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The deal was hailed as historic as it was the first citing of fossil fuels, the root cause of the climate crisis, in 30 years of climate negotiations. But scientists said the agreement contained many loopholes and did not match the severity of the climate emergency.
“The lack of an agreement to phase out fossil fuels was devastating,” said Prof Michael Mann, a climatologist and geophysicist at the University of Pennsylvania in the US. “To ‘transition away from fossil fuels’ was weak tea at best. It’s like promising your doctor that you will ‘transition away from doughnuts’ after being diagnosed with diabetes.”
Dr Magdalena Skipper, the editor in chief of the science journal Nature, said: “The science is clear – fossil fuels must go. World leaders will fail their people and the planet unless they accept this reality.”
An editorial in Nature said the failure over the phase-out was “more than a missed opportunity”, it was “dangerous” and ran “counter to the core goals laid down in the 2015 Paris climate agreement” of limiting global heating to 1.5C (2.7F) above preindustrial levels.
“The climate doesn’t care who emits greenhouse gases,” the editorial continued. “There is only one viable path forward, and that is for everybody to phase out almost all fossil fuels as quickly as possible.”
Sir David King, the chair of the Climate Crisis Advisory Group and a former UK chief scientific adviser, said: “The wording of the deal is feeble. Ensuring 1.5C remains viable will require total commitment to a range of far-reaching measures, including full fossil fuel phase-out.”
There was a chasm between the stark statement of the emissions cuts needed and the action proposed to deliver those reductions, he said: “The Cop28 text recognises there is a need for ‘deep, rapid and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions’ to stay in line with 1.5C. But then it lists a whole bunch of efforts that don’t have a chance of achieving that.”
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