PARIS – The energy crisis triggered by the war in Iran “has made the economic logic of renewables impossible to ignore”, the top United Nations climate change official, Simon Stiell, told leading figures in international climate negotiations on Thursday.

“Renewables offer safer, cheaper, cleaner energy that can’t be held captive by narrow shipping straits or global conflicts,” he told a group of past and future leaders of the UN climate change summits known as COPs.

Speaking at the International Energy Agency (IEA)’s headquarters in Paris, Stiell said that the fossil fuel cost crisis “has its foot on the throat of the global economy”.

Immense irony

Stiell also hinted at the “immense irony” that those same states that “fought to keep the world hooked on fossil fuels are inadvertently supercharging the global renewables boom.” The comments appeared to be a reference to the United States under President Donald Trump, who publicly opposes policies that would reduce fossil fuel use.

He said that national plans to make green energy a “cornerstone of energy security,” or France’s decision to double its spending on electrification, mean that there is now “real momentum” for renewables.

“We must harness it to accelerate a truly global shift,” Stiell said, pointing to the need for climate finance to reach developing states wishing to “embrace” clean energy.

COP31 priorities

The event saw the Turkish Environment Minister Murat Kurum, who will be the president of the next COP31 summit in Antalya, outline his country’s priorities for the upcoming climate conference in November.

These include the clean energy transition, green industrialisation, the shift to clean cooking in developing countries, an issue important to the US, critical minerals and climate-resilient cities.

On the thorny topic of climate finance, which should see rich nations channel $1.3 trillion a year to poorer ones by 2035, Kurum said that work on a “new mechanism” that would match “the right projects with the right financing” is ongoing, and could simplify access to the financial support as much as possible.

Fossil fuels exit

Stephen Jones, Australia’s ambassador to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), said the debate over how to transition away from fossil fuels worldwide will remain hotly contested, as his country prepares to steer the COP31 negotiations under a deal with Ankara.

“Yes, maintaining our oil and traditional and fossil fuel supplies are critical as we make this transition, but we should have no doubt about where our destination is,” Jones said.

He recalled that international climate negotiations have already cut the projections of future temperature increases from 4°C to 2.5°C.

“We are now seeing an irreversible trend in the clean energy transition,” he said.

“Technologies are becoming mature, and investment flows into clean energy are outpacing fossil fuels,” Jones added.

(cm, aw)