The COP28 president who oversaw a world-first pledge for countries to transition away from fossil fuels this decade has said his firm will keep investing in oil, the Guardian reports. In an interview with the newspaper, Dr Sultan Al Jaber, who heads the state Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), says: “My approach is very simple: it is that we will continue to act as a responsible, reliable supplier of low-carbon energy, and the world will need the lowest-carbon barrels at the lowest cost…At the end of the day, remember, it is the demand that will decide and dictate what sort of energy source will help meet the growing global energy requirements.” Al Jaber argued his oil was “low-carbon” because it is “extracted efficiently and with less leakage than other sources”, the Guardian adds. He also said his investment plans were viable with the 1.5C Paris Agreement limit, the Guardian says. He tells the paper: “The world continues to need low-carbon oil and gas and low-cost oil and gas. When the demand stops, that’s a completely different story. What we need to do right now is to decarbonise the current energy system, while we build the new energy system.” A second Guardian story reports that climate scientists have said that the lack of a clear reference to the need to “phase out” fossil fuels in the COP28 is “devastating”.

Elsewhere, the Financial Times reports that the price of carbon fell to its lowest level in 14 months on Thursday “after traders were unconvinced that the agreement struck at COP28 would lead to meaningful action by governments on the climate”. Bloomberg reports that the new UN carbon market, aimed at channelling climate finance to poorer nations, has been left in “limbo” after negotiators at COP28 failed to agree on standards. The outlet says: “The EU led a push against recommendations on the functioning of the mechanism at the meeting in Dubai, arguing stricter norms are needed to ensure its environmental and social integrity. The lack of a deal means a delay in launching the programme, which would allow companies to compensate for some pollution at home by investing in projects in developing countries to cut emissions or remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.” In an article for the Conversation, Dr Susannah Fisher from University College London says that COP28 “kicked the can down the road” when it came to agreeing on more finance for adapting to climate change.

In more positive news, the Guardian reports that conservation groups are pleased that the COP28 package does more to recognise the interlinks between climate change and nature loss than any other COP. Inside Climate News also reports on this, noting that ministers signed a first-of-its-kind joint statement on “climate change, nature and people” at the sidelines of the summit. [Carbon Brief’s soon-to-be-published piece on COP28 outcomes for food, land and nature will have all the details.] Politico reports that US green groups see “new leverage” for ending new oil and gas projects across the states after US special climate envoy John Kerry was among countries calling for a total “phase-out” of fossil fuels at the summit. 

Many UK publications report that the government has scrapped plans for a large-scale trial of hydrogen for home heating in Redcar, a seaside town in northern England, following local backlash. The Times says: “Northern Gas Networks wanted to supply about 1,800 homes in Redcar with clean-burning hydrogen in place of natural gas, switching over the gas in their pipes in 2026. But the plan had attracted local protests and the government said on Thursday that ‘ministers have decided not to proceed with a hydrogen trial in Redcar’. The government claimed the reason was that ‘the main source of hydrogen will not be available’, although it appears that this is only because of a simultaneous government decision not to award funding to the BP project that would have supplied it.” Plans for another large-scale trial of hydrogen for home heating in Ellesmere Port, a port town in northern England, had already been scrapped in July after strong local opposition, the Times adds. The Daily Telegraph reports that the government also said when making the announcement: “We continue to recognise the role that hydrogen could play in home heating and we will decide in 2026 whether, and if so how, hydrogen will contribute to household heat decarbonisation.” [The UK’s Climate Change Committee (CCC) sees hydrogen for home heating playing a minimal role in the journey to net-zero.] The Guardian and the Financial Times also have the story.

Elsewhere, the FT covers a report from the foreign affairs select committee that warned that “decades of inaction in policymaking to ensure access to critical minerals has left the UK vulnerable to China’s dominance of raw materials”. The FT also reports that the UK government has signalled it will not step in to help France’s EDF fund Hinkley Point C after its Chinese partner CGN halted payments.

Meanwhile, the Daily Telegraph has a highly misleading article titled: “Net-zero to cost global economy trillions of pounds, OECD warns.” [The article quotes OECD figures on expected GDP losses from cutting back on coal, oil and gas, without acknowledging the rising effect of costly climate impacts on GDP or the potential that new fossil fuel projects will become “stranded assets” as the world moves to net-zero.] A government spokesperson tells the Daily Telegraph that the figures do not “capture the full economic benefits of net-zero”.

The Times reports on a monthly oil update from the International Energy Agency (IEA) that says growth in global oil demand is slowing “drastically” as high interest rates weigh on the economy. The newspaper says: “Output curbs by the Opec+ [Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries] alliance of major producers, led by Saudi Arabia and Russia, have done little to prop up prices in the face of record-breaking supplies from other producers including the US, Brazil and Guyana.” The Financial Times reports that curbs from Opec+ mean that the alliance “now controls barely half of global oil production”. The FT says: “The watchdog added that the sway of Opec+ over the market could fall further next year, because increases in production by non-members are expected to be enough to meet the entire rise in global demand forecast for 2024.” Elsewhere, BBC News reports that Russian energy giant Gazprom earned £39m from its gas field in the North Sea last year. Sir Ed Davey, leader of the Liberal Democrats, tells BBC News that it is “totally unacceptable” that gas from UK territory is supporting “Putin’s illegal war against Ukraine”.

