347: Beyond COP: Can Brazil Chart a Path Off Fossil Fuels?

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Ana Toni (guest, CEO of COP30): We are in these planning sessions that we have in, in listening to key people. And obviously you are one of them to see your reactions and to hear others. But the four parts that we are looking at in planning, as I said, throughout the last weeks is first, obviously there are lots of things related to the negotiations that a COP30 or a COP30 will have to do. There is decisions on the MULTIRÃO that defines that we need to do. For example, the accelerator is something that we agreed to be discussed and led by COP30 and COP31. So this is one thing that we feel really important, has to do with accelerating implementation. So very pleased about that. There is also on the negotiation the Belém Mission 1.5 that has to do with ambitions of NDCs and OPs. So that's one bucket. The second one is the three roadmaps. Very important one. And I think is core of the work that we wanted to do. As you remember last year, the COP president, Andrea, had to deliver the roadmap on 1.3 trillion. We did deliver the report. The report came just before the COP. There is a lot of work to debate and mobilize support for how to mobilize 1.3 trillion. So we wanted to go deeper on that debate of 1.3 trillion. The fossil fuel roadmap, the big debate at COP 30 that we had. Again, Andre Correia do Lago did say in the last plenary that Brazil, COP 30 presidency, will do two roadmaps. The roadmap on fossil fuel, transitioning away from fossil fuel, and another one to combat deforestation and obviously forests. So we will be engaging everybody and we wanted to do that in a really collaborative manner, delivering those two new roadmaps. And the third bucket for us that was very important is adaptation. I think COP 30 was a turning point on the debate about adaptation, especially finance for adaptation. We wanted to deepen that debate, so adaptation will be key for us. And finally is consolidating the action agenda. The action agenda, we have reworked the action agenda and we really strongly feel now that we wanted to link the action agenda that was restructured into the six axis, with the climate weeks, for example, where we can have the climate weeks more and more relating to the globe stock take, perhaps using the same structure of the five-year plans that was agreed in COP 30 as a frame to organize and help us to dialogue during climate weeks. So, and we feel that this is the new agenda. I think COP 30 really helped us to move towards implementation, and I think the action agenda is at the center of that. So, those are the four big buckets. Each of them have a lot of details that we discussed as well. Christiana, one of them is how to do roadmaps. Everybody knows how to do big roadmaps, and roadmaps are something that's easy to do. So, we are discussing, that's why we had that conversation, what is the expectations of roadmaps, and especially the one on fossil fuel, that I know is a topic that you discussed so much, and how to go forward with that. And we do have some ideas at the moment, and as I said, discussing with others, on how now to do a roadmap that can be more than a document, but can be a platform to continue an ongoing debate that's overdue for us to start planning the transitioning away from fossil fuel.

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Christiana Figueres: How do you imagine that platform?

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Ana Toni (guest, CEO of COP30): At the moment, what we're thinking in that platform is obviously we do need a document that brings a lot of the ideas that are already out there. There's a lot of documents being produced every day on scenarios for that transitioning away. So how can we bring that knowledge together? But we feel that that document has to be done again in a collaborative manner. So obviously, we feel one of the areas is the systemic risks, and we needed a place to put all the systemic risks, not only the negative tipping points, but also the systemic risk related to finance and economics. We needed to look at it from the perspective of producing countries. What are the difficulties of producing countries? That they don't only depend on the fossil fuel for their own energy needs, they are exporters, they depended for financial and economic reasons. So what is the perspective and what are countries most ready to do the move, to transitioning away from a producer point of view? There is a perspective also of consumer countries. Consumer countries have different challenges. What are their challenges? What are the countries most prepared as consumers also to transitioning away, and what should be their next steps? For example, which type of investments they need to transition away? One point that I feel that we have not yet debated a lot as a group is what are the political strategies we have for transitioning away? We saw it in COP30, that debate, half of the countries wanted the language to be agreed, and another half not wanting that. Is that the UNFCCC the only place for the international governance on fossil fuel? You know the UN has never had an international energy agency, we only have the atomic agency under the UN. The debate about energy is scattered everywhere. But what are the other governance structures that we needed to look at to go ahead on transitioning away in a just, equitable and fair manner? So, looking at the first, economic challenges and financial challenges on transitioning away and look at the political challenges and opportunities, what are the places is something that I think we needed to have in a document to make that debate more mature from all the different perspectives.

