European Union agrees to push for global phase out of fossil fuels

• The European Union has endorsed a global phase-out of fossil fuels.
• In an effort to advance a global agreement to phase out fossil fuels.
• At the meeting last year, more than 80 countries, including the EU.

Prior to the COP28 climate meeting at the United Nations this year, countries of the European Union decided on Thursday to support a global phase-out of fossil fuels in an effort to advance a global agreement that was unsuccessful at the summit last year.

Before the COP28 conference, which starts on November 30 in Dubai and will see nearly 200 countries strive to improve efforts to rein in climate change, ministers from the 27 EU member states endorsed a document on their diplomatic priorities.

“The EU will systematically promote and call for a global move towards energy systems free of unabated fossil fuels well ahead of 2050”, it said, adding that global fossil fuel consumption should peak in the near term.

In order to achieve its climate goals and break its long-standing reliance on Russian fossil resources, Europe is currently modernising its energy system.

According to the text, nations should combine the two objectives and substitute fossil fuels for Russian energy with renewable sources of energy or energy-saving measures.

“There is no need for a one-to-one replacement of former Russian natural gas import volumes,” it said.

Some nations are expecting that the COP28 summit this year would result in a worldwide agreement to phase out fossil fuels, which release pollutants that warms the globe.

They want oil and gas included in addition to coal, which was agreed upon at prior UN climate conferences.

At the meeting last year, more than 80 countries, including the EU, backed an Indian proposal to do this, but Saudi Arabia and other oil- and gas-rich countries opposed it.

Due to a disagreement among nations over whether it should support nuclear energy, the EU members finalized its climate document two weeks later than anticipated.

The final draught removed some language that different nations disagreed with, but it stated that in addition to promoting renewable energy, EU diplomacy will support sustainable “low-carbon technologies”—a term that frequently alludes to nuclear power.

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