COP30 will likely not produce a roadmap to a transition from fossil fuels

Divisions over fossil fuels and climate finance remain.

WHAT: A record number of oil and gas delegates are attending the annual COP conference.

WHY: A transition from fossil fuels is being discussed but is not part of the official agenda.

WHAT NEXT: Stiff opposition from petro-states is unlikely to be overcome.

UN climate talks are nearing the end with battle lines drawn over fossil fuels, as dozens of countries demanded a roadmap to phase out oil, coal and gas in the face of fierce resistance from producers and a record number of industry lobbyists.

The confrontation has become the defining issue at COP30 in Belém, Brazil, with global emissions from fossil fuels hitting record levels in 2025 even as climate scientists warn the world is on track for 2.6 °C of warming by 2100.

Amid growing calls for action from the scientific community, a coalition of around 80 countries from across Europe, Africa, Latin America and Small Island Developing States is pushing to add a fossil fuels roadmap to the official agenda.

France, Colombia, Germany, and Kenya are leading the diplomatic effort, with supporters aiming to reach 100 nations out of the nearly 200 that have sent delegations. The EU has also suggested a flexible roadmap for easing out of fossil fuel use, but it was “non-prescriptive” and did not oblige members to follow any particular path, said Reuters.

"Our priority for the coming days is to broaden this coalition, to speak to all the countries that believe we need to move forward and accelerate on this issue," a source from the French delegation told DW.

The push builds on COP28's historic call to "transition away from fossil fuels," which offered few details on implementation.

Brazilian Environment Minister Marina Silva expressed support for a roadmap "because it lays the foundation for a fair and planned transition" away from polluting fuels, while Jochen Flasbarth, German state-secretary for climate action, said his country would support any roadmap decision.

Colombia has drafted a declaration on phasing out fossil fuels that a handful of states have signed.

Record fossil fuel lobbyist presence

Opposition to the roadmap – which analysts say would be too complex to negotiate at a single two-week COP conference – has also been bolstered by an unprecedented concentration of fossil fuel industry representatives at the summit.

COP 30 officially ends on November 21, but talks are sure to continue for some days, as they always do.

This comes as one in every 25 participants at the conference is tied to the oil and gas sector, the highest concentration ever at UN climate talks, according to Radio France Internationale (RFI) citing data from an NGO.

An estimated around 1,600 delegates with links to oil, coal and gas are in Belém, including representatives of energy giants ExxonMobil, Shell and TotalEnergies, as well as state-owned oil firms.

They outnumber the delegations of every country except Brazil and have two-thirds more conference passes than the 10 most climate-vulnerable countries combined.

This figure has risen sharply from 500 attendees with fossil fuel ties at the Glasgow COP summit five years ago.

At least 600 lobbyists hold special party overflow badges, allowing them to remain in closed negotiation rooms without speaking rights. France's delegation of 449 includes at least 22 people linked to the fossil fuels sector, including five TotalEnergies executives, amongst them CEO Patrick Pouyanné.

Brazil's contradictory position

The host nation's position reflects the summit's central tensions. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who has positioned himself as a climate advocate, has urged world leaders to end fossil fuel dependence even as his government recently approved oil exploration at the mouth of the Amazon River, an environmentally sensitive area.

To this end, Lula had stated at the end of October that Brazil "will not throw away" the wealth generated by oil and announced during the COP30 Leaders' Summit the creation of a specific fund to allocate part of oil exploration profits to renewable energy investment.

Fierce opposition 

Most oil-producing states, particularly Saudi Arabia, have unequivocally rejected the roadmap idea and were pushing back against diplomatic efforts. One negotiator estimated that around 70 countries would oppose any new COP30 decision addressing fossil fuels, DW reported.

At COP28 in Dubai, major oil-producing nations had resisted transition calls, proposing instead to phase out fossil fuel emissions using uncommercialised and unproven technology such as carbon capture and storage.

TotalEnergies’ CEO Pouyanné expressed scepticism about a roadmap, calling it a "European vision" and suggesting more government regulation was not the answer. He said to DW he was not a lobbyist and had been invited to COP30.

In a letter dated October 1, 225 environmental organisations urged the COP30 presidency to stop inviting major polluters into the talks.

They argued that "big polluters should not have access to climate policy making" and that allowing industry representatives lets them "continue to influence and undermine the international response."

US absence and hostility

Meanwhile, the US withdrawal from climate negotiations under President Donald Trump has further hindered efforts to hash out actionable strategies to promote a transition to clean energy sources. US Energy Secretary Chris Wright went as far as to condemn COP30 as "harmful and misguided," Associated Press reported.

“It's essentially a hoax. It's not an honest organisation looking to better human lives," Wright said, defying global scientific consensus on climate change. He added he might attend next year's summit "just to try to deliver some common sense."

Wright's comments echoed the Trump administration's rejection of global climate agreements and prioritisation of fossil fuels. President Trump, a long-time climate sceptic, pulled out of the Paris Agreement for the second time upon returning to office and declined to send high-level negotiators to Belém.

COP31 appears set to be in Turkey, with high-level meetings also in Australia. The same divisions will likely persist, between oil-oriented countries and those that are seeking a way to diminish reliance on fossil fuels, and also those that are divided  - such as Brazil, Latin America’s main oil producer and also a would-be climate leader.

After Lula failed to broker a climate deal at the conference, early on November 19, he tried to sound optimistic, telling reporters: "I am so happy that I leave here certain that my negotiators will have the best result a COP could have ever offered to the Planet Earth."