Tag Archives: Climate change

Business

A big new Exxon Mobil climate deal that got assist from Joe Biden

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Could it be that Big Oil’s next big thing got a big assist from Joe Biden?

Maybe, if carbon capture and storage is indeed as big a deal as ExxonMobil’s first-of-its-kind deal to extract, transport and store carbon from other companies’ factories implies.

The deal, announced last month, calls for ExxonMobil to capture carbon emitted by CF Industries‘ ammonia factory in Donaldsonville, La., and transport it to underground storage using pipelines owned by Enlink Midstream. Set to start up in 2025, the deal is meant to herald a new stage in dealing with carbon produced by manufacturers, and is the latest step in ExxonMobil’s often-tense dialogue with investors who want oil companies to slash emissions.

The Inflation Reduction Act, passed in August, may determine whether deals like Exxon’s become a trend. The law expands tax credits for capturing carbon from industrial uses in a bid to offset the high up-front costs of plans to capture carbon from places like CF’s plant, as other tax credits in the law lower costs of renewable power and electric cars. 

The Inflation Reduction Act and Big Oil

The law may help oil companies like ExxonMobil build profitable businesses to replace some of the revenue and profit they’ll lose as EVs proliferate. Though the company isn’t sharing financial projections, it has committed to investing $15 billion in CCS by 2027 and ExxonMobil Low-Carbon Solutions president Dan Ammann says it may invest more.

“We see a big business opportunity here,” Ammann told CNBC’s David Faber. “We’re seeing interest from companies across a whole range of industries, a whole range of sectors, a whole range of geographies.”

The deal calls for ExxonMobil to capture and remove 2 million metric tons of carbon dioxide yearly from CF’s factory, equivalent to replacing 700,000 gasoline-powered vehicles with electric versions. 

Each company involved is pursuing its own version of the low-carbon industrial economy. CF wants to produce more carbon-free blue ammonia, a process that often involves extracting ammonia’s components from carbon-laden fossil fuels. Enlink hopes to become a kind of railroad for captured CO2 emissions, calling itself the would-be “CO2 transportation provider of choice” for an industrial corridor laden with refineries and chemical plants. 

An industrial facility on the Houston Ship Channel where Exxon Mobil is proposing a carbon capture and sequestration network. Between this industry-wide plan and its first deal for another company’s CCS needs, ExxonMobil is hoping that its low-carbon business quickly scales to a legitimate source of revenue and profit.

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Exxon itself wants to develop carbon capture as a new business, Amman said, pointing to a “very big backlog of similar projects,” part of the company’s pledge to remove as much carbon from the atmosphere as Exxon itself emits by 2050.  

“We want oil companies to be active participants in carbon reduction,” said Julio Friedmann, a deputy assistant energy secretary under President Obama and chief scientist at Carbon Direct in New York. “It’s my expectation that this can become a flagship project.”

The key to the sudden flurry of activity is the Inflation Reduction Act.

“It’s a really good example of the intersection of good policy coming together with business and the innovation that can happen on the business side to tackle the big problem of emissions and the big problem of climate change,” Ammann said. “The interest we are seeing, the backlog, are all confirming this is starting to move and starting to move quickly.”

The law increased an existing tax credit for carbon capture to $85 a ton from $45, Goldman said, which will save the Exxon/CF/Enlink project as much as $80 million a year. Credits for captured carbon used underground to enhance production of more fossil fuels are lower, at $60 per ton.

“Carbon capture is a big boys’ game,” said Peter McNally, global sector lead for industrial, materials and energy research at consulting firm Third Bridge. “These are billion-dollar projects. It’s big companies capturing large amounts of carbon. And big oil and gas companies are where the expertise is.” 

Goldman Sachs, and environmentalists, are skeptical

A Goldman Sachs team led by analyst Brian Singer called the law “transformative” for climate reduction technologies including battery storage and clean hydrogen. But its analysis is less bullish when it comes to the impact on carbon capture projects like Exxon’s, with Singer expecting more modest gains as the law accelerates development in longer-term projects. To speed up investment more, companies must build CCS systems at greater scale and invent more efficient carbon-extraction chemistry, the Goldman team said.

Industrial uses are the third-largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S., according to the EPA. That’s narrowly behind both electricity production and transportation. Emissions reduction in industrial uses is considered more expensive and difficult than in either power generation or car and truck transport. Industry is the focus for CCS because utilities and vehicle makers are looking first to other technologies to cut emissions.

Almost 20 percent of U.S. electricity last year came from renewable sources that replace coal and natural gas and another 19 percent came from carbon-free nuclear power, according to government data. Renewables’ share is rising rapidly in 2022, according to interim Energy Department reports, and the IRA also expands tax credits for wind and solar power. Most airlines plan to reduce their carbon footprint by switching to biofuels over the next decade.

More oil and chemical companies seem likely to get on the carbon capture bandwagon first. In May, British oil giant BP and petrochemical maker Linde announced a plan to capture 15 million tons of carbon annually at Linde’s plants in Greater Houston. Linde wants to expand its sales of low-carbon hydrogen, which is usually made by mixing natural gas with steam and a chemical catalyst. In March, Oxy announced a deal with a unit of timber producer Weyerhauser. Oxy won the rights to store carbon underneath 30,000 acres of Weyerhauser’s forest land, even as it continues to grow trees on the surface, with both companies prepared to expand to other sites over time.

Still, environmentalists remain skeptical of CCS.

Tax credits may cut the cost of CCS to companies, but taxpayers still foot the bill for what remains a “boondoggle,” said Carroll Muffett, CEO of the Center for International Environmental Law in Washington. The biggest part of industrial emissions comes from the electricity that factories use, and factory owners should reduce that part of their carbon footprint with renewable power as a top priority, he said.

“It makes no economic sense at the highest levels, and the IRA doesn’t change that,” Muffett said. “It just changes who takes the risk.” 

Friedman countered by saying economies of scale and technical innovations will trim costs, and that CCS can reduce carbon emissions by as much as 10 percent over time.

“It’s a rather robust number,” Friedmann said. “And it’s about things you can’t easily address any other way.” 

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Business

Lab-grown meat is OK for human consumption, FDA says

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Sign up for CNN’s Life, But Greener newsletter. Our limited newsletter series guides you on how to minimize your personal role in the climate crisis — and reduce your eco-anxiety.



CNN
 — 

The US Food and Drug Administration has given a safety clearance to lab-grown meat for the first time.

