Pretoria - Dr Sultan Al Jaber, the president-designate of COP28, has called on world leaders to start delivering on climate finance reform and accelerate the development of technology that will mitigate climate change.
COP28 will be held in the United Arab Emirates between November 30 and December 12. The conference which will be hosted at Dubai’s Expo City is expected to draw more than 70 000 delegates from across the world and deliver the first-ever Global Stocktake - a comprehensive evaluation of progress against climate goals.
Speaking in Britain during the recent London Climate Week, Al Jaber said money was not flowing to the places that need it most. “Less than 2 percent of the $1.5 trillion of clean tech finance was invested in vulnerable and low-income countries across the Global South.
“We must stop talking and start delivering. We must create an active partnership between the largest producers of energy, the biggest industrial consumers, technology companies, entrepreneurs, the finance community, investors, governments and civil society.
Al Jaber met with King Charles III, government leaders, including Britain’s secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, Grant Shapps MP, and Zac Goldsmith, the Minister of State for Overseas Territories, Commonwealth, Energy, Climate and Environment, as well as the Vice-Chancellors of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge and the CEOs of HSBC, AstraZeneca, OVO Energy, and Gridserve, university students and climate advocates in a bid to help shape the upcoming COP28 agenda.
“If we are going to cut emissions by 43% in the next seven years, we need a holistic ecosystem that connects policy, technology, finance and people. We need supportive policies to stimulate adoption of clean energies and incentivise decarbonisation. We obviously need to apply the latest technologies rapidly and at scale. That will require finance and lots of capital across the world, and particularly in emerging and developing economies.
“A critical success factor is people. We need capacity building, and skills development to train young people for the jobs of the future because we must deliver climate action and socio-economic opportunity at the same time. This is a moment of clarity that we must face with total honesty, we need a major course correction, and we need it now.”
Al Jaber, who also chairs the world leading renewable energy company Masdar, also visited the UK-based Octopus Energy and its founding CEO, Greg Jackson, to discuss the latest technologies in the rollout of renewable energy and storage solutions. The UAE-based Masdar has committed to Invest £1 billion in British battery storage, following its acquisition of Arlington Energy.
Masdar has partnered with Octopus Energy to license its ground-breaking technology platform, Kraken, to manage its battery portfolio at low cost and with maximum efficiency. The platform aims to manage 100 000 devices and 6GW of energy capacity by the end of 2023.
Al Jaber also met with young climate activists and university students, hosted by UAE youth minister and COP 28 Youth Climate Champion Shamma Al Mazrui. He urged them to take part in this year’s conference.
“Your generation is critical, because you will inherit some of the greatest challenges of climate change, but you will also provide many of the solutions. Your perspectives must be heard. And you must be empowered to make a difference. We need pioneers like yourselves - who are impatient - and set new benchmarks.”
COP28, he said, had to be the most inclusive ever by providing opportunities through the Youth Climate Delegates Forum for youth who have never been included in the process yet live in countries that have experienced climate disaster first hand.
“Bring your passion, your focus and your courage to meet the challenge. It is time to do things differently because we cannot rely on ‘business as usual’ to bring about the change we need.”
Pretoria News