Dr. Vidhura Ralapanawe’s Post

🌍 Spotlight on Azerbaijan: COP29 and the Green Transition 🌍 This week, all eyes are on Azerbaijan, as it hosts the United Nations' COP29 Climate Conference in its capital, Baku. Here's why it’s so significant: 🔹 Historic Significance: Azerbaijan is a key player in the global oil industry, with Baku being the birthplace of the world’s first oil fields in 1846. 🔹 Green Transition: Despite its reliance on oil and gas, Azerbaijan aims to transition to greener energy solutions, including hydropower, solar, and wind power. 🔹 Challenges: Critics argue Azerbaijan’s efforts may amount to greenwashing, pointing out the country’s ongoing fossil fuel expansion and lack of real action on climate change. 🔹 Geopolitical Influence: Azerbaijan is also a major energy supplier to Europe, especially in the wake of the Ukraine crisis. 🔹 Public Scrutiny: While the country plans to ramp up renewable energy, it faces significant human rights concerns and environmental issues linked to its fossil fuel industry. #ClimateChange #COP29 #Sustainability #GreenEnergy #Azerbaijan #FossilFuels #RenewableEnergy #ClimateSummit

COP29 is starting next week in Azerbaijan, a country that is a cradle of oil extraction, a country sandwiched between Iran and Russia (the two countries at war!) Not sure much can be expected, and results could be similar to COP28 held in UAE, the oil producing country. With Trump back and who is not a strong advocate of renewable energy, he could back-out again from the Paris agreement of 2015. https://lnkd.in/gh6WyBUf https://lnkd.in/g2-n3REj #sustainability #cop29 #climatechange

We are two days until #COP29, with hopes of negotiation on climate finance and new collective quantified goal(NCQG), national adaptation plans, growing the loss and damage fund, phasing out of fossil fuels, amongst others. A report from BBC News has broke out of a senior official at COP29 Azerbaijan who has used his role to arrange a meeting to discuss fossil fuel deals 👇 https://lnkd.in/db9GqkrE This is coming at a time when we are clamoring for transitioning to clean energy and the phasing out of fossil fuel, in our community greatly impacted 👇 https://lnkd.in/dJXRZw82. This conference aims to solve the climate crisis and transition away from hydrocarbons in a just, orderly, and equitable manner. What is the hope of our community that has been greatly affected by the fossil fuel companies and have sent us to represent and speak on their behalf? Should we call COP29 a failed one going by this report and the breach of the code of conduct for COP29? What are your thoughts?

https://lnkd.in/eJpdFtJt The COP29 may follow similar disappointing pattern as COP28 for the expansion of fossil energy production. The incoming president of the COP29 UN climate summit in Azerbaijan told AFP on Friday that his country would keep increasing fossil fuel production "in parallel" with investments in cleaner alternatives. The roadshow to justify oil and gas investments and delay the net zero continues. #COP28 #COP29 #oilandgas

"GOD GIVEN GAS" It was verging on the criminally negligent for Azerbaijan to be given the honour of hosting COP29 and that chicken is already coming home to roost. We already had a complete mockery of the COP process unravel in Dubai when the president of that COP said there was no science to suggest phasing out fossil fuels will limit global warming to 1.5C and then there were the reports of fossil fuel company meetings going on in the background of the conference. Now we have the president of Azerbaijan asserting that COP29 won’t stop his county investing in ‘God-given’ gas. COP29 will be car crash. It will further the aims of the fossil fuel industry and push us back into the dark ages. Azerbaijan intends to profit from the war in Ukraine and 'help out' Europe by supplying us with more gas. This is ludicrous when the issues with malevolent control over energy supplies are evident to everyone and SHOULD be resulting in a deep dive into renewables. Fossil fuel energy resources are totally controlled by the countries in which they are based. We, in Britain, have again and again squandered our chance to lead in renewable energy. We have ignored our biggest most reliable source Tidal Power even though a Government Study has concluded this area could produce 20GW of power in the UK - at this precise moment as I write this post that is nearly 60% of our entire current energy usage and 3GW more than all our renewable energy production! It is also reliable and predictable and will 'keep the lights on' when the wind is not blowing and the sun is not shining. In Britain we must lead the way. We need to invest and innovate in tomorrow's technologies. We need to lead the new clean industrial revolution and become not "a superpower" in only "clean energy" but "THE superpower" in all of tomorrow's technology - ALL of it! We can do this but need to move decisively, as advocated by The Climate Party, bringing forward our net zero target by decades and galvanising the entire economy to win this race, grow a trade surplus into the 2030s and 2040s and give hope, optimism and prosperity to British people. Dale Vince Greg Jackson Toddington Harper Greg Skinner Ben Goldsmith Paul Dickinson John Caudwell Chris Stark Dr Victoria Hurth Paul Behrens Professor Chris Rhodes Nick Molho Ben Dear Julia Davies Paul Bodnar Rupert Labrum Jerome Muscat Steff Wright Charlie Giblin #renewableenergy #GreatBritishEnergy #ClimateElection #generalelection #tidalenergy #tidalpower #tide #wycombe #highwycombe #conservative #labour #greenparty #climateparty https://lnkd.in/ebsPau9U