Upside Foods, a California-based company that makes meat from cultured chicken cells, will be able to begin selling its products once its facilities have been inspected by the US Department of Agriculture.

The agency said it had evaluated the information submitted by Upside Foods and it had “no further questions at this time about the firm’s safety conclusion.”

“Advancements in cell culture technology are enabling food developers to use animal cells obtained from livestock, poultry, and seafood in the production of food, with these products expected to be ready for the U.S. market in the near future,” Dr. Robert M. Califf, the FDA’s commissioner of food and drugs and Susan T. Mayne, director of the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN), said in a statement.

“The FDA’s goal is to support innovation in food technologies while always maintaining as our first priority the safety of the foods available to U.S. consumers,” the statement added.

Upside Foods founder and CEO Uma Valeti said on Twitter that its cultivated chicken “was one step closer to being on tables everywhere.”

“UPSIDE has received our ‘No Questions Letter’ from the FDA,” Valeti tweeted. “They’ve accepted our conclusion that our cultivated chicken is safe to eat.”

He told CNN earlier this year that the process of making cultivated meat was “similar to brewing beer, but instead of growing yeast or microbes, we grow animal cells.”

“These products are not vegan, vegetarian or plant-based – they are real meat, made without the animal.”

Singapore was the first country to allow the sale of cultured meat. It granted San Francisco start-up Eat Just Inc. regulatory approval in 2020 to sell its laboratory-grown chicken in Singapore.

Advocates hope that cultured meat will reduce the need to slaughter animals for food and help with the climate crisis. The food system is responsible for about a quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions, most of which are from animal agriculture.

“We are thrilled at FDA’s historic announcement that, after a rigorous evaluation, UPSIDE Foods has become the first company in the world to receive the US FDA greenlight for cultivated chicken,” David Kay, director of communications at Upside Foods, said via email.

“At scale, cultivated meat is projected to use substantially less water and land than conventionally-produced meat.”

Although not technically an approval, the FDA said that a thorough pre-market consultation process had been completed. The clearance only applies to food made from cultured chicken cells by Upside, but the statement said the FDA “is ready to work with additional firms developing cultured animal cell food.”



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Business

The ‘world’s largest floating wind farm’ produces its first power

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Offices of Equinor photographed in Feb. 2019. Equinor is one of several companies looking at developing floating wind farms.

Odin Jaeger | Bloomberg | Getty Images

A facility described as the world’s largest floating wind farm produced its first power over the weekend, with more turbines set to come online before the year is out.

In a statement Monday, Norwegian energy firm Equinor — better known for its work in the oil and gas industry — said power production from Hywind Tampen’s first wind turbine took place on Sunday afternoon.

While wind is a renewable energy source, Hywind Tampen will be used to help power operations at oil and gas fields in the North Sea. Equinor said Hywind Tampen’s first power was sent to the Gullfaks oil and gas field.

“I am proud that we have now started production at Hywind Tampen, Norway’s first and the world’s largest floating wind farm,” Geir Tungesvik, Equinor’s executive vice president for projects, drilling and procurement, said.

“This is a unique project, the first wind farm in the world powering producing oil and gas installations.”

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Hywind Tampen is located around 140 kilometers (86.9 miles) off the coast of Norway, in depths ranging from 260 to 300 meters.

Seven of the wind farm’s turbines are slated to come on stream in 2022, with installation of the remaining four taking place in 2023. When complete, Equinor says it will have a system capacity of 88 megawatts.

Alongside Equinor, the other companies involved in the project are Vår Energi, INPEX Idemitsu, Petoro, Wintershall Dea and OMV.

Equinor said Hywind Tampen was expected to meet around 35% of the Gullfaks and Snorre fields’ electricity demand. “This will cut CO2 emissions from the fields by about 200,000 tonnes per year,” the company added.

The use of a floating wind farm to help power the production of fossil fuels is likely to spark some controversy, however.

Fossil fuels’ effect on the environment is considerable and the United Nations says that, since the 19th century, “human activities have been the main driver of climate change, primarily due to burning fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas.”

Speaking at the COP27 climate change summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, last week, the U.N. Secretary General issued a stark warning to attendees.

“We are in the fight of our lives, and we are losing,” Antonio Guterres said. “Greenhouse gas emissions keep growing, global temperatures keep rising, and our planet is fast approaching tipping points that will make climate chaos irreversible.”

An emerging industry

Equinor said the turbines at Hywind Tampen were installed on a floating concrete structure, with a joint mooring system. One advantage of floating turbines is that they can be installed in deeper waters than fixed-bottom ones.

Back in 2017, Equinor started operations at Hywind Scotland, a five-turbine, 30 MW facility it calls the world’s first floating wind farm.

Since then, a number of major companies have made moves in the sector.

In Aug. 2021, RWE Renewables and Kansai Electric Power signed an agreement to assess the feasibility of a “large-scale floating offshore wind project” in waters off Japan’s coast.

In Sept. of that year, Norwegian company Statkraft announced a long-term purchasing agreement relating to a 50 MW floating wind farm — which it has also dubbed the “world’s largest” — off the coast of Aberdeen, Scotland.

And a few months later, in Dec. 2021, plans for three major offshore wind developments in Australia — two of which are looking to incorporate floating wind tech — were announced.

Earlier this year, meanwhile, the White House said it was targeting 15 gigawatts of floating offshore wind capacity by the year 2035.

“The Biden-Harris Administration is launching coordinated actions to develop new floating offshore wind platforms, an emerging clean energy technology that will help the United States lead on offshore wind,” a statement, which was also published by U.S. Department of the Interior, said at the time.

As well as the 15 GW ambition, a “Floating Offshore Wind Shot” aims to reduce the costs of floating technologies by over 70% by the year 2035.

“Bringing floating offshore wind technology to scale will unlock new opportunities for offshore wind power off the coasts of California and Oregon, in the Gulf of Maine, and beyond,” the statement added.

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Business

Jeff Bezos for the first time says he will give most of his money to charity

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Washington
CNN Business
 — 

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos plans to give away the majority of his $124 billion net worth during his lifetime, telling CNN in an exclusive interview he will devote the bulk of his wealth to fighting climate change and supporting people who can unify humanity in the face of deep social and political divisions.

Though Bezos’ vow was light on specifics, this marks the first time he has announced that he plans to give away most of his money. Critics have chided Bezos for not signing the Giving Pledge, a promise by hundreds of the world’s richest people to donate the majority of their wealth to charitable causes.

