By Njeri Irungu,
November 29, 2025.
COP30 ended with familiar language about progress, perseverance and multilateral cooperation, but behind the polished diplomatic phrasing lay a harsher truth: the world’s premier climate summit has once again fallen dramatically short of what the moment demands. With global temperatures now surpassing the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit, the consequences of failure are no longer theoretical. They are unfolding in real time, reshaping communities, ecosystems and entire economies.
From extreme droughts and deadly heatwaves to catastrophic flooding and collapsing coral reefs, climate impacts are accelerating across every continent. Scientists warn that critical Earth systems — including the Amazon rainforest and the massive ice sheets of Greenland and West Antarctica — are edging dangerously close to irreversible tipping points. The window for preventing runaway climate disruption is no longer narrowing. It is almost shut.
Yet COP30 concluded without securing the single most essential commitment needed to avert catastrophe: a global agreement to phase out fossil fuels. Saudi Arabia and several Arab states, emboldened by the Trump administration’s position, blocked any language pointing to a fossil fuel phaseout. Wealthy nations once again avoided pledging real financial support — offering loans instead of grants — for vulnerable countries that must adapt to extreme impacts or shift to renewable energy despite having contributed least to the crisis.
For years, these disappointments were met with patient frustration. Diplomacy is difficult, after all, and global negotiations require compromise. But the time for such sympathy has run out. Incremental gains at the margins cannot disguise the deeper reality: a small group of nations, enriched and hardened by fossil fuel profits, continues to hold the global future hostage. The consensus model at the heart of the UN process is buckling. And pretending otherwise only delays the reckoning humanity needs.
Historically, the climate movement has often drawn its greatest strength from moments of collapse. The failure of Copenhagen in 2009 helped spark the fossil fuel divestment movement and the mass mobilizations that built political momentum for the Paris Agreement. In the United States, the Green New Deal push — which ultimately shaped the landmark 2022 Inflation Reduction Act — emerged from public disillusionment during Donald Trump’s first term, fueled by youth activists demanding urgency. Again and again, real transformation has taken root only after the façade of progress fell away.
That is why naming COP30 as a failure is not pessimism — it is necessary clarity. Honest outrage is the fuel required for renewal.
Two major global efforts now stand poised to channel that momentum. The first is the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty, inspired by the treaty that halted the nuclear arms race. Its goal is straightforward: stop new fossil fuel development immediately, phase out existing production fairly, and fund a just transition for workers and communities. Support for the treaty is surging. Over 100 Nobel Laureates, thousands of faith leaders, more than 100 major cities and 850 elected officials globally have endorsed it. Nineteen countries — including Pacific Island nations, Caribbean states, Pakistan and Colombia — have publicly embraced the call. Colombia will host its first international conference on phasing out fossil fuels this April, a milestone expected to draw major moral and political attention.
The second movement gaining force is the push to Make Polluters Pay. Campaigners worldwide are crafting legal and legislative tools to force fossil fuel companies to compensate communities for the damage they have caused. A related effort, Stop Paying Polluters, seeks to end the staggering US$3 million per minute in fossil fuel subsidies. In an era of deepening inequality and shrinking social protections, these demands offer a clear ethical alternative: instead of relying on reluctant wealthy governments, redirect the industry’s vast profits to the countries suffering the worst climate impacts.
No one expects the world’s major oil and gas producers to abandon extraction overnight. But the path forward has never depended on their sudden moral awakening. It depends on mass public pressure — the kind that arises when people stop accepting empty declarations and start demanding accountability.
So as discussions turn to climate change in the weeks ahead, speak plainly: the UN process is failing. The threat is real, immediate and existential.
Then join the work that must now follow, because clarity about failure is not the end — it is the beginning of the fight for a new path forward.
