Brazil's final text proposal at UN climate talks draws fire as weak — after a real fire at the COP30
BELEM, Brazil (AP) — Brazil offered several texts on Friday morning for this year's last day of the U.N. climate talks but what was supposed to be nearly final proposals on key contentious issues failed to explicitly mention fossil fuels — the cause of global warming.
This omission upset more than two dozens nations, along with advocates for stronger action.
On top of that, it came on the heels of a fire on Thursday that briefly spread through pavilions of the conference known as COP30 on the edge of the Amazon, prompting evacuations. Officials said 13 people were treated for smoke inhalation.
A key text among host Brazil's proposals — called the mutirao decision — deals with four sticky issues, including climate financial aid and strengthening inadequate national climate plans that have dominated discussions here.
A second big issue that has loomed over the talks in the city of Belem is creating a more detailed road map for the world to phase out fossil fuels — coal, oil and natural gas — expanding on a single sentence agreed upon two years ago that has not been changed since.
More than 80 nations have called for stronger directions and Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva also pushed for it earlier this month.
On phasing out fossil fuels, the mutirao decision says that it “acknowledges that the global transition towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient development is irreversible and the trend of the future” and it "also acknowledges that the Paris Agreement is working and resolves to go further and faster."
Some nations think that's not nearly enough.
An upset response letter was drafted by some countries to the documents, which has the potential to further delay the proceedings — which need near consensus unanimity. COP30 was to end Friday, but the U.N. climate talks usually extend an extra day or two. The letter was from 29 nations, including wealthy ones such as the United Kingdom, France and Germany along with smaller climate vulnerable islands Palau, Marshall Islands and Vanuatu.
“We express deep concern,” the letter said. “In its present form, the proposal does not meet the minimum conditions required for a credible COP outcome.”
“We cannot support an outcome that does not include a road map for implementing a just, orderly, and equitable transition away from fossil fuels," it added. "This expectation is shared by a vast majority of parties, as well as by science and by the people who are watching our work closely.”
Activists were just as unhappy.
“Hopes were raised by initial proposals for road maps both to end deforestation and fossil fuels, but these road maps have disappeared," Greenpeace climate policy expert Tracy Carty said.
"We’re again lost without a map to 1.5°C and fumbling our way in the dark while time is running out," she added, referring to the goal set by the Paris Agreement to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels.
Bronwen Tucker of the advocate group Oil Change International called it “a shamefully weak text that fails to mention fossil fuels, fails to deliver accountability towards rich countries’ finance obligations, and only makes vague promises on adaptation.”
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This story was produced as part of the 2025 Climate Change Media Partnership, a journalism fellowship organized by Internews’ Earth Journalism Network and the Stanley Center for Peace and Security.