Exclusive: Jeff Bezos offers his advice on taking risks right now


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In a sit-down interview with CNN’s Chloe Melas on Saturday at his Washington, DC, home, Bezos, speaking alongside his partner, the journalist-turned-philanthropist Lauren Sánchez, said the couple is “building the capacity to be able to give away this money.”

Asked directly by CNN whether he intends to donate the majority of his wealth within his lifetime, Bezos said: “Yeah, I do.”

Bezos said he and Sánchez agreed to their first interview together since they began dating in 2019 to help shine a spotlight on the Bezos Courage and Civility Award, granted this year to musician Dolly Parton.

The 20-minute exchange with Bezos and Sánchez covered a broad range of topics, from Bezos’s views on political dialogue and a possible economic recession to Sánchez’s plan to visit outer space with an all-female crew and her reflections on a flourishing business partnership with Bezos.

That working relationship was on display Saturday as Bezos and Sánchez announced a $100 million grant to Parton as part of her Courage and Civility Award. It is the third such award, following similar grants to chef Jose Andrés, who has spent some of the money making meals for Ukrainians — and the climate advocate and CNN contributor Van Jones.

“When you think of Dolly,” said Sánchez in the interview, “Look, everyone smiles, right? She is just beaming with light. And all she wants to do is bring light into other people’s worlds. And so we couldn’t have thought of someone better than to give this award to Dolly, and we know she’s going to do amazing things with it.”

The throughline connecting the Courage and Civility Award grantees, Bezos said, was their capacity to bring many people together to solve large challenges.

“I just feel honored to be able to be a part of what they’re doing for this world,” Bezos told CNN.

Unity, Bezos said, is a trait that will be necessary to confront climate change and one that he repeatedly invoked as he blasted politicians and social media for amplifying division.

But the couple’s biggest challenge may be figuring out how to distribute Bezos’ vast fortune. Bezos declined to identify a specific percentage or to provide concrete details on where it would likely be spent.

Despite being the fourth-wealthiest person in the world, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Bezos has refrained from setting a target amount to give away in his lifetime.

Bezos has committed $10 billion over 10 years, or about 8% of his current net worth, to the Bezos Earth Fund, which Sánchez co-chairs. Among its priorities are reducing the carbon footprint of construction-grade cement and steel; pushing financial regulators to consider climate-related risks; advancing data and mapping technologies to monitor carbon emissions; and building natural, plant-based carbon sinks on a large scale.

Though Bezos is now Amazon’s

(AMZN) executive chair and not its CEO — he stepped down from that role in 2021 — he is still involved in the greening of the company. Amazon is one of more than 300 companies that have pledged to reduce their carbon footprint by 2040 according to the principles of the Paris Climate Agreement, Bezos said, though Amazon’s

(AMZN) footprint grew by 18% in 2021, reflecting a pandemic-driven e-commerce boom. Amazon’s

(AMZN) reckoning with its own effect on the climate mirrors its outsized impact on everything from debates about unionization to antitrust policy, where the company has attracted an enormous level of scrutiny from regulators, lawmakers, and civil society groups.

Bezos compared his philanthropic strategy to his years-long effort constructing a titanic engine of e-commerce and cloud computing that has made him one of the most powerful people in the world.

“The hard part is figuring out how to do it in a levered way,” he said, implying that even as he gives away his billions, he is still looking to maximize his return. “It’s not easy. Building Amazon was not easy. It took a lot of hard work, a bunch of very smart teammates, hard-working teammates, and I’m finding — and I think Lauren is finding the same thing — that charity, philanthropy, is very similar.”

“There are a bunch of ways that I think you could do ineffective things, too,” he added. “So you have to think about it carefully and you have to have brilliant people on the team.”

Bezos’ methodical approach to giving stands in sharp contrast to that of his ex-wife, the philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, who recently gave away nearly $4 billion to 465 organizations in the span of less than a year.

While Bezos and Sánchez plot out their plans for Bezos’ immense wealth, many people of more modest means are bracing for what economists fear may be an extended economic downturn.

Last month, Bezos tweeted a warning to his followers on Twitter, recommending that they “batten down the hatches.”

The advice was meant for business owners and consumers alike, Bezos said in the interview, suggesting that individuals should consider putting off buying big ticket items they’ve been eyeing — or that companies should slow their acquisitions and capital expenditures.

“Take some risk off the table,” Bezos said. “Keep some dry powder on hand…. Just a little bit of risk reduction could make the difference for that small business, if we do get into even more serious economic problems. You’ve got to play the probabilities a little bit.”

Many may be feeling the pinch now, he added, but argued that as an optimist he believes the American Dream “is and will be even more attainable in the future” — projecting that within Bezos’ lifetime, space travel could become broadly accessible to the public.

Sánchez said the couple make “really great teammates,” though she laughed, “We can be kind of boring,” Sánchez said. Bezos smiled and replied, “Never boring.”

Sánchez, the founder of Black Ops Aviation, the first female-owned and operated aerial film and production company is a trained helicopter pilot. She said in the interview that they’ve both taken turns in the driver’s seat.

Bezos has credited his own journey to space for helping to inspire his push to fight climate change. Now, it is Sánchez’s turn.

Sánchez told CNN she anticipates venturing into orbit herself sometime in 2023. And while she did not directly address who will be joining her — quickly ruling out Bezos as a crewmate — she said simply: “It’ll be a great group of females.”

Bezos may be adding NFL owner to his resume. CNN recently reported that Bezos and Jay-Z are in talks on a potential joint bid on the Washington Commanders.

It is not clear if the two have yet spoken with Dan Snyder and his wife, Tanya, the current owners of the NFL team, about the possibility.

But during the interview on Saturday, Melas asked Bezos if the speculation was true.

“Yes, I’ve heard that buzz,” Bezos said with a smile.

Sánchez chimed in with a laugh, “I do like football. I’m just going to throw that out there for everyone.”

Bezos added, “I grew up in Houston, Texas, and I played football growing up as a kid … and it is my favorite sport … so we’ll just have to wait and see.”

– CNN’s Chloe Melas contributed to this report



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US

Biden to Announce Restrictions on Methane Emissions at COP27

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SHARM EL SHEIKH, Egypt—President Biden is moving to tighten restrictions on emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, and boost funding for developing countries to adapt to the effects of climate change and transition to cleaner technologies, according to the White House. 