A number of outlets report on how China featured at COP28. China’s Wuhan University and the Kampala-based East African International University signed an initiative at COP28 that aims to “monitor the forest carbon sinks in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo with the help of satellite remote sensing and laser radar technologies”, reports the state-run newspaper China Daily. The state-run website China.org carries a commentary by Hannan R. Hussain, a foreign affairs commentator and recipient of the Fulbright award, who writes that China and the US “play a critical role in driving up consensus on energy transition needs and help balance competing expectations of developing and developed economies”. China Energy Net reports on the agreement that “has been reached on the issue of fossil fuels”, which officially brought “the curtain down of the COP28”. Chinese industry outlet BJX News writes that the attitude conveyed by the Chinese delegation at COP28 was “conducive” for China to achieve “dual carbon” targets and “promote energy transition, as well as developing renewable energy”. Then, it adds, opportunities will grow for “China’s wind power, solar enterprises to go [into the global] market”.

Meanwhile, Chinese business outlet Caixin quotes Li Bo, a deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), as saying that “countries should hike carbon prices significantly to curb global warming”. China Daily reports that Laurent Bardon, first counsellor for climate action and environment at the EU delegation to China, said that “CBAM [the EU’s carbon border adjustment mechanism] was not designed as a trade tool, as a protectionist tool, it was genuinely designed as a climate tool”, at a session in response to “concerns” on CBAM. The counsellor adds that it is “only a temporary transitional phase and our colleagues will meet Chinese industries to discuss and listen to their concerns and take them into account”.

Another Caixin article quotes Ma Weihua, a member of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals impact global steering group, as saying that the “green transition has created new strategic industries” that will grow to become a “new paradigm” for development and revitalise the global economy. Finally, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reports that domestic demand falls short of being able to fully accommodate the increasing supply of new electric vehicle (EV) batteries and solar panels. “In the words of industry insiders, [the industry has] become too ‘involuted’…[which denotes] a process in which additional input cannot produce more output,” the outlet says.

Guardian environment editor Fiona Harvey has a long read on how the final moments of COP28 helped to shape the headline outcome of countries agreeing to “transition away from fossil fuels”. She writes: “Not long before the crucial final meeting of COP28 climate summit, a seemingly chance meeting took place in the heavily guarded VIP lounge next to the main conference hall in Dubai. John Kerry, the US climate envoy, and Sultan Al Jaber, the COP28 president, exchanged warm greetings with Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman Al Saud, the energy minister of Saudi Arabia. It was only a brief encounter, but it sealed a crucial understanding. Saudi Arabia, the blocker for 30 years of attempts to include fossil fuels in international climate agreements, was not going to stand in the way of this one. Just 24 hours earlier, according to insiders, Al Jaber faced fierce pressure from the Saudi delegation to water down the text. Now, for the first time, the archetypal petrostate would allow a global commitment to be made to ‘transition away’ from fossil fuels.” The article examines how different country groupings and civil society organisations have been left feeling pleased and disappointed by the final outcome in Dubai.

Elsewhere, the Washington Post has an editorial saying that delegates at COP28 are “working hard” to convince people the summit was a success, but this may be “hard to convey” to the rest of the world. It says: “The takeaways from the UN affair for the average citizen of the world: Countries are not on track to hit the global climate targets they set in previous summits; these targets are not enough to prevent warming in excess of 1.5C above pre-industrial averages, the ostensible goal; everybody will propose new targets in a couple of years. Yet the conference’s conclusions on how to make progress from here are so vague that their promise seems empty.” Elsewhere, analysis by Washington Post columnist Ishaan Tharoor says a “key” issue with the summit was the decision not to agree to a fossil-fuel phase-out. He says: “This is not simply semantic gymnastics, it points to the reality of myriad countries scaling up their fossil fuel activities even while working toward decarbonising their economies.”

In addition, Le Monde explores whether the COP28 agreement is “historic or an empty shell”. The Guardian recounts the “winners and losers” from the summit. Axios examines what comes next for fossil-fuel companies after the agreement. And Bloomberg releases a podcast exploring the “hard part” after COP28 – making sure the words agreed are implemented. 

A new study finds that the extensive seagrass meadows in the coastal Bahamas may store up to 590m tonnes of organic carbon in the top metre of sediment, “representing a substantial global blue carbon hotspot”. Using samples from 10 seagrass meadows across the Bahamas, researchers determine the carbon content of the coastal sediment and estimate the accumulation rates. They determine an accumulation rate of 2.1-2.9m tonnes of carbon annually. However, the amount of organic carbon in the sediments has decreased since 1980, “suggesting disturbance of seagrass ecosystems, likely caused by tourism and maritime traffic activities”, they write.