The world’s leading oil exporter has become the most forceful opponent of a new agreement at the U.N. climate summit, according to people inside the talks.

The Saudi delegation has flatly opposed any language in a deal that would even mention fossil fuels — the oil, gas and coal that, when burned, create emissions that are dangerously heating the planet. Saudi negotiators have also objected to a provision, endorsed by at least 118 countries, aimed at tripling global renewable energy capacity by 2030.

  • a4ng3l@lemmy.worldEnglish
    75·
    11 months ago

    Is there a legitimate reason why « we » globally care about their opinion ?

    • Sanctus@lemmy.worldEnglish
      461·
      11 months ago

      The Saudis own entire economies. They aren’t even listed on the world’s richest people because they own the mechanism that those people operate in.

    • TurboDiesel@lemmy.worldEnglish
      371·
      11 months ago

      They’ll just start funding more terrorist organizations and attacks à la 9/11. The Saudis are no one’s friends and the world would do well to remember that.

    • Hyperreality@kbin.social
      23·
      11 months ago

      They produce a lot of oil, they can easily influence oil prices, and thereby influence elections.

      Piss off the Saudis, they reduce output, prices go up, idiots everywhere vote for the other guy who’s willing to suck their dick.

      Eg. 2022 US midterms they used oil as a weapon against the democrats, losing them the house.

      • a4ng3l@lemmy.worldEnglish
        8·
        11 months ago

        True but eventually there will be an alternative to oil and that day they can go back to trading camels. There power is relatively new and won’t last. It’s so weird to piss everyone off in the meantime.

        • anlumo@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          11 months ago

          The concept of money is built in a way that once you have a lot of it, it doesn’t go away any more.

      • hh93@lemm.eeEnglish
        3·
        11 months ago

        One more reason for renewables so sucking the dicks of dictators can’t help you win elections as easy as that

          • a4ng3l@lemmy.worldEnglish
            22·
            11 months ago

            Iran? What’s the deal with them? They seem rather tame compared to a lot of other shitholes.

            • xmunk@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              2·
              11 months ago

              Saudi Arabia is western aligned because they oppose Iran - Iran has always been viewed as more dangerous to America… ever since they kicked out the British backed Shah in 1979.

              There’s also oil, but both countries had oil… but one stayed a monarchy while the other became a theocracy and then kind of democracy. Instead of supporting the democratic transition away from a theocracy America, of course, backed the monarchy.

              If that doesn’t gel with your expectations about America and spreading freedom and whatnot bear in mind… Kissinger.

              • anlumo@lemmy.worldEnglish
                1·
                11 months ago

                Monarchies are way easier to control than democracies, so this isn’t surprising.

                You can see that with Russia, it took them an ungodly amount of money and decades of propaganda to take over the Western democracies.

    • silence7@slrpnk.netOPEnglish
      5·
      11 months ago

      The rules on the talks require consensus, and the president of the talks is an oil executive from another petrostate and likely to interpret a requirement for consensus as a requirement for unanimity