"More than 50 countries will gather in Colombia to try to develop real-world timetables to phase out oil and gas amid global energy shocks and petrostate stalling."
"In an overheated and fractured world that’s lurching from one crisis to the next to feed its oil and gas addiction, collaboration toward an energy transition may seem unrealistic or even radical.
But more than 50 nations are gathering in Santa Marta, Colombia, today to start mapping out specific plans to phase out fossil fuels, going beyond the conditional global consensus on “transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems” reached at COP28 in Dubai. A lack of progress toward that goal spurred Colombia and the Netherlands to build a coalition of countries willing to move faster and farther.
Attending countries span a spectrum from influential fossil fuel producers like Australia, Norway, Brazil, Nigeria and Mexico to climate-vulnerable island nations including Fiji, Tuvalu and the Maldives, as well as Denmark, Spain and France and the European Union. Notably absent are the United States, Russia, China and major Gulf petrostates such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Offering a perspective from The Elders, a group of former independent world leaders that acts as a moral and ethical voice on issues of peace, justice and climate, former President of Ireland Mary Robinson described the conference as “a new multilateral space for a committee of doers … those who want to collaborate and usher out fossil fuels