you wanted to think about. Yeah lightning

34:26

round, I'll be super fast. A lot of people

34:28

here have been talking about like 80,000 people flying

34:30

around the world to come to this. Is it

34:32

really a big deal? And I'm like this is

34:34

one event in Wembley Stadium. Like this is like

34:38

80,000 people? Like it's a single sporting event. Like

34:40

you got to organize yourself. True up to what's

34:42

actually happening here and this whole, the only reason

34:44

why people are here is to counter climate change.

34:46

So I'm not worried about the footprint or the

34:49

optics of these sort of things. I'm a little

34:51

more worried about the footprint of the optics of

34:53

the maybe eight billion dollars of

34:55

yachts sitting in the marina. Like

34:57

that's a different kind of look and so hopefully

34:59

though that will bring more ambition and commitment as

35:02

well. Absolutely. So final

35:04

thoughts then we're all going to be leaving soon

35:06

I think. I don't know you're going to be

35:08

here a bit longer right because you'll stick it

35:11

out to the bitter end and as you say

35:13

that final statement coming out of the talks. I'm

35:16

interested in what you're going to take away

35:18

from having been here. Maybe Julio, start with

35:20

you. Just when you think

35:22

about the experience, what you've learned here

35:24

does it leave you more or less

35:26

optimistic about the world's ability to tackle

35:28

the challenge of climate change? Unquestionably

35:31

more optimistic and part

35:33

of the reason why I said at the beginning

35:35

that like the last seven years have been about

35:37

boosting ambition. Boosting ambition involves

35:39

a lot of yelling at people. If

35:42

you're fielding solutions it's the opposite. Fielding

35:44

solutions is a cooperative enterprise and

35:46

so I'm seeing people who normally don't sit together,

35:49

who normally don't play nice doing that. That

35:51

is core work of the energy transition and I've

35:53

seen a lot of that here so I'm pretty

35:55

happy. So Morgan I mean for you

35:58

it's I guess it's too early to say right because you're

36:00

going to have to see what happens over the next four days. But

36:02

what do you think you'll leave with? No,

36:04

it's not too early and I won't stay until

36:06

the bitter end, bless

36:08

them. Look,

36:11

I come out, I think this has

36:14

been a really positive cop. There's

36:16

an enormous amount of momentum, but

36:20

not necessarily because of everyone's

36:23

focus on climate change. So

36:25

I think that there's a lot

36:28

of momentum here because the low

36:30

carbon technologies we're talking about

36:32

have gotten a lot closer

36:35

to be, or already are

36:37

economically viable and distributed

36:40

and able to move to different

36:42

countries and accessible to

36:45

all kinds of different places.

36:47

And that certain amounts

36:50

of financial capital that are

36:52

significant can therefore move

36:55

into those solutions. I

36:57

still don't believe that very many

37:00

people have climate change as the

37:02

driving force. And I think transacting

37:05

everything through a climate lens tends

37:08

to be myopic. And

37:11

so, yes, there's been a lot

37:14

of positive things we've

37:17

heard about, we've even discussed in this last hour,

37:20

but not only for the climate reason. And

37:23

no, I never stay till the very bitter end.

37:25

Melissa, what about you? I

37:27

have this feeling, it's very optimistic, y'all. And

37:30

that sounds a little tired. We've been running.

37:32

I think what did we say, a day

37:34

a cop is like a week in the

37:36

world. You're going, going, going, going, going. There

37:39

seems like a lot more wind at our backs to the point that

37:41

we've been talking about than there was before. I just

37:44

have this sensation that I need to buy so many

37:46

more pairs of running shoes because when I leave COP

37:48

this year, I'm just going to need to run faster.

37:50

And we're all just running faster

37:52

because there are so many things at play that

37:54

make it very urgent, but that also make

37:57

it possible and even more possible to bend this country. And

38:00

that's an interesting need to come out of it because

38:03

you could come out of some of these conversations feeling

38:05

very pessimistic And I just feel like I need to

38:07

lace up. I'm like, all right time to go. So

38:10

that's where I'm at leaving cops Risk

38:20

first but after that the work stuff. Yeah. Yeah

38:22

one and I know now you have to go

38:24

and do work yourself around

38:27

I'm gonna let everybody go but thank you very

38:29

much a new deal of you for joining us

38:31

on the energy gang today There's

38:33

a lot to leave Friedman Morgan

38:36

mazillion. Thanks very much indeed And thanks very much

38:38

to all of you for listening and

38:40

keep following us We will be carrying on

38:42

ourselves right for the bitter end at the

38:44

energy gang following all the discussions or

38:46

negotiations as they continue Right

38:48

to the conclusion on December the 12th. So keep

38:51

tuning into the energy gang Where to get your

38:53

podcasts and we'll see you very soon. Until

38:55

then. Goodbye