Mr. Biden is expected to announce the measures in a speech before a United Nations climate conference, known as COP27, according to a fact sheet released by the White House ahead of the address. The measures include plans for the Environmental Protection Agency to require oil-and-gas companies to monitor existing production facilities for methane leaks and repair them, according to administration officials.

Methane is 80 times as potent at trapping heat from solar radiation as carbon dioxide over its first 20 years in the atmosphere. It is responsible for about half a degree Celsius of global warming since the preindustrial era, and its levels are rising fast, according to measurements made by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. 

The planned rules affect hundreds of thousands of U.S. wells, storage tanks and natural-gas processing plants, and require companies to replace leaky, older equipment and buy new monitoring tools.

EPA Administrator

Michael Regan

said flaring—a technique used by gas producers to burn off excess methane from oil and natural-gas wells—would be reduced at all well sites under the planned rules. Owners would be required to monitor abandoned wells for methane emissions and plug any leaks, he said.

“We’ve tightened down to limit flaring as much as possible without banning it,” Mr. Regan said.

President Biden met on Friday with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi in Sharm El Sheikh.



Photo:

KEVIN LAMARQUE/REUTERS

The American Petroleum Institute, which represents U.S. oil and gas producers, said it was reviewing the proposed rule. 

“Federal regulation of methane crafted to build on industry’s progress can help accelerate emissions reductions while developing reliable American energy,”

Frank Macchiarola,

API’s senior vice president of policy, economics and regulatory affairs, said in a statement.

Lee Fuller of the Independent Petroleum Association of America, a Washington, D.C., trade group that represents many smaller producers, said his group would be reviewing the regulations closely. 

“While everyone wants to produce oil and natural gas using sound environmental procedures, there will always be a need to assure that the regulatory structure is cost effective and technologically feasible,” he said in a statement. 

Rachel Cleetus, lead economist for the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit advocacy group, said in a statement that the EPA had “taken an important step forward by issuing a robust standard for methane emissions from oil-and-gas operations.”

Mr. Biden is walking a political tightrope during his brief stopover in Egypt on his way to summits in Cambodia and Indonesia. The war in Ukraine has unleashed turmoil in energy markets, underscoring the world’s continued reliance on fossil fuels.

Control of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives still hinged on races that were too close to call as of early Friday morning, with both parties girding for a final outcome that might not be known for days. If Republicans win control of either chamber it would mean more power to a party that is deeply skeptical of Mr. Biden’s climate agenda and reluctant to spend billions of dollars to help other countries transition to cleaner sources of energy.

The White House said Mr. Biden is expected to announce an additional $100 million for the United Nations Adaptation Fund, which helps countries adapt to floods, droughts and storms that climate scientists say are increasing in frequency and severity as the earth’s atmosphere and oceans warm. The U.S. has yet to pay the $50 million it pledged to the fund at last year’s climate talks in Glasgow.

As world leaders gather for the COP27 climate conference in Egypt, WSJ looks at how the war in Ukraine and turmoil in energy markets are complicating efforts to reduce carbon emissions. Photo: Mohammed Salem/Reuters

The U.S. also owes $2 billion to the U.N. Green Climate Fund, which finances renewable energy and climate adaptation projects in the developing world. The administration has asked for $1.6 billion for the fund in the fiscal 2023 budget.

The White House said Mr. Biden would also pledge $150 million to a U.S. fund for climate adaptation and resilience across Africa; $13.6 million to the World Meteorological Organization to collect additional weather, water and climate observation across Africa; and $15 million to support the deployment of early-warning systems in Africa by NOAA in conjunction with local weather-forecasting agencies.

The U.S. pledges don’t address demands from poorer nations to provide money for damage they say is the result of climate-related weather events—a new category of funding known as “loss and damage.” This week at the summit, Belgium and Germany pledged a combined 172 million euros, equivalent to $176 million, to support loss-and-damage payments to developing countries. Scotland pledged $5.8 million and Ireland pledged $10 million.

Developing countries have made a renewed push to set up a mechanism for loss-and-damage payments after severe floods in Pakistan this summer that caused $30 billion in losses, according to World Bank estimates, killed more than 1,700 people and displaced 33 million residents. Sen.

Sherry Rehman,

Pakistan’s federal minister for climate change, said she is hoping for more resources from the U.S. and other nations to help her country.

U.S. negotiators are concerned the concept of loss and damage exposes wealthier nations to spiraling liability. There is also the scientific uncertainty of determining which effects can be tied to human-induced climate change and which are part of normal seasonal variation. However, U.S. climate envoy

John Kerry

said this week at the conference that he is open to discussing loss and damage.

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“We need more,” Ms. Rehman said in an interview. “What you hear everywhere at COP is ‘action now.’ Everything else is fluff.”

Mr. Biden arrived at the climate summit Friday after most world leaders have departed. He met privately with Egyptian President

Abdel Fattah Al Sisi

at the conference, located at a resort town along the Red Sea. The U.S. and Germany were expected to announce Friday a $250 million financing program to build 10 gigawatts of new wind-and-solar energy facilities in Egypt while decommissioning 5 gigawatts of inefficient natural-gas power plants.

The Biden administration’s efforts to curb methane emissions follow an agreement reached on the sidelines of the Glasgow summit a year ago, in which China and the U.S. pledged to work on reducing emissions of the gas. Beijing this week announced a plan to cut methane emissions but hasn’t yet included the new measures in its climate plans submitted to the U.N. 

Nigeria announced its first-ever regulations, including limits on flaring, to cut overall methane emissions by more than 60% over 2020 levels. Canada said Thursday it plans to cut emissions of methane from its oil-and-gas industry by more than 75% over 2012 levels by 2030. 

Emissions from flaring are far higher than previous government and industry estimates, according to an analysis of 300 wells in four states published in September in the journal Science.

The White House says 260 billion cubic meters of gas are wasted every year from flaring and methane emissions within the oil-and-gas sector. 

Under the 2015 Paris climate agreement, countries aim to limit global warming to well under 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels and preferably to 1.5 degrees. The gap between the emissions cuts pledged by 166 nations, including the U.S., and their current emissions puts the world on track to warm 2.5 degrees Celsius, or 4.5 degrees Fahrenheit, by the end of the century, according to a recent U.N. report.

White House officials point to Mr. Biden’s support of the Democrats’ climate, health and tax legislation that allocates hundreds of billions of dollars to climate and energy programs, including tax credits for buying electric vehicles and investments in clean technologies.