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Tom Rivett-Carnac: I mean, I remember so well the ambition of the Brazilian COP presidency to get this language on fossil fuels and the big fight you had in the plenary. And of course, it was only two months ago, but it feels like years ago, given everything that's happened in between, not least the removal of President Maduro and the participation and the removal of the sitting president of another country. That symbolizes what is, of course, happening in the US, which is not only pulling out of multilateralism, but also doubling down on fossil fuels, which will create and embolden other producers. Do you still think that there is a pathway for a roadmap with broad participation on fossil fuels, given the changes since the COP?

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Ana Toni (guest, CEO of COP30): I mean, we said in every letter from the COP 30 president that is moving together by choice. We ended every letter saying we wanted to move ahead together, planning that change, because this is the only manner to be fair, actable, and just. And what we are seeing now is the opposite of that. So yes, we needed to explore exactly what are the options to move that together by choice, planning this transition. We do need to plan the transition rather than be expected just to react to the movement. So I think more than ever, Tom, we need to explore the different scenarios of a transitioning that is orderly, just and actable. And there is enough knowledge there for us to put together. And we start this discussion at COP30. We feel COP30 is now a platform that can continue that discussion. And obviously, together with COP31 and then COP32 and going forward, we need to have that discussion.

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Christiana Figueres: One thing that I know is very close to your heart on that topic, Ana, is the dependence of the global economy on fossil fuels, which is every day less. But it is not moving toward less fast enough. And if there was a lesson from the Venezuela kidnapping of Maduro, it is how deep that dependence on fossil fuels is actually determining politics and aggression. So, I would just love to invite you to speak a little bit more about that dependence on fossil fuels and how you are thinking of framing our transition away from fossil fuels through the lens of the risky dependence on fossil fuels.

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Ana Toni (guest, CEO of COP30): This phrase about dependence on fossil fuel came from President Lula at COP 28 already. At COP 28, President Lula said we needed to end our dependency on fossil fuel, and he repeated time and time again during COP 30. Since the summit, he was talking about how can we diminish our dependency on fossil fuel. So, what we are thinking on the road map and looking, as I was saying, as the first pillar being the document, when we look at from producers' point of view, consumers' point of view, economic, financial point of view, is with that goal. How can any country, being a producer, a consumer, or looking at the economic dependencies, how can we plan less dependency? This is absolutely key on the document. But also, people are not conscious about our own dependency on fossil fuel. We don't know how much we are all dependent on fossil fuel, on the way we transport, obviously many countries in terms of the electricity needs, but also in most of the equipment we have at home, plastic. And there are so many ways that all of us are dependent on fossil fuel, and that is not clear to people how dependent we are. And again, I think we have an opportunity using as a platform this year to communicate that dependency. I would love if we had, and I don't know if we have one, but to have a calculator of dependency on fossil fuel, so all of us, all companies, all institutions could measure how dependent are they on fossil fuel. Is this good or bad so each of us could have national plans and scenarios for less dependence? We could have also our own institutions, our own lives being less dependent on fossil fuel, because I truly believe and I think the Venezuela case is again show to us, that we had the whole thing about Venezuela and the price of oil has not changed because there is oversupply at the moment, and what is determining is the consumption. So we need to debate much more the consumption of fossil fuel, the dependence that we have. And again, I think that the economic dependence of countries is really important. We shouldn't underestimate that because some countries depend on their GDP on 70, 80 percent, or their exports depended so much on fossil fuel. And that needs to look at and to see what are the scenarios without that dependency.

