Letters | Cop28: so are we anywhere near the end of the fossil fuel era?

Readers discuss two key factors the UN climate change conferences have overlooked, the proposal for a third medical school in Hong Kong, ways to improve minibus services, and the prioritising of students’ mental health

Reading Time:3 minutes

United Nations climate chief Simon Stiell embraces Cop28 president Sultan al-Jaber after the final gavel at the UN climate summit on December 13 in Dubai. Photo: AP

Published: 11:30am, 20 Dec 2023

Feel strongly about these letters, or any other aspects of the news? Share your views by emailing us your Letter to the Editor at [email protected] or filling in this Google form. Submissions should not exceed 400 words, and must include your full name and address, plus a phone number for verification.

We have seen yet another UN climate change conference, this time in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates.

The objective of Cop28 and others before it has been to arrive at a set of globally acceptable rules that would ensure the rise in global average temperatures is contained to within 1.5 degrees Celsius of pre-industrial levels. Unfortunately, after 28 editions of the meeting, there is no sign of us achieving that objective.

Despite talks and more talks, the Cop series has not addressed two important anthropogenic factors that contribute to climate change, namely, the population explosion and the disparity in per capita energy consumption across the world. The disparity is huge between most developed countries and developing countries. So where is equality and fairness?

Whether there is global warming or not, Earth’s resources should not be unnecessarily wasted, but should be shared equitably. This is where geopolitics plays an important role.

It is a fact that temperature rises can be due to natural causes as well as anthropogenic causes. The latter involves energy production and energy consumption. Greenhouse gases are emitted when energy is produced from fossil fuels (oil, gas and coal). The climate change summits have concentrated on energy production but paid less attention to reducing and/or making energy consumption more efficient.