Administration officials said the legislation has helped put the U.S. on track to meeting Mr. Biden’s goal of cutting domestic emissions 50% below 2005 levels by 2030.

—Matthew Dalton and Scott Patterson contributed to this article.

Write to Eric Niiler at eric.niiler@wsj.com

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World

Biden aims to assert American leadership abroad at UN climate summit and G20

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Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt
CNN
 — 

It’s a story President Joe Biden tells at nearly every opportunity: last year, meeting his new counterparts at his first international summit, he proudly informed them, “America is back.”

“For how long?” one of them asked.

As Biden departs this week for a weeklong around-the-world trip, the question still resonates.

“They’re very concerned that we are still the open democracy we’ve been and that we have rules and the institutions matter,” Biden said Wednesday during a news conference.

Biden hopes his stops at a climate meeting here on the Red Sea, a gathering of Southeast Asian nations in Cambodia and a high-stakes Group of 20 summit on the Indonesian island of Bali will assert American leadership in areas former President Donald Trump either ignored or actively shunned.

“If the United States tomorrow were to, quote, withdraw from the world, a lot of things would change around the world. A whole lot would change,” Biden said ahead of his trip.

He and his advisers believe they are entering the series of high-stakes meetings with a solid argument his version of the US role in the world will endure. He resisted historical and political headwinds in this year’s midterm elections while many of Trump’s handpicked candidates lost. And over the past year, he secured passage of a major climate investment and rallied the world behind efforts to support Ukraine and isolate Russia.

Yet the anxieties of American allies persist over the future of US commitments – to Ukraine, to fighting climate change, to treaty partners and, perhaps most urgently, to upholding Democratic norms. Foreign diplomats have watched intently as the midterm political season played out, searching for clues at how the American electorate was judging Biden’s first two years in office and reporting back to their capitals on voter dissatisfaction that could fuel Trump’s return to office.

Republicans appeared to be moving toward gaining control of the House of Representatives as of Wednesday night. And Trump is readying a third presidential bid, potentially to be announced while Biden is on the opposite side of the planet.

White House aides have not voiced concern at the potential split-screen, believing foreign policy to be among the president’s strengths, particularly when compared to Trump’s chaotic style of diplomacy.

“We just have to demonstrate that he will not take power,” Biden said Wednesday. “If he does run, making sure he, under legitimate efforts of our Constitution, does not become the next president again.”

Presidents have often turned to foreign policy, where they can act with relatively few congressional restraints, at moments of domestic political turmoil. President Barack Obama launched a similar tour of Asia after his self-described “shellacking” in the 2010 midterms.

Four defining global threats will loom over Biden’s trip: Russia’s war in Ukraine, escalating tensions with China, the existential problem of climate change and the potential for a global recession in the coming months. Other flashpoints, like North Korea’s rapidly accelerating provocations and uncertainty over Iran’s nuclear program, will also factor in.

Of those, defending Ukraine and combating climate change could be the most impacted by results from this week’s election.

At the G20 summit, Biden hopes to rally leaders from the world’s developed economies behind his 10-month effort to isolate and punish Russia for its invasion of Ukraine. He isn’t planning to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin, who won’t be attending the meeting in person and is considering whether to participate virtually.

Global economic headwinds have tested international resolve for the pressure campaign, however, and world leaders have worked with varying levels of intensity toward finding a diplomatic end to the conflict.

Some Trump-aligned House Republicans have called for cutting funding to Ukraine, though other GOP defense hawks have vowed not to abandon the country amid its war with Russia.

House Republican Leader McCarthy, in an interview with CNN this week, attempted to reaffirm his support for Ukraine while saying they would not automatically rubber stamp any additional requests for aid.

“I’m very supportive of Ukraine,” McCarthy said. “I think there has to be accountability going forward. … You always need, not a blank check, but make sure the resources are going to where it is needed. And make sure Congress, and the Senate, have the ability to debate it openly.”

At the United Nations climate summit in Egypt, Biden arrives having signed the largest US investment in fighting climate change ever, a dramatically different scenario from previous international meetings – including last year’s gathering in Scotland – where American commitments to carbon reduction weren’t backed by law.

“We’ve seen the United States go from a global laggard to a global leader in less than 18 months,” a senior administration official said this week.

The $375 billion commitment will provide Biden leverage as he works to convince other countries to step up their own efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, all with the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

In his speech, Biden will call on nations to “really keep their eyes on the ball when it comes to accelerating ambitious action to reduce emissions,” the official said. And he will highlight his administration’s intent to propose a rule this week requiring large federal contractors to develop carbon reduction targets and disclose their greenhouse gas emissions, leveraging the federal government’s purchasing power to combat climate change in the private sector and bolster vulnerable supply chains.

But Republicans have said they will work to repeal parts of the law, and have accused Biden of contributing to rising energy prices by blocking the extraction of fossil fuels, which contribute to climate change.

When Trump was president, he withdrew the US altogether from the Paris Climate Accord, the agreement leaders are meeting to discuss the week.

Even absent the American political uncertainty, there are concerns rising energy costs and a looming recession could dampen resolve toward transitioning to cleaner energy. US officials have moderated expectations for this year’s summit, which Biden is only expected to attend for a few hours.

In Congress, Biden has achieved more bipartisan success in his efforts to counter China, the other major issue he will confront this week. A recently passed law meant to bolster the American semiconductor industry earned Republican and Democratic votes, partly because it promised to wean the US off its dependence on Chinese products.

Biden’s aides worked over the past month to arrange his first face-to-face meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping since taking office, even as tensions simmer between Washington and Beijing. The meeting will take place on Monday at the G20 in Indonesia. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit in August to self-governing Taiwan enraged Chinese leaders and led to a near-shutoff of communication with the US.

Biden said Wednesday he and Xi would lay out “what each of our red lines are” and discuss issues they each believe are in their own “critical national interests” during the meeting.

In his recently released National Security Strategy, Biden identified China as “America’s most consequential geopolitical challenge,” and he hopes an in-person meeting with Xi – who has just resumed international travel following the Covid-19 pandemic – can help establish lines of communication.

Xi arrives at the G20 fresh from an historic Communist Party conference that elevated him to an unprecedented third term – a sharp contrast to Biden’s current political situation.

It’s not yet clear how that disparity will manifest in Bali.

