COP30 Dispatch: Keeping Climate Cooperation Alive

Catherine Osborn reports live from Belém.  
  
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Brazil Tries to Keep Climate Cooperation Alive  
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_By  **Catherine Osborn**, the writer of Foreign Policy’s weekly Latin America Brief._  
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| | BELÉM, Brazil—This humid Amazonian rainforest city is swarming with all the trappings of a United Nations climate summit except one: a U.S. negotiating team.  
  
Tens of thousands of participants from more than 190 countries and dozens of Indigenous groups are staging two weeks of meetings, protests, and negotiations during this year’s summit, known as COP30. Though no U.S. diplomats are present, Foreign Policy has seen a handful of conference-goers sporting white-and-green “Make Science Great Again” hats. California Gov. Gavin Newsom also made a defiant appearance on Tuesday.  
  
The annual climate conference, held this year in Belém, is the first since U.S. President Donald Trump returned to the White House and triggered the United States’ second exit from the 2015 Paris Agreement. This time, Trump has gone beyond withdrawing from international climate diplomacy and is actively working to undermine it. U.S. sanctions threats last month against envoys from countries on the verge of reaching a landmark deal to limit global shipping pollution succeeded in blocking the agreement.   
  
The threat of potential U.S. sabotage hangs over Belém, where countries are negotiating if and how they will speed up climate action. Trump’s pressure could give political cover to delegations that are already dragging their feet on climate issues for any number of reasons. Saudi Arabia, for example, moved in lockstep with the United States to torpedo the shipping pollution deal. U.S. proxies could act similarly at COP30.  
  
However, host nation Brazil watched this adverse political environment build for a year and hatched a plan to make progress in Belém in spite of it.  
  
A key pillar of Brazil’s approach to COP30 is what some climate strategists call “coalitions of the doing.” Rather than waiting for absolute consensus among U.N. member states, Brazil is moving in smaller groups to push action forward and emphasizing how climate action can lead to economic development...  
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China Is Already Pulling Ahead on the Next Energy Supply Chain  
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While the United States pursues a vision of energy dominance that centers on hydrocarbons, China is inching toward dominating yet another future energy supply chain. Key technologies to produce low-emission hydrogen are quickly becoming one of the latest frontiers for geoeconomic competition, and the United States may yet again fall behind.  
  
Often referred to as the “Swiss Army knife” of the energy transition, hydrogen is uniquely flexible. It can be produced from various types of resources, including natural gas and renewables...  
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**Tehran’s Residents Are Panicking as Taps Run Dry   
**Years of drought and neglect have left the city nearly unsustainable.  
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_By Nik Kowsar, Alireza Nader_  
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**5 Novelists on Their Favorite Climate Fiction   
**Sometimes, literature meets the moment better than diplomacy.   
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_By Amitav Ghosh, Jessi Jezewska Stevens, Megha Majumdar, Eric Puchner, Madeleine Thien_  
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**How China Became a Solar Power   
**Beijing’s green energy ambitions are fueling a global revolution.  
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_By Christina Lu_  
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**COP30’s Dangerous Omission   
**Brazil’s people-centered climate vision risks abandoning the most vulnerable.  
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_By Mauricio Vazquez, Habib Mayar_  
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**Why Extreme Weather Hits Southeast Asia So Hard   
**The Philippines has been battered by back-to-back typhoons.  
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_By Joseph Rachman_  
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|  **Tehran’s Residents Are Panicking as Taps Run Dry **Years of drought and neglect have left the city nearly unsustainable.  
---  
_By Nik Kowsar, Alireza Nader_  
---  
| |   
---  
|  **5 Novelists on Their Favorite Climate Fiction **Sometimes, literature meets the moment better than diplomacy.   
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_By Amitav Ghosh, Jessi Jezewska Stevens, Megha Majumdar, Eric Puchner, Madeleine Thien_  
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| |   
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|  **How China Became a Solar Power **Beijing’s green energy ambitions are fueling a global revolution.  
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_By Christina Lu_  
---  
| |   
---  
|  **COP30’s Dangerous Omission **Brazil’s people-centered climate vision risks abandoning the most vulnerable.  
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_By Mauricio Vazquez, Habib Mayar_  
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| |   
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|  **Why Extreme Weather Hits Southeast Asia So Hard **The Philippines has been battered by back-to-back typhoons.  
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_By Joseph Rachman_  
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#  Can Clean Energy Fix the Climate Crisis?  
  
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What will it take to accelerate the growth of clean energy? How will geopolitical competition play a role?  **Bill McKibben** will join FP Live for a wide-ranging conversation.  
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