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Two people speak to one another against the backdrop of the COP28 logo on Nov. 29 ahead of the climate summit’s kickoff in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. (AP/Yonhap)

“The road we have been on will not get us to our destination in time.”

The UN climate summit, known as COP28, kicked off in Dubai on Thursday with delegates from 198 countries around the world.

In a speech to start the conference, Sultan Ahmed al Jaber, the UAE’s minister of industry and advanced technology who is president of the conference, urged those gathered there to “never lose sight of our North Star of 1.5 degrees Celsius.”

This statement serves as a warning: if we don’t act to keep the 2015 Paris Agreement to hold the increase in the global average temperature to well below 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, we could cross a point of no return in the climate crisis. “Action makes belief,” read various banners in the building where the summit is taking place.

The UN’s World Meteorological Organization released a report on the same day that the General Assembly opened, in which it stated that the average temperature for the year is up about 1.4 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial times, meaning only 0.1 degrees left until the limit agreed upon in Paris.

“It’s practically sure that during the coming four years we will hit this 1.5, at least on a temporary basis,” WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas told the Associated Press. “And in the next decade we are more or less going to be there on a permanent basis.”

“It has confirmed that the moment is now to find a new road, a road wide enough for all of us, free of the obstacles and detours of the past,” al Jaber said in his speech, adding that the global stocktake is a “decision that is ambitious, corrects course, and accelerates action to 2030.”

“Let’s work efficiently, agree on the agenda, and move to text - quickly, please!” the COP president urged in his address.

To that end, he called on member parties to take the pledge to triple renewable energy capacity and double energy efficiency prior to the opening of the conference. The countries committed to the pledge will be announced on Saturday, and it is said that more than 100 countries have already joined, including the US and China.

The opening ceremony will be followed by two weeks of meetings to commit to climate action, including speeches by heads of state and government and a summit on the second day. This year’s COP will include the first “stocktake” on whether nations are on track to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement, which was agreed to in 2015.

It will also finalize the detailed operationalization of the so-called loss and damage fund, which was adopted as an official agenda item at last year’s COP27, and debate the phase-out of fossil fuels.

In particular, opposition from oil-producing countries remains strong, and it will be interesting to see if an agreement on fossil fuel phase-out can be reached.

The success of the 2023 conference will be determined by whether countries can agree to immediately halt the expansion of fossil fuels, phase out all fossil fuels fairly and equitably, and shift the subsidies that developed countries are pouring into fossil fuels to renewable energy, said Romain Ioualalen, a global policy campaign manager at Oil Change International.

By Ki Min-do, staff reporter

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