“The big question is are the two leaders going to come in a sort of more conciliatory mode or sort of a more defiant one,” said Matthew Goodman, senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

“They’ve both gotten through their political events of the year and they might come in a little more liberated for one reason or another to try to reach out and find common ground,” Goodman said. “There are the kind of global challenges that really affect both the US and China – whether it’s growth, or pandemics, or climate change. And so there’s possibility of some kind of conciliatory approach from both sides.”

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Business

Renault is betting the market for gasoline cars will continue to grow

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Renault sees the internal combustion engine continuing to play a crucial role in its business over the coming years, according to a top executive at the French automotive giant.  

On Tuesday, it was announced that the Renault Group and Chinese firm Geely had signed a non-binding framework agreement to establish a company focused on the development, production and supply of “hybrid powertrains and highly efficient ICE [internal combustion engine] powertrains.”

According to Renault, both itself and Geely will have a 50% stake in the business, which will consist of 17 powertrain facilities and five research and development centers.

Speaking to CNBC’s Charlotte Reed on Tuesday, Renault Chief Financial Officer Thierry Pieton sought to explain some of the reasoning behind the planned partnership with Geely.

“In our view, and according to all the studies that we’ve got, there is no scenario where ICE and hybrid engines represent less than 40% of the market with a horizon of 2040,” he said. “So it’s actually … a market that’s going to continue to grow.”

Read more about electric vehicles from CNBC Pro

The tie-up with Geely comes as Renault fleshes out plans to establish an EV spin-off called Ampere.

According to Renault, France-based Ampere “will develop, manufacture, and sell full EV passenger cars.” It’s eyeing an initial public offering on the Euronext Paris, which would take place in the second half of 2023 at the earliest, subject to market conditions.

During his interview with CNBC, Pieton touched upon the need, as he saw it, for different types of vehicles. “It’s very important to have, at the same time, the development of our electric vehicle business on one side — with Ampere — and to build a sustainable source of ICE and hybrid powertrains.”

This was why Renault was going into a partnership with Geely, he added, explaining the move represented “an absolute slam dunk” from a business and financial perspective.

This was because, Pieton argued, it created “a world-leading supplier of ICE and hybrid powertrains with around 19,000 employees in the world, covering 130 countries.”

Read more about energy from CNBC Pro

In comments sent to CNBC via email, David Leggett, an analyst at GlobalData, noted that automotive manufacturers could still enjoy profits from the sale of vehicles that used internal combustion engines.

“Margins are generally higher than on electric vehicles, which are relatively costly to manufacture,” he said.

“The gap will eventually narrow as EV volumes rise sharply and unit costs on major EV components fall significantly, but there is still much profitable business to be done on ICEs and hybrids and will be for some time to come,” he added.

“Manufacturers need to be flexible in their powertrain offerings according to market needs — which differ across the world.”

Renault’s continued focus on the internal combustion engine comes at a time when some big economies are looking to move away from vehicles that use fossil fuels.

The U.K., for example, wants to stop the sale of new diesel and gasoline cars and vans by 2030. It will require, from 2035, all new cars and vans to have zero tailpipe emissions.

The European Union, which the U.K. left on Jan. 31, 2020, is pursuing similar targets. Over in the United States, California is banning the sale of new gasoline-powered vehicles starting in 2035.

Such targets have become a major talking point within the automotive industry.

During a recent interview with CNBC, the CEO of Stellantis was asked about the EU’s plans to phase out the sale of new ICE cars and vans by 2035.

In response, Carlos Tavares said it was “clear that the decision to ban pure ICEs is a purely dogmatic decision.”

Expanding on his point, the Stellantis chief said he would recommend that Europe’s political leaders “be more pragmatic and less dogmatic.”

“I think there is the possibility — and the need — for a more pragmatic approach to manage the transition.”

 

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World

Ukraine’s Zelensky Sets Conditions for ‘Genuine’ Peace Talks With Russia

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Ukrainian President

Volodymyr Zelensky

said he was open to negotiations with Russia if they are focused on safeguarding Ukraine’s territorial integrity, compensating Kyiv and bringing to justice perpetrators of war crimes.

Speaking ahead of his address to a global climate summit in Egypt on Tuesday, Mr. Zelensky said late Monday: “Anyone who treats seriously the climate agenda should just as seriously treat the necessity of immediately stopping Russian aggression, resuming our territorial integrity and forcing Russia into genuine peace talks.”

Mr. Zelensky’s statement comes after the U.S., Ukraine’s key backer in its defense against Russia’s invasion, has urged Kyiv to publicly signal that it is open to talks with Moscow, to avoid alienating international opinion.

“One more time: restoration of territorial integrity, respect for the U.N. charter, compensation for all material losses caused by the war, punishment for every war criminal and guarantees that this does not happen again,” Mr. Zelensky said. “Those are completely understandable conditions.”

U.S. officials have said it is up to Ukraine to define the terms of any acceptable settlement. Many Western officials are skeptical that Russian President

Vladimir Putin

will be open soon to a settlement that involves Russian withdrawal from occupied regions of Ukraine—a key demand for Kyiv.

A building damaged by shelling in Shchurove, eastern Ukraine.



Photo:

Andriy Andriyenko/Associated Press

Since Mr. Putin said in late September that swaths of Ukraine’s east and south belonged to Russia, Kyiv has said it wouldn’t negotiate with Moscow until there is a different leader in the Kremlin. Mr. Putin’s insistence that Russia’s territorial demands are nonnegotiable, meanwhile, appears to leave little scope for talks at present.

“We’ve always made clear our readiness for such talks,” Russia’s deputy foreign minister,

Andrei Rudenko,

said Tuesday in comments carried by state news agency RIA. “From our side there are no preliminary conditions whatsoever, except the main condition—for Ukraine to show goodwill.”

Buoyed by recent battlefield successes, Ukraine has demanded that all occupied areas are returned to its control as a condition for any peace deal—including Crimea and parts of the eastern Donbas area that Russia seized in 2014.

Military realities will dictate how much of its internationally recognized borders Ukraine is able to restore, officials in Kyiv and Western capitals say.

Ever since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February, many Western governments have been skeptical about how much of its territory Ukraine can take back through fighting. Kyiv has sought to erase such doubts with offensives in eastern and southern Ukraine since late summer, which have made inroads, especially in the Kharkiv region.

Continued Western military and financial support is vital for Ukraine’s ability to advance, however. Many in Kyiv fear that a reduction in aid could scuttle Ukraine’s hopes of retaking occupied regions, forcing it into negotiations with a weak hand.