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Paul Dickinson: And if I may briefly say that I've certainly spent more than 20 years and worked with Tom for some years, on a kind of repository certainly that describes company's performance in this area. And I think it's a very, very rich area. So we'd love to think, you know, as some other time, how we can kind of advance that. I wanted to say this vision you had of strengthening multilateralism before the COP, you know, we probably need the diplomatic vision and energy of Brazil more than ever in the year ahead given the other forces that are undermining multilateralism. But this brings me to a very practical question. Many, many thousands of people who listen to Outrage and Optimism. How do they practically get involved? Do they contact the Brazilian government? It's like a huge question, but I wondered very practically how people can kind of contribute to helping to fulfil the vision you've set out.

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Ana Toni (guest, CEO of COP30): At COP30, we brought this concept of multilateralism. And I think what COP30 shows is that it's not one process anymore, there are many. We cannot depend on one player. Just the opposite, I think the fight against climate change has become a collective effort. So they don't need to contact COP30 to the Presidency of the Brazilian government. They should go to their own cities and start asking their own mayors, how dependent is their cities, or their company, or their organizations on fossil fuel, what they can do to think about scenarios for them to become less dependent on fossil fuel. And do send to your repository or any other repository how people are doing, because now is obviously a moment of action. What is inspire people is action. So we need to move this needle bottom up and top down. We need it to come from all different sources. But I think will be a movement, these collective actions that we see will be the only way forward at this moment. Hopefully in COP 31, we will be able to move the needle internationally as well. Let us hope for that, but not just wait for that. Let us do what we can do at the level that each of us can do, be it as a CEO, be it a teacher, whatever people are. But we need to be conscious about our dependency. That's not the fault of anybody, it's the model of development. But now we need to be conscious about how we can diminish that dependency.

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Paul Dickinson: So to summarize, start where you are, use what you have, do what you can. But I love that framing, dependency scenarios, actions. Thank you.

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Christiana Figueres: And I would just like to bring you out a little bit, Ana, thank you for going a little bit into the roadmap of dependence on fossil fuels. The third roadmap on nature-based solutions, what emerging ideas do you have there?

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Ana Toni (guest, CEO of COP30): I mean, for what I understand from experts that we are contacting and learning from, in terms of the forest and deforestation, it seems there is much more international language already in the direction that we need to take. There is obviously now, again, on COP30 with the TFFF, there is a new movement to looking at economic instruments to help both deforestation, conservation and reforestation. You need different economic instruments for each of those three things. So it seems that in the area of the road map of the forest, deforestation and reforestation, there is much more debate and international agreed language to that. So we may be pulling things that are already there will help us going forward in a coordinated manner. And there are international organizations that are already working with that. So we'll be contacting those players to be working with us and see how can we move that needle off. But I think again, bringing back to being an era of implementation. I hope that through this now process that's starting COP33, now this platform that we'll be putting forward at COP31 and COP32, we can continue this debate about how. It's not any longer a question of if, it's a question of how we are going to diminish our dependency. And we need to be very practical about that. And we haven't been able yet to put some of the scenarios there that we needed, the political and economic one. So hopefully, that will be a contribution to the debate.

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Christiana Figueres: And it seems to me that the dependence question has two sides to it. One is, some countries' economy depends on the export of fossil fuels, but those are basically can be counted on two hands. But most countries depend on importing fossil fuels still. And therefore, the challenge there is how to begin to substitute that. And many countries have been moving over to renewables. But, for example, just to use the most striking case, so many Pacific Islands dedicate 20, 25, sometimes even 30% of their national budget to import fossil fuels, A, because of the cost of fossil fuels, but also because of the very expensive transport. And so that's the extreme case. And obviously, they're the ones that are most motivated to move over to renewables. But 80% of our world's population lives in countries that are importing fossil fuels. So that is the other side of the dependence question.

