This Week’s U.N. Climate Conference Is a Depressing Sign of the Times

More broadly, it is unclear whether there is any bandwidth in the troubled political present for the type of bold environmental action COP was always meant to encourage. Lula has repeatedly invited Trump to attend the summit, but the American president has not deigned to offer a public response. As CNN’s Andrew Freedman recently noted, the U.S. hasn’t just “estranged itself from official international climate negotiation processes.” It has also put “pressure on trading partners to water down or reject climate commitments.”

Meanwhile, the summit itself is unfolding amid a surge of climate disinformation. Over 1,770 fossil fuel lobbyists attended COP29, a contingent larger than all but three national delegations. In response, COP30 will feature a new Global Initiative for Information Integrity on Climate Change, led by Brazil, to counter the flood of falsehoods and defend the integrity of climate science. In doing so, the Lula government has subtly linked the fight against climate misinformation to a broader political argument about the rise of the far right worldwide. Of course, as if to prove the point, the Trump administration has positioned the defense of fossil fuel interests as a central element of both its domestic agenda and its broader geopolitical strategy. Countries like Brazil trying to push the world to engage on climate issues are not dealing with indifference from Washington but a forceful coordinated push in the opposite direction.

The global consensus around fighting climate change is fraying elsewhere too. Scrambling to reach a new climate change target ahead of COP, European ministers agreed this week to cut emissions 90 percent by 2040 but weakened the plan by allowing foreign carbon credits and delaying a new carbon market until 2028. This compromise would reduce the emissions cuts that must happen within Europe itself and slow the pace of structural change. It signals exhaustion rather than resolve. This is not encouraging for anyone hoping that COP30 can recharge global climate ambitions. Ultimately, it takes collective effort to make these kinds of summits into more than a stage for virtue signaling from countries with the means and will to attend. Buffeted by genocide, trade wars, institutional uncertainty, and military quagmires, the world doesn’t seem overly focused on what’s happening in the Amazon. Those who profit from environmental decline are surely overjoyed.