My experience at COP29 Azerbaijan - explained in detail in illuminem Link to the article: https://lnkd.in/dfgVYb_s 1) Overall, it was an immense learning experience for me to attend the COP29 as an appointed delegate by Society for Low Carbon Technologies. I got the opportunity to meet several energy and climate experts, attend multiple side events and relish the winds of Baku, made it a wholesome journey. 2) For someone who belongs to the Global South, it is disappointing to learn that the developed countries have once again failed us in terms of providing financial support to make our energy mix greener and cleaner. 3) This underscores the need to continue to stress upon and infuse the concerns of the Global South in what is an otherwise Eurowestern centric debate - something that is my personal mission. #cop29 #climate #climateaction #financing #climatefinance #baku #oil #gas #trump #policy #netzero #greentechnology

🌍COP29 chief exec filmed promoting fossil fuel deals A senior official at the COP29 climate conference in Azerbaijan allegedly arranged discussions on fossil fuel investments. A secret recording reveals Elnur Soltanov, the chief executive of Azerbaijan's COP29 team, talking about "investment opportunities" in the state oil and gas company with a man posing as a potential investor. "We have a lot of gas fields that are to be developed," he stated. Critics have condemned his actions as "completely unacceptable" and a "betrayal" of the conference’s mission. Learn more: https://lnkd.in/eeizD36a #COP29 #ClimateAction #FossilFuels #Sustainability

As the UN climate summit kicks off in Baku, #Azerbaijan, its leader has vowed to move "towards a green agenda" while exploiting oil reserves deemed "a gift from god". Rick Spence gives us a primer on an authoritarian petrostate that is stepping into the spotlight as host of #COP29. Azerbaijan leaders were also recently exposed in an undercover investigation by Global Witness for using their COP leadership position to facilitate meetings with oil and gas producers. #climatecrisis #oilandgas #fossilfuels https://lnkd.in/duT8mpBP

COP29: Report reveals just 1% of 1,200 UNEP methane alerts triggered action #bne #bneEditorsPicks #COP29 #bneGreen #methane #ESG #ClimateCrisis #Azerbaijan Just 1% of 1,200 notifications on major methane leaks delivered to governments and companies in the past two years by a high-tech detection system were responded to, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) has revealed at the COP29 climate summit. Scores of countries around the world are leaking an alarming amount of methane into the atmosphere from oil and gas activities and other operations, such as landfills, delegates to the event in Azerbaijani capital Baku were reminded. The frustration for scientists battling the climate crisis is that many “super-emitter” zones, including in three countries located just across the Caspian Sea from Azerbaijan—namely Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Iran—could be tackled relatively cheaply and easily if all obstacles to international cooperation on the issue were removed.

While the world is increasingly aware of the climate change scam, the #COP29 meeting is taking place in Baku in the total indifference. During this event, one of the hosts from the local oil company was caught off guard, telling the world that Azerbaijan's goal is to continue increasing oil and gas production. https://lnkd.in/g-8ijFnS