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Ana Toni (guest, CEO of COP30): Absolutely, absolutely. But even countries that depend, I mean, for example, France, that has an energy sector, as we know, they still depend on more than 50% of their energy on fossil fuel, although they don't produce anything. So it's again an economic issue. So it's not just the ones that are exporting that are dependent economically. It's just in terms of the cost to substitution is also big. And I'm not sure in how many countries the debate about diminishing the economic dependency, how many countries have involved their finance ministers? How many of them have involved the president of the central banks to debate those issues? So I think that debate has not yet, I mean, we have the circles of ministers of finance that we put together. G20, we start a little bit of that debate. But that link between the economic dependency and I would say it's not just of the producing countries. It's obviously much more for the producing countries. And there are not just a few of them. Unfortunately, there are many of them. And there are some that are mixed, like Brazil. Brazil is a big exporter, producer of fossil fuel and also is one of the most countries that most rely on renewable energy. Ninety percent of our electricity comes from renewable. So you have a mix. And understanding that mix, understanding each country and where they are and what could be that diminish. But it needs to be conscious that we all need to diminish our dependency, be it economic, be it energetic, be it by... Is that easier by sector? Is that easier by country? Those are the types of discussions. And why should be a taboo to discuss that?

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Christiana Figueres: Absolutely. Absolutely. Ana, thank you so much. Thank you so much. We look forward to the leadership of Brazil during this year and to much more, to taking the results of the COP really, as you say, to the implementation level in the ways that you have laid out, and many more, because I think there was a lot of residual enthusiasm that we saw at the end of the COP, that it really spread out so much enthusiasm for getting the work done. And I wouldn't say even despite the United States, I would say maybe even because of the United States withdrawal, I think there is a scenario, we will wait to see if this is true, that there can be a reaction in the opposite direction.

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Ana Toni (guest, CEO of COP30): And, Christiana, just one thought, I mean, again, reacting to Tom, that we were not able to get an agreement in Belém on the fossil fuel. But unfortunately, we haven't even seen countries putting forward agenda items on that topic throughout the history. I mean, for, again, everybody that have been following negotiations and you above, everybody knows that the negotiators love to know what's coming up. They don't like surprises. And that topic came at a late stage, perhaps. But now that we had had the debate, this unprecedented debate there, so hopefully some of the countries that supported that movement will be able to...

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Christiana Figueres: 80, you had 80 countries supporting that.

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Ana Toni (guest, CEO of COP30): Exactly, exactly. But let us see if any of them will suggest that as an agenda item and let us see how others will react to that. The consensus process takes time, unfortunately. And that's why now we needed to go with consensus, but also all the ways to move the needle faster in the implementation era. Thank you so much for having me here.

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Tom Rivett-Carnac: Nice to see you again, Ana.

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Paul Dickinson: Thank you, Ana. Thank you.

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Christiana Figueres: Thank you, Ana. I look forward to continuing to work with you.

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Tom Rivett-Carnac: Okay, so great to catch up again with Ana Toni and hear her reflections a couple of months on from the COP. Paul, maybe I'll start with you. What did you think of that discussion?

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Paul Dickinson: I mean, I just love the scale and the ambition of the Brazilian government. You know, how a nation can support a global movement and can really move people. Now, obviously, the key is sort of delivering the enabling frameworks, the approaches, the ideas, a kind of attitude around the world that I guess they're trying to stimulate. But, quoting Cristiana from before the interview, she's talking about innovating procedural development and opening a space for innovative procedure. The phrase I would use is projecting your dreams. I think Ana Toni and the Brazilian government are creating an enormous space, a blank piece of paper for us to do that. So I found that very exciting, a real tonic.

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Christiana Figueres: You know, what I thought was fascinating about our conversation with Ana Toni, that happened this week, so definitely after Christmas and after the US announces withdrawal from the UNFCCC, what I found fascinating is the absence of any referring to that. I mean, it's like it never happened. It is inconsequential to what Brazil is going to do. I just thought that was fascinating. Absolutely fascinating that, you know, they know what needs to be done. They have a plan. They're going to go forward and they're going to work with those who want to go forward. And I guess it will be left to the future COP presidencies to work with those who don't want to go forward or who don't even turn up. But I just love that attitude of, OK, who's in the party? Here we go. Let's roll up our sleeves and get it done. I just love that attitude.

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Paul Dickinson: Imagine there's like a meeting of the Coalition of the Willing and agenda point number one is, what do we think about the not willing? No, that's not agenda point number one. The Coalition of the Willing of what we're going to do.

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Christiana Figueres: Exactly. Exactly. I just love that.

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Tom Rivett-Carnac: Yeah, I completely agree with that attitude. And thank goodness that it's a country with such political heft and diplomatic ability as Brazil, right? If we had a different COP presidency, they may find it more difficult.

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Christiana Figueres: Costa Rica could have pulled off something like that.

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Paul Dickinson: Costa Rica, obviously.

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Christiana Figueres: I don't think so. I don't think so.

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Tom Rivett-Carnac: Just keep plowing a diplomatic path knowing that they're essential to the Chinese food supply chain and all sorts of other things. They've got so much hand in this. They've got so much power, which enables them to just keep saying, let's just move forward. And that's actually brilliant. And it shows the opportunity that comes from a year like this. So I really hope Ana's brilliant, Andre's brilliant, they're going to stay focused on this issue. They're going to keep trying to move us forward. And inevitably, as the year goes on, as you mentioned at the beginning, Christiana, the world will begin to pivot to the new COP presidencies in the form of Turkey and Australia. And I just hope they stay there, because they can have such a big impact. The president and presidency just stay there on the agenda and push and push, because I'm sure it will be frustrating and they won't get the things they want. And in some ways they've had their big moment in the sun and it may be hard to deliver new things. But actually, I think in a funny way, we might look back in a year's time and say, it was the year after the COP that they really were able to make progress by bringing coalitions together. So it'd be interesting, wouldn't it, to review that through the year. And that might be a new model of how you run a COP. You kick it off, you do what you can diplomatically, and then you really work throughout the year to put the coalitions together and deliver breakthroughs.

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Christiana Figueres: Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's what I was saying before, because going into the COP, you do have to work with all parties, the full multilateral panoply of countries. But after, you don't. You can just work with those who want to work. It frees up the presidency. It's fascinating.

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Paul Dickinson: I don't know if you know that phrase, the deer in the headlights. But I worked with somebody and they showed this graphic they've made of a deer, and there's a sort of light in the eyes of the animal when the car headlights catch it. And there were little faces of Donald Trump in the eyes of the deer. As if to say we've been caught in the headlights of this madness. But we're not deer, and this isn't a car approaching us. We're actually a great big world taking collective action to protect our children and future generations. And yeah, moving on, just moving on. That's the spirit of it.

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Tom Rivett-Carnac: Okay, and speaking of moving forward into 2026, obviously this week and last, we've talked very much about the engagement in the international process. We will keep touching on that throughout the year as we work our way towards the next COP, but we're also going to have a lot of programming that looks more practically at the progress we're making, how we can come together and deliver the outcomes we need this year. The three of us, together with our brilliant team, will be coming together to talk about delivering the outcomes this year, together in person next week, so very exciting. I know we've mentioned this before, but keen to receive your questions. We've had so many and we're going to do our best to get through them. It looks like it could be multiple episodes looking at that, and we'll put them out over the coming months. Please do send questions about 2026, about what happened last year, about the outlook for the coming year. We would be very pleased to receive them. I'm looking forward to seeing the two of you early next week.

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Christiana Figueres: Yay.

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Paul Dickinson: See you then and speak to you all soon enough. Bye for now.

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Christiana Figueres: Bye. Bye.