Nations committed to fossil fuel exit to gather in Santa Marta as new climate diplomacy takes shape

The world’s first conference dedicated to ditching fossil fuels kicked off in Santa Marta last Friday with three days of dialogue among activists, scientists, Indigenous communities and local governments. On Monday, civil society organisations will deliver their demands to government delegates at the People’s Assembly, ahead of a high-level ministerial segment running from Tuesday through Wednesday.

The conference, co-organised by Colombia and the Netherlands, was announced in the aftermath of a botched Cop30 climate summit in Belém, where oil producers refused at the last minute to back a fossil fuel transition plan despite past commitments.

A new kind of multilateralism

Invitations went to 98 nations on the basis of their demonstrated commitment to moving beyond fossil fuels responsible for heating the planet. Around 56 will be attending, from oil-rich Canada and Norway to climate frontline states like Tuvalu, whose existence is threatened by rising seas. Coincidence or not, the US, China, Russia, India and Saudi Arabia are not attending. Neither are the battalions of fossil fuel lobbyists who’ve turned Cops into networking events.

“We are not going to have boycotters or climate denialists at the table,” Colombian environment minister Irene Vélez-Torres told The Guardian.

The format of the conference is a stark departure from the UN’s traditional model. With major powers increasingly flouting the international order, countries are searching for ways to regroup and push ahead on their common goals, even if it means sidelining the spoilers.

The US-Israeli war with Iran has also upped the stakes. Disruption to the Strait of Hormuz has rocked energy markets and given clean energy advocates a new argument – fossil fuel dependence isn’t just a climate problem, it’s a security one. Whether that’s enough to compensate for the absence of some of the world’s largest emitters will be a defining question.

Focus on solutions

The meeting aims to map out concrete pathways toward a fossil fuel phase-out. The co-organisers will draft an outcome report, though, unlike in typical negotiation, will not put it to a vote to avoid any blocking tactics. The conclusions are expected to also feed into November’s Cop31 summit in Turkey.

A new scientific panel, launched on Saturday, will also help countries build that roadmap. “With emissions yet to peak, another El Niño on the horizon, and the prospect of overshooting the 1.5°C limit coming closer and closer, it has never been more important that leaders demonstrate that sensible, sustained and informed decisions on climate action can make a difference in people’s lives for the better,” said Johan Rockström, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and one of the panel’s conveners.

Beyond Santa Marta

Campaigners are also pushing for the conference to lay the diplomatic groundwork for a fossil fuel non-proliferation treaty — a binding agreement to halt new coal, oil and gas extraction while phasing out current production in a just manner.

The proposal has broad backing from civil society and international organisations, including the World Health Organization. But government support has been slow to follow. Only a few dozen nations, mostly small island states with the most to lose, have thrown their weight behind it. That may be shifting. Colombia became the first major oil-producing nation to join in 2023.