Colombia hosts talks on exiting fossil fuels as global energy crisis deepens
Just opposite the site of Colombia’s first international conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels, oil tankers regularly unload at the Pozos Colorados terminal, which has a large tank farm.
The tension between climate ambition and fossil fuel addiction is at the heart of climate change. meetingIt started Friday in the Caribbean city of Santa Marta. The United Nations has brought together more than 50 countries, from oil producers like Nigeria to major consumers like Germany and the European Union, in a bid to prevent climate talks from reaching a deadlock.
The meeting reflects growing impatience with the slow progress of global negotiations. Countries first agreed to “move away from fossil fuels” at COP28 in Dubai in 2023, but have made little progress on this front. At last year’s COP30 in Brazil, nearly 80 countries supported a roadmap to phase out oil, gas and coal, but this roadmap was removed from the final document due to lack of consensus. infuriating There are many delegates.
This disappointment helped Colombia and the Netherlands gather this “coalition of the willing” in Santa Marta. These efforts have gained momentum in recent weeks as the Iran war has disrupted energy markets and highlighted the risk of continued dependence on carbon fuels.
“Countries enter Santa Marta with the energy crisis at the forefront of their minds. They have a visceral reminder of how volatile, unpredictable and unstable reliance on fossil fuels is,” said Natalie Jones, senior policy advisor at the International Institute for Sustainable Development, a think tank.
David Waskow of the World Resources Institute said Santa Marta had taken the “first steps” on the practical challenges, adding, “We now need to move from the general goal of moving away from fossil fuels to how we do it.”
Waskow said one of the important steps is a global road map. Brazil’s COP30 presidency has submitted a proposal and is expected to present it at COP31 in Türkiye in November. The Santa Marta conference aims to discuss how national and international road maps can be developed. Brazilian delegates told negotiators meeting in Berlin this week for a separate pre-COP meeting that they aim to prepare a plan in time for the UN General Assembly in September, according to people familiar.
The decision-making process will be less formal than at the UN climate talks, using a participatory process in which governments, scientists and civil society inform senior levels. The results of the meeting will be consolidated into a final report rather than a binding agreement.
“My expectation is not that this will have huge consequences after one conference,” EU climate commissioner Wopke Hoekstra said in an interview at the Berlin meeting. However, it is important to carry out this process with this coalition of willing people.”
But the limits of this effort are also seen in who is not in the room: China, the United States and India, the world’s three largest emitters of greenhouse gases. Major oil producers Saudi Arabia, Russia and neighboring Venezuela are also absent. Saudi Arabia has long blocked any mention of phasing out fossil fuels in international talks.
For policymakers, the crisis caused by the Iran war poses a dilemma. High oil prices strengthen demand for renewable energy and reduce dependence on variable supply routes. But they also trigger short-term responses such as more drilling and more subsidies.
The result is a global landscape in which hydrocarbon markets are both under pressure and generating windfall profits even among Santa Marta participants. In the face of increasing energy prices France announced It will help households and businesses switch to electric power instead of distributing short-term fuel subsidies. Inside NorwayOil and gas revenues pushed the trade surplus to its highest level since January 2023.
Colombia, the host of the meeting, shows how fragile the transition can be. Leftist President Gustavo Petro since taking office in 2022 brought Colombia to the fore Movement to stop fossil fuels. He has pushed to ban fracking and halted new oil and gas exploration in a country where oil and coal still account for about half of exports. He also supported the Non-Proliferation Treaty, helping give rise to a movement that had until then been largely driven by vulnerable island states.
However, the contradictions are obvious. At the Pozos Colorados terminal, which handles most of the country’s fuel imports, a subsidiary of state-controlled Ecopetrol SA opened Colombia’s largest storage tank in June, increasing capacity for refined products.
Recently, a growing domestic gas shortage has emerged, worsened by the halting of new drilling and exacerbated by the Iran war. revived demand For Colombia’s own coal.
The country is also going to elections. A recent survey It shows both conservative presidential candidates with a lead over leftist Senator Iván Cepeda in a possible runoff election, signaling a possible shift to the right when voters go to the polls on May 31, with a runoff scheduled for three weeks later.
Colombia’s energy policy could take a U-turn if Petro’s allies lose. “There is a consensus among opposition candidates to expand oil and gas exploration, even through fracking,” said Adrián Correa, a professor of electrical engineering at Francisco José de Caldas University. “There may be strong pressure to increase fossil fuel activity.”
Global warming is on track to exceed the targets set in the Paris Agreement. According to the UN’s 2025 Emissions Gap Report, even if countries fully implement their current climate commitments, temperatures are projected to rise by 2.3°C to 2.5°C this century; Current policies point to a trend closer to 2.8°C. This is well above the 1.5C threshold that scientists say is needed to avoid the worst effects of climate change.
Emissions continue to move in the wrong direction. Carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels 38.1 billion tons record According to the Global Carbon Budget, it increased by 1.1% in 2025 compared to the previous year.
“The fact that the conference even took place is an achievement in itself,” said Claudio Angelo, senior policy advisor at the Brazilian Climate Observatory, a network of environmental, civil society and academic groups. “We’ve known since at least the 1960s that fossil fuels cause climate change, but countries have never come together to specifically discuss how to deal with it.”
Maisonnave writes for Bloomberg. Andrea Jaramillo and Bloomberg’s John Ainger contributed.