Ukraine also fears any cease-fire would allow Russian forces to regroup and that Mr. Putin would use talks to consolidate Russian control of occupied areas.

Kyiv officials continue to warn the West of the dangers of premature talks.

“What do you mean by the word ‘negotiations’? Russian ultimatums are well-known: ‘we came with tanks, admit defeat and territories loss.’ This is unacceptable. So what to talk about? Or you just hide the word ‘surrender’ behind the word ‘settlement’?,” Ukrainian presidential adviser

Mykhailo Podolyak

said Tuesday in a tweet.

As Russia suffers losses in Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin has made veiled threats to use nuclear weapons—a scenario that security experts still deem unlikely. WSJ looks at satellite images and documents to understand how the process of launching a strike would work. Photo composite: Eve Hartley

Widespread evidence of alleged Russian war crimes in places such as Bucha and Izyum, which Moscow has denied, has hardened Ukraine’s insistence of a full Russian withdrawal from its territory.

However, the global economic toll of the war and signs of fraying political consensus in Western nations are raising uncertainty about how long the U.S. and Europe will continue to back Kyiv’s position.

U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan has in recent months engaged in confidential conversations with top aides to Mr. Putin in an effort to reduce the risk of the war widening, while warning Moscow against using nuclear weapons against Ukraine, U.S. and allied officials said Monday.

The aim has been to guard against the risk of escalation and keep communications channels open, and not discuss a settlement of the war in Ukraine, the officials said.

Ukraine has continued to call for further arms deliveries from the West to protect its cities against Russian missile-and-drone attacks and help it recapture occupied territories.

A firefighter works at the scene of a damaged residential building in Lyman, eastern Ukraine.



Photo:

Andriy Andriyenko/Associated Press

Mr. Zelensky, in his comments late Monday, hailed the provision this week of the U.S.-Norwegian National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile System, or Nasams, and of Spanish-supplied Aspide air-defense systems, after weeks of Russian attacks that have caused substantial damage to Ukraine’s energy infrastructure and caused numerous blackouts in Ukrainian cities.

“The defense of Ukraine’s sky is obviously not complete, but gradually we are moving toward our goal,” Mr. Zelensky said. He added that Russia had hit 50 towns and cities across Ukraine with missile attacks on Monday, the latest barrage aimed at sapping Ukrainian morale as winter sets in.

Ukraine’s military offensive against Russian occupation forces in the south has slowed as both sides tire after weeks of fighting and as muddy ground in some areas makes advancing difficult for armored vehicles.

In the southern Kherson region, Russian-installed officials say they have almost completed a mass-evacuation campaign aimed at clearing the regional capital of residents in advance of their planned defense against advancing Ukrainian forces. Some elite Russian forces have left the city, Ukrainian officials say, and in their place Moscow has brought in newly mobilized soldiers tasked with holding the line if Kyiv’s forces reach the city.

A market in downtown Kyiv.



Photo:

Bernat Armangue/Associated Press

Western officials said Tuesday that Russia has begun constructing defensive structures near occupied Mariupol, a city deep behind the front lines in the country’s southeast that was captured by Russia in May after months of intense fighting that reduced much of it to rubble.

Russian occupation authorities in Mariupol are producing concrete antitank structures known as dragon’s teeth as part of efforts to reinforce the area, the U.K.’s Defense Ministry said Tuesday. Dragon’s teeth have also been sent to the regions of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, which Russia partly controls and now claims as part of its territory, the ministry said.

The reported construction of fortification lines far from areas of active fighting is evidence of a Russian campaign to shore up occupied areas as fortunes on the battlefield shift in Kyiv’s favor, Western officials say.

“This activity suggests Russia is making a significant effort to prepare defenses in depth behind their current front line, likely to forestall any rapid Ukrainian advances in the event of breakthroughs,” the U.K. Defense Ministry said.

People line up for soup, bread and hot food at a stand in Kyiv.



Photo:

Ed Ram/Getty Images

Write to Matthew Luxmoore at Matthew.Luxmoore@wsj.com and Marcus Walker at marcus.walker@wsj.com

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World

A former NBA champion is changing ‘how the world builds’ to fight the climate crisis

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London
CNN Business
 — 

Three years ago, a hurricane devastated the Bahamas, claiming dozens of lives. Today, the country is building what it claims to be the world’s first carbon-negative housing community to reduce the likelihood of future climate disasters and to ease the shortage of homes caused by the storm.

Rick Fox, a former Los Angeles Lakers player, is the lynchpin of the new housing project. The former basketball player and Bahamian citizen was spurred into action after he witnessed the destruction caused by Hurricane Dorian in 2019. Fox teamed up with architect Sam Marshall, whose Malibu home was severely damaged by wildfires in 2018, to develop Partanna, a building material that removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

The technology is being put to the test in the Bahamas, where Fox’s company, Partanna Bahamas, is partnering with the government to build 1,000 hurricane-resistant homes, including single-family houses and apartments. The first 30 units will be delivered next year in the Abaco Islands, which were hardest hit by Dorian.

“Innovation and new technology will play a crucial role in avoiding the worst climate scenarios,” Philip Davis, prime minister of the Bahamas, said in a statement. He is due to formally announce the partnership between the Bahamian government and Partanna Bahamas on Wednesday at the COP27 climate summit in Egypt.

As a country on the frontline of the climate crisis, the Bahamas understands that it’s “out of time,” Fox told CNN Business. “They don’t have time to wait for someone to save them,” he added.

“Technology can turn the tide, and at Partanna we have developed a solution that can change how the world builds,” Fox said.

Partanna consists of natural and recycled ingredients, including steel slag, a by-product of steel manufacturing, and brine from desalination. It contains no resins and plastics and avoids the pollution associated with cement production, which accounts for around 4%-8% of global carbon emissions from human activities.

The use of brine, meanwhile, helps solve the desalination industry’s growing waste problem by preventing the toxic solution from being discarded back into the ocean.

Almost all buildings naturally absorb carbon dioxide through a process called carbonation — which is where CO2 in the air reacts with minerals in the concrete — but Partanna says its homes remove carbon from the atmosphere at a much faster rate because of the density of the material.

The material also emits almost no carbon during manufacturing.

A 1,250 square foot Partanna home will contribute a “negligible amount” of CO2 during manufacturing, while removing 22.5 tons of CO2 from the atmosphere after production, making it “fully carbon negative within the product’s lifecycle,” according to the company.

