IEA chief expects negotiations at COP29 to focus more on clean energy finance to developing countries

By Nuran Erkul

LONDON (AA) - Climate negotiations at the United Nations's summit this year in Baku are broadly expected to focus on how finance will be provided for the clean energy transition in emerging and developing countries, according to Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA).

Birol spoke to Anadolu exclusively after he was honored with the First Class Order of Zayed II, the United Arab Emirates' (UAE) highest civil decoration, by President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.

This honor was conferred on Birol and the IEA in recognition of their contributions to key outcomes of the COP28 UN Climate Change Conference held in Dubai last year.

With Azerbaijan hosting this year's climate negotiations, COP29 will be held in Baku between Nov. 11 and 22.

While the headline outcome of COP28 was an agreement to transition away from fossil fuels, over 100 countries also committed to tripling renewable energy and doubling energy efficiency by 2030. The loss and damage fund for climate-change-related losses in the least developed countries became operational on the first day of the summit.

In the lead-up to COP28, the IEA called on countries to commit to the achievable goal of tripling renewables and doubling energy efficiency by 2030.

Birol said the goal of tripling renewables and doubling energy efficiency is one of the must-haves that the IEA has advised for a successful outcome at COP28.

"We organized a series of meetings with COP28 President Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, where a consensus emerged. We are now holding similar meetings with COP29 President Mukhtar Babayev ahead of the summit in Baku," he said.

Among the various critical issues up for discussion this year, Birol said the most vital is how finance will be provided for the clean energy transition in emerging and developing countries.

This will extend to the role of international public and financial institutions like the World Bank in supporting this transition, and this is a subject under discussion with the COP29 presidency with the aim of developing a plan.

A meeting was held between the IEA and the COP29 Presidency in Paris, and another one is scheduled for June 3 in Baku on Birol’s visit to Azerbaijan, where he will meet President Ilham Aliyev and cabinet members to discuss how to bring the COP28 success further at COP29.

According to the IEA's estimate, annual clean energy investment in emerging and developing countries will need to more than triple from $770 billion per year in 2022 to $2.2-2.8 trillion per year by the early 2030s.

Excluding China, the need for increases in clean energy investment in emerging and developing countries is almost sevenfold, from $260 billion to $1.4–1.9 trillion per year.

These emerging and developing countries are mostly in the Global South: Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean; Asia, excluding Israel, South Korea, and Japan; Oceania, excluding Australia, New Zealand and Russia, according to the UN Conference on Trade and Development.

- Oil-dependent COP hosts create coordination mechanism for first time

Over the past three consecutive years, COP meetings have been held in oil-producing and exporting countries: last year in the UEA, this year in Azerbaijan, and next year in Brazil.

According to Birol, the IEA is in support of the coordination mechanisms that these countries have and will continue to provide in helping to “deliver complementary and supportive COP outcomes” and in contributing to the acceleration of the clean energy transition in oil-producing countries.

"It definitely creates momentum, but we will see in time how long this momentum will last. But I can see that both the UEA and Azerbaijan are quite eager to take further steps in the clean energy transition," he said.

According to the most recent analysis by financial think tank Carbon Tracker, Azerbaijan's budgetary reliance on oil and gas earnings is 64%, while the UEA's is 52%.

Birol said the IEA and United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will publish results on how the countries deliver upon their commitments they made at the COPs through a tracking mechanism.