In less than a month’s time everyone who is involved in the climate negotiations process will travel to Turkey for COP31.
I am referring to the international body authorised to address climate change, the Conference of the Parties, the COPs, where politicians, businessmen, lobbyists, civil society groups and scientists, gather to discuss where we are with our climate and…
I don’t follow up with the obvious second part of the above sentence “…and seek ways to remedy the situation“, because it has failed miserably time and time again to deliver what is so urgently needed.
Saw this coming
It shouldn’t be a surprise. It’s a gathering of groups with different objectives, some directly opposing and they certainly have different capacity to influence the outcome or to put it more explicitly some have the power to influence the outcome while others only dream and hope for a different outcome.
And to call a spade a spade, on the one side is the all-powerful fossil fuels group and its thousands of lobbyists and on the other the scientists and the diverse civil society groups with only the power of scientific truth and love for mankind.
The result is, always, historical, dramatic, emotional and fiery speeches and no real climate action.
Proof alone is the fact that, carbon dioxide emissions have kept increasing from 1995 (COP01) to 2026 (COP31). No dent in the curve at all, with the exception of the covid pandemic but only briefly.
Not to mention the still unbelievable fact, that up to COP26, COP decisions didn’t dare mention fossil fuels as the perpetrators of this catastrophe.
If you think about it, COPs, by continuing on this trajectory, in essence they gave us a false sense of security that something good was brewing and it will take shape maybe in the next years…
It didn’t and we should have been wise enough to know that it wouldn’t because it couldn’t.
The consensus rule at COP
The truth of the matter is that it couldn’t, because those who didn’t want any real progress, since they were profiting really big from the current state, they laid the foundations of this impasse as early as COP1.
The undisputed “Achilles heel” of COPs that leads consistently to delays or paralyses decision-making is the ….consensus rule.
Under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) operational framework, nearly 200 member nations must agree on a text for it to pass, otherwise no decision is taken. This means that every single country holds effectively veto power over any decision.
And because any nation can formally object and derail a deal, final agreements are repeatedly watered down to satisfy the least ambitious participants. This more often than not, results in vague, non-binding text rather than aggressive climate action…. (Check below to see the countries which used veto to derail and block important decisions in many COPs).
Have you read? OP-ED: The canary of the climate crisis
It’s all about the failure to establish Rule 42
“The Missing ‘Rule 42’ “: This consensus system is actually the result of a permanent bureaucratic loophole. Ever since the inception of the UNFCCC in the early 1990s, the parties have failed to formally adopt the official Rules of Procedure. Specifically, Rule 42—which was meant to outline voting majorities (such as a two-thirds or three-fourths majority)—was blocked. As a result, the conferences must rely on the default practice of absolute consensus to pass any substantive text.
They achieved this from day 1. Talk about foresight.
And they were so cunning that they sugar-coated this disastrous bitter pill by claiming that the consensus ensures that smaller, developing nations legally have an equal voice to global superpowers…
Brilliant, you must concede.
And there is more to it: the beauty of this rule is that it is self-shielded, it is self-protected: to abolish it you need… consensus.
Game set and match to the forces of darkness at COP
There is only one conclusion from the above: only and only when the fossil fuel group decides to transition away from fossil fuels, then and only then the world will do so.
The COP architecture has been rendered irrelevant from day 1 but we were all too busy with our own climate action agenda issues that we failed to see the whole picture.
And so we kept on, hoping against hope that our rhetorical yet scientific arguments will turn the table.
They were never meant to be able to turn anything.
Unless we drastically and I am afraid dramatically change COP architecture, nothing will change and we will continue fighting windmills like Don Quixote
Am I exaggerating?
The results of 30 consecutive failed COPs are silent-screaming witnesses of this. They always win!!!
Even the northern star of climate negotiations the Paris Agreement, makes no mention of fossil fuels, of oil, of gas of coal!!! Unbelievable but true!
Therefore, according to this one can conclude that CO2 is self-emitted…
Of interest The obsolete Net Zero bubble and what happens now
This is the hard reality of COPs
The power of greed has won over the power of scientific truth.
So dear scientists and civil societies and hopeful activists and… What do you expect to happen at COP31? At COP32? COP33?
And don’t lose focus of the rising global temperature. Rising way more that the “official expectations of 1.7°C” and the cute “overshoot theory” which is supposed to give us hope.
Wake up and see that it is COPeless.
Chronological breakdown of COP blocking nations
- COP1 (Berlin, 1995): Saudi Arabia and Kuwait blocked initial voting procedures to permanently enforce the absolute consensus rule, giving petrostates long-term veto leverage.
- COP3 (Kyoto, 1997): Saudi Arabia and other OPEC nations actively tried to block emissions targets, while the United States later vetoed its practical implementation by refusing to ratify the protocol.
- COP6 (The Hague, 2000): The United States blocked a final deal with the European Union over how to count carbon sinks (forests and soils), causing the entire summit to collapse without an agreement.
- COP15 (Copenhagen, 2009): A small coalition led by Sudan, Venezuela, Bolivia, Cuba, and Tuvalu formally vetoed the final Copenhagen Accord, forcing the summit to merely “take note” of the document rather than adopt it.
- COP19 (Warsaw, 2013): Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus blocked key procedural tracks out of anger over how previous meetings were run, while a block of developed countries led by the United States blocked legal language on financial loss and damage.
- COP21 (Paris, 2015): The United States threatened to veto the entire historic Paris Agreement at the final hour unless the word “shall” (legally binding emissions cuts) was changed to “should” (voluntary).
- COP24 (Katowice, 2018): Russia, Saudi Arabia, the United States, and Kuwait teamed up to block the official “welcoming” of the landmark Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 1.5°C scientific report.
- COP25 (Madrid, 2019): Brazil and Australia blocked progress on global carbon market rules (Article 6) by demanding loopholes for double-counting carbon credits.
- COP26 (Glasgow, 2021): India and China staged a last-minute joint intervention, threatening to veto the final text unless the commitment to “phase out” coal was weakened to “phase down.”
- COP27 (Sharm El-Sheikh, 2022): Saudi Arabia and Russia blocked attempts to expand the fossil fuel phasedown language to include oil and gas, keeping the focus solely restricted to coal.
- COP28 (Dubai, 2023): Saudi Arabia and the OPEC bloc fiercely vetoed early drafts that mandated a complete “fossil fuel phase-out,” delaying the summit until compromised language (“transitioning away”) was substituted.
- COP29 (Baku, 2024): Saudi Arabia and several developing allies successfully derailed work programmes meant to operationalise the previous year’s fossil fuel transition pledges.
- COP30 (Belém, 2025): Saudi Arabia and Russia forced the complete removal of a mandatory roadmap to phase out fossil fuels from the final draft text, prompting walking out protests from the EU and Colombia.
About the author
Prof Dr Ioannis Tsipouridis, a Senior Research Fellow at Strathmore University in Kenya. He is a Renewable Energy Consultant Engineer and Climate Action Advocate, Project Manager IAM COMPACT and FUELPHORIA EU Horizon Projects at Technical University of Mombasa (TUM), Adjunct Professor @Great Lakes University Kisumu GLUK, Member of Fossil Fuel Non Proliferation Treaty & of Loss and Damage Collaboration Group, Editor of Energy Matters to Climate Change Emc2 portal and ANEMOlogia