By comparison, a standard cement home of the same size typically generates 70.2 tons of CO2 during production.

The use of salt water means that Partanna homes are also resistant to corrosion from seawater, making them ideal for residents of small island countries such as the Bahamas. That could make it easier for homeowners to get insurance.

The carbon credits generated from each home will be traded and used to fund various social impact initiatives, including promoting home ownership among low-income families.

Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated losses suffered by Rick Fox and Sam Marshall as a consequence of Hurricane Dorian and wildfires.

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World

COP27: What is ‘loss and damage,’ the climate summit’s key issue

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CNN
 — 

Aftab Khan felt helpless when torrential floodwaters submerged a third of Pakistan, his home country.

Khan’s hometown was completely underwater. His friend rescued a woman who had walked barefoot, carrying her sick child, through stagnant floodwaters for 15 miles. And Khan’s own mother, who now lives with him in Islamabad, was unable to travel home on washed-out roads to check if her daughter was safe.

“These are heart-wrenching stories, real stories,” Khan, an international climate change consultant, told CNN. “I was heartbroken.”

Pakistan became the clearest example this year of why some countries are fighting for a so-called “loss and damage” fund. The concept is that countries which have contributed the most to climate change with their planet-warming emissions should pay poorer countries to recover from the resulting disasters.

Earlier this year, Pakistan cooked under a deadly heat wave that climate change made 30 times more likely, according to the World Meteorological Organization. Now it is reeling from the aftermath of the worst floods in living memory.

The South Asian country is responsible for less than 1% of the world’s planet-warming emissions, but it is paying a heavy price. And there are many other countries like it around the world.

Loss and damage will be center stage at COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, this year, as low-emitting countries inundated with floods or watching their islands sink into the ocean are demanding that developed, high-emissions countries pay up for this damage.

But it’s been a contentious issue for years, as rich countries like the United States fear that agreeing to a loss and damage fund could open them up to legal liability, and potential future lawsuits.

Climate activists in developing nations and a former top US climate official told CNN time is running out, pointing to Pakistan’s cascading disasters as the clearest evidence why a dedicated loss and damage fund is needed.

The developing world is “not prepared to protect themselves and adapt and be resilient” to climate disasters, former White House Climate Adviser Gina McCarthy told CNN. “It’s the responsibility of the developed world to support that effort. Commitments have been made but they’re not being delivered.”

As a concept, loss and damage is the idea that rich countries, having emitted the most planet-warming gases, should pay poorer countries who are now suffering from climate disasters they did not create.

Loss and damage is not a new ask. Developing countries and small island states have been pressing for these kinds of funds since 1991, when the Pacific island Vanuatu first proposed a plan for high-emitting countries to funnel money toward those impacted by sea level rise.

It took more than a decade for the proposal to gain momentum, even as much of Vanuatu and other small island Pacific nations are slowly disappearing.

In Fiji, climate activist Lavetanalagi Seru’s home island, it has cost an average of $1 million to relocate communities because of sea level rise. Moving away from ancestral lands is not an easy decision, but climate change is having irreversible impacts on the islands, said Seru, the regional policy coordinator with the Pacific Islands Climate Action Network.

“Climate change is threatening the very social fabrics of our Pacific communities,” Seru said. “This is why these funds are required. This is a matter of justice for many of the small island developing states and countries such as those in the Pacific.”

A major reason this type of fund is contentious is that wealthy nations are concerned that paying for such a fund could be seen as admission of liability, which may trigger legal battles. Developed nations like the US have pushed back on it in the past and are still tiptoeing around the issue.

Khan said he understands why rich developed nations are “dragging their feet.” But he added that it’s “very important for them to empathize and take responsibility.”

There has also been confusion about its definition – whether loss and damage is a form of liability, compensation or even reparations.

“‘Reparations’ is not a word or a term that has been used in this context,” US Climate Envoy John Kerry said on a recent call with reporters. He added: “We have always said that it is imperative for the developed world to help the developing world to deal with the impacts of climate.”

Kerry has committed to having a conversation on a fund this year ahead of a 2024 deadline to decide on what such a fund would look like. And US officials still have questions – whether it would come through an existing financial source like the Green Climate Fund, or an entirely new source.

Kerry also sparked some controversy on the topic at a recent New York Times event, when in response to a question on loss and damage, Kerry seemed to suggest that no country has enough money to help places like Pakistan recover from devastating climate disasters.

“You tell me the government in the world that has trillions of dollars, cause that’s what it costs,” Kerry said at the event.

But others say the money is there. It’s more a matter of priorities.

“Look at the annual defense budget of the developed countries. We can mobilize the money,” Alden Meyer, senior associate at E3G, told CNN. “It’s not a question of money being there. It’s a question of political will.”

At COP27, the biggest debate will be over whether to create a dedicated financial mechanism for loss and damage – in addition to existing climate finance meant to help countries adapt to climate change and transition to clean energy.

After climate-ravaged nations called for a new loss and damage finance facility at COP26 in Glasgow last year, it’s likely it will be an official COP27 agenda this year. But even as wealthier countries like the US and EU nations have committed to talk about it, there’s not a lot of hope countries will emerge from Sharm in agreement about a fund.

“Do we expect that we’ll have a fund by the end of the two weeks? I hope, I would love to – but we’ll see how parties deliver on that,” Egypt ambassador Mohamed Nasr, that country’s main climate negotiator, told reporters recently.

But Nasr also tamped down expectations, saying that if countries are still haggling over whether to even put loss and damage on the agenda, they’re unlikely to have a breakthrough on a financing mechanism.

He said it’s more likely that the loss and damage conversation will continue over the two weeks of Sharm, perhaps ending a framework established for a financing mechanism – or clarity on whether funds might come from new or existing sources.

Some officials from climate-vulnerable nations warned that if countries fail to come to an agreement now, the problem will be much worse later.

“For countries not on the front line, they think it’s sort of a distraction and that people should focus on mitigation,” Avinash Persaud, special envoy to Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, told CNN. “If we had done mitigation early enough, we wouldn’t have to adapt and if we’d adapted early enough, we wouldn’t have the loss of damage. But we haven’t done those things.”

Correction: An earlier version of this story misstated how much money has been spent to relocate communities in Fiji because of sea level rise. It’s an average of $1 million per community, according to Lavetanalagi Seru.

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