Former United States vice president Al Gore has criticised the influence of oil and gas interests at the annual United Nations climate conference.
In impassioned remarks at the World Economic Forum gathering in Davos, Switzerland, Gore called for the COP climate talks to make supermajority decisions rather than requiring unanimous agreement as oil-rich countries frustrate the process.
Gore said on Wednesday during a session on climate action leadership that “we cannot let the oil companies and gas companies and petro-states tell us what is permissible. In the last COP, we were not allowed to even discuss scaling down oil and gas”.
He expressed concerns of the “appearance of the conflict of interest” of having the head of oil company Abu Dhabi National Oil Co – Sultan al-Jaber – as the next COP president.
Gore asked: “Are we going to be able to discuss scaling down oil and gas in the next COP or (are we) putting the oil industry in charge of the COP?”.
He asserted that “we’ve just decided to not even disguise” fossil fuel presence at COP anymore.
Gore added that fossil fuel industries were also responsible for stifling pro-climate legislation in the US and elsewhere.
But he noted some instances of positive climate action around the world in the last year, including the US Inflation Reduction Act and elections in Brazil and Australia that ushered in governments with stronger climate ambitions.
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