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A deal by richer nations to pay poorer countries hundreds of billions of dollars a year to tackle climate change is in Britain’s interest, the energy secretary has insisted.
Ed Miliband spoke after returning from Cop29 in Baku, where a climate finance goal was eventually reached despite representatives of the world’s poorest countries storming out of the conference.
Miliband told The Times: “It’s 100 per cent in Britain’s national interest this deal.
“We need to accelerate the clean energy transition for two particular reasons. First, we are 1 per cent of emissions; 99 [per cent] of all emissions also need to be reduced and dealt with, and this facilitates that. Secondly, by the clean energy transition being driven forward it creates huge opportunities for businesses and jobs.”
He added that there was a “great British tradition” of helping more vulnerable countries.
Miliband indicated that he understood why some developing countries were still upset with the money offered. Climate change impacts had gone from a “theoretical future” to a “present-day reality”, he said, and some nations had a “scale of need” to cope with global warming.
The energy secretary said that Britain would have to think about how it “navigates” efforts by some fossil fuel-producing countries to slow down the move away from oil, coal and gas.
The outcome rescued tortuous talks at Cop29 in Baku, where negotiations between more than 190 countries ran about 33 hours into extra time and threatened to collapse.
Activists demonstrating in Baku over the role of developed countries and how much they should be paying to help tackle the climate crisis
SERGEI GRITS/AP
“This is a critical eleventh-hour deal at the eleventh hour for the climate. It is not everything we or others wanted but is a step forward for us all,” Miliband said.
The final number of $300 billion annually by 2035 amounts to around a trebling of what the EU, US, UK and Japan and other nations have been paying since 2022.
“Cop29 took place in tough circumstances,” said Laurence Tubiana, a former French diplomat and one of the architects of the 2015 Paris Agreement. She said that the finance deal was “not as ambitious as the moment demands” but provided a foundation to build on.
The new sum is a portion of an even bigger headline figure of $1.3 trillion by 2035. The number is in line with what experts, including Lord Stern of Brentford, the British economist, say is needed for developing nations to decarbonise their economies and prepare for the impact of rising temperatures and seas.
Developed countries have committed to “take the lead” on paying the $300 billion. However, the deal said that some of the funds should come from multilateral sources. That means China, the world’s biggest emitter, could pay in via multilateral banks such as the World Bank. Under a quirk of the UN process, China still counts as a developing country.
After world leaders including Sir Keir Starmer departed Baku, officials got down to the nitty gritty of a finance deal. But it took until Friday, the official closing day of Cop29, for rich nations to put a figure on how much they would pay. The offer of $250 billion by 2035 was roundly dismissed as unacceptable by countries from Brazil to the US to China.
Sir Keir Starmer was also present at Cop29
MAXIM SHEMETOV/REUTERS
Developed nations tried to achieve a breakthrough a day later by privately raising their gambit to $300 billion. However, negotiators from the world’s poorest nations walked out complaining that they had not been listened to. The 47 least developed countries and small island states threatened by rising seas said they should be prioritised.
The moment of drama injected a sense of urgency into the stalled talks. The prospect of so many delegates rushing to catch flights home raised the real risk that the conference might no longer be quorate if it ran late into Sunday.
As midnight came and went, the Azerbaijani diplomats organising the talks began a stop-start final session. Shortly before 3am in Baku, Mukhtar Babayev, the Cop29 president, gavelled through the deal to a standing ovation.
The deal was criticised by Chandni Raina, the Indian environment secretary, who said that her nation was “extremely disappointed” by the “stage-managed” way in which the target was approved. Raina argued that because the target included multilateral sources, which some developing countries contribute to, it amounted to no progress on what rich nations paid in the past. Nigeria and Bolivia also expressed disappointment and frustration.
Despite some poorer countries being disappointed, many also appeared to have taken the view that it was better to seize an imperfect finance target now rather than wait until next year’s Cop30 in Belem, Brazil. The US will then be led by Donald Trump, who talks about a “climate scam”, while Canada and Australia could have governments less inclined to back a deal.
Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary-general, who repeatedly urged countries to set aside their differences at Baku, said the final outcome was a base to build on. “Cop29 comes at the close of a brutal year — a year seared by record temperatures and scarred by climate disaster, all as emissions continue to rise,” he said.
Antonio Guterres urged countries to set aside their differences
IGOR KOVALENKO/EPA
Analysis
Britain had expected the talks in Baku to be hard. Having poorer nations pitched against richer ones on money was always going to make for a fraught dynamic, while Donald Trump’s election win added to a difficult geopolitical backdrop.
With a finance deal done, some western politicians facing straitened finances and voters struggling with the cost of living will baulk at transferring more funds to developing countries. But it is seen by delegates at UN climate negotiations as essential for building green energy, sea defences and trust between rich and poor leaders.
Climate finance is “not charity” or a “hand-out”, said Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary-general. “It’s a downpayment on a safer, more prosperous future.”
The $300 billion a year from rich countries is a subset of a bigger target of $1.3 trillion a year by 2035, with the rest paid from other sources. Question marks remain over precisely how that will happen, however.
The private sector is meant to rise to the challenge. But companies are not beholden to the UN climate process. And it remains to be seen whether ideas for new sources of money — such as a shipping tax backed by Keir Starmer — materialise in time.
Politically, the key number that matters in the Cop29 deal is $300 billion. There is no mandate for how much individual rich nations, from Japan and the US to the UK and Australia, will pay.
Developed countries have already been paying more than $100 billion (£80 billion) a year since 2022, having hit a deadline two years late.
The UK is committed to giving £11.6 billion between 2022 and 2026 out of its overseas development aid. The commitment survived Labour’s budget despite being reviewed by the Treasury. But with the end of that spending commitment nearing, and the need to hit a higher target by 2035, the government will eventually have to look at how to pay more.
A key story at Cop29 was how Britain and Brazil buddied up in Baku. The two countries showed leadership by announcing new emissions targets for 2035, blazing a trail ahead of other countries.
Miliband has been a prominent figure in the halls, along with the Brazilian environment minister Marina Silva. Both are veterans of UN climate talks. The growing warmth and co-operation between the two countries, including a clean power pact, grew out of Miliband’s visit to Brasilia in August.
Brazil had huge self-interest in Baku’s success. Next year it hosts Cop30, expected to be a blockbuster conference on a par with Glasgow three years ago.
The talks will act as a de facto deadline for countries including China to follow the lead of Britain and Brazil and publish new climate strategies.