Report shows how little fossil fuel giants have helped the energy transition

Every year, United Nations member states gather together at the Conference of the Parties, better known as COP, to negotiate international climate agreements and assess global progress toward emissions reduction. The 30th annual COP will begin November 7 in Belém, Brazil, a city of about 2.5 million on the edge of the Amazon. Depending on who you ask, COP is either the world’s best attempt to date at collective climate action or a massive forum for greenwashing: At last year’s COP29, the human rights NGO Global Witness found that oil and gas lobbyists significantly outnumbered negotiating officials from the 10 countries most threatened by climate change.

“We genuinely believe that COPs have been co-opted by the fossil fuel industry, to such an extent that we’re seeing thousands of lobby