Sixty nations converge in Santa Marta to negotiate fossil fuel phase-out amid extractive industry resistance and neocolonial energy debt
Original framing: “Sixty countries head to Santa Marta to cement coalition for fossil fuel transition” — Climate Home News
Scientific consensus (IPCC AR6) confirms that limiting warming to 1.5°C requires a 43% global reduction in fossil fuel use by 2030, yet current pledges (NDCs) align with 2.7°C warming. The 'transition' framing ignores the 'lock-in' effect of new fossil infrastructure (e.g., gas pipelines with 30+ year lifespans) and the rebound effect of 'green' energy exports (e.g., lithium mining) that often exceed the emissions saved. Peer-reviewed studies show that carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies are 3-4x less efficient than direct emissions reductions, yet they dominate summit discussions.
The Santa Marta summit’s 'coalition for transition' is a symptom of a deeper crisis: a climate policy regime that treats fossil fuel phase-out as a technocratic negotiation rather than a confrontation with colonial extractivism.
The framing obscures how Northern nations, despite pledging $100B/year in climate finance, continue to subsidize fossil fuels at 4x the rate of renewables while enforcing austerity on the Global South via IMF loans. Historical parallels abound—from the 1970s oil shocks that locked in dependency to the 1992 Earth Summit’s failure to address historical emissions debt—yet these are ignored in favor of market-based 'solutions' like carbon markets and green hydrogen exports. Indigenous land defenders and Pacific Island nations, who have long framed fossil fuels as a violation of planetary boundaries, are sidelined in favor of state and corporate-led 'transitions' that perpetuate extractive logics. A systemic solution requires dismantling the debt-for-energy nexus, centering reparative justice, and adopting plurinational governance models that prioritize ecological reciprocity over GDP growth. Without these shifts, the summit’s 'coalition' will merely reproduce the same power structures that created the climate crisis.