Eamon Ryan: Climate is an election issue — we can't give up on the world

The vast majority of Irish people understand the risk that climate change brings and want our politicians to step up to the mark

King Felipe VI of Spain being heckled by angry residents during his visit to Paiporta in the region of Valencia, eastern Spain, in the aftermath of devastating floods. We must build new financial architecture because we are all equally threatened. As we saw in Valencia, no place is safe, we are all on the same frontline. Picture: Manaure Quintero/AFP

The Cop29 climate negotiations in Baku in Azerbaijan this week were never going to be easy but they got far more difficult after the US elections. How do we get agreement to phase out fossil fuels when the largest polluter wants to drill on from here? How do we deliver a UN agreement when the biggest economy says it wants out? What do we tell our young people when they know we risk crossing climate tipping points, which will leave them living in an unstable, unsafe world?

These negotiations were always going to be tense because we must agree on how much financial support the wealthy countries will provide to the lower income ones. Those who have done least to cause the problem are already being hit most by climate impacts.

There was already a chance the talks could break down if developing countries felt the funding was not big enough, or if developed countries blocked progress until the contributor base was expanded to include countries such as China and Saudi Arabia. Not to forget that the ongoing atrocities in Gaza, Ukraine, and Sudan could poison any move toward international co-operation.

The EU was always going to have a pivotal role, in part because we’ve had the highest climate ambition but also because we’ve been the largest provider of climate finance to the developing world. Unfortunately, we now find ourselves in an uncertain position. The US can no longer be relied upon, and our competitiveness is being undermined by its lower fossil fuel costs and the fact that clean technologies are also now coming cheaper from the East.

Some political parties here in Ireland and in Europe are reducing their climate ambition because they sense the public is somewhat overwhelmed or has switched off from the issue.

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But side-stepping climate because it is not coming up on the doors, or because it is not seen as a vote-getter, is only going to cost us all in the end. 

The withdrawal of two key climate memos from our last Cabinet agenda was in my mind a political mistake by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. Their close association with the disinformation Michael O’Leary has been spreading only makes matters worse.

Real change is always hard to deliver, especially when it must happen here and now rather than at some point, somewhere else in the future. It is increasingly clear that political science often trumps climate science, which leads to a reduction in what politicians think we can do.

Vested interests use that faultline to spread doubt and dissent, which will protect their immediate bottom line but not our long-term future.

All is not lost, however, and we are not giving up.

The heart of our European economic strategy is still based around the Green New Deal the Greens have been promoting. At the latest EU energy and environment councils the question was again asked whether this decarbonisation agenda would be good or bad for European competitiveness.

We concluded that we are not going to power ahead by being better at burning other countries’ fossil fuels. Instead, delivering the clean energy economy quicker is the best way to give Europe an advantage over other markets, as it will be the only viable economy in the end.

Europe’s negotiating position in Baku is clear. We want to work with the small island states, the least developed countries, and the African Union to make sure we use this process to advance both development and climate action.

We recognise the real injustice whereby developing countries are not able to access capital markets or must pay interest rates four times higher than our own.

At a ‘pre-Cop’ negotiation in Azerbaijan last month, a representative of the African Union said to me that they want “fairness not freebies”. We need a negotiated text which commits to real reform of international financial institutions, such as the World Bank and the IMF. If we can match that with exploring new innovative sources of finance and provide sufficient private as well as public funding, then I think we can still get a deal over the line. Even if the Americans step aside.

Such a deal would be good for Europe in so many ways. It would help to reduce conflicts and forced migration and avoid new trade wars and protectionism, which is not in our long-term interest. By advancing standardised reporting and accounting regimes, we can monitor raw material and energy flows, so we get greater investor certainty and reduce the cost of capital for everyone. Such transparency is the key to building international trust and co-operation, which is what we lack most today.

This moment when America is considering pivoting away from the global role it has played for some 80 years could also prove to be the right time to modernise the international financial system. We have an opportunity to build new financial architecture which is fit for tackling this greatest battle of our time. We have the need to do so because we are all equally threatened. As we saw in Valencia and North Carolina, no place is safe. We are all on the same frontline.

I was very proud to be lead EU negotiator on climate finance at the last two Cops. We used that position to help to get a loss and damage fund established and make sure it targeted the most vulnerable countries.

This year, the Cop presidency asked me to take on another role, as one of the ministerial pairs who help with the negotiations. The job is a diplomatic one, to listen to what all the parties have to say on a range of issues. My Costa Rican colleague and I will have responsibility for the talks about climate adaptation, which is a red line issue for the least developed countries, because it is where finance is least available and most needed.

I think we have been given that responsibility because Ireland is good at providing adaptation finance. We lived up to our promise of doubling our climate finance over the last four years and we’ve spent our money well.

We have a tradition of helping to build up local leadership in any aid programme and have a cultural understanding going back decades of how development can work best.

The other reason we can hold our heads up high is that we are also starting to move from laggard into leadership status when it comes to reducing our own emissions.

That is thanks to a lot of positive changes the Irish people have taken up in the last five years — promoting more public transport and active travel, building out solar power and retrofitting our buildings, using less fertilizer on our farms, and restoring our peatlands in a just transition way.

With the Cop negotiations now taking centre stage, I think climate and nature will come back again as an election issue. People usually vote for what is important to them. I’m convinced the vast majority of the Irish people get the risk climate change brings and want our politicians to step up to the mark, because this is important for our children and their children’s future.

The next two weeks will tell a lot. We can’t give up on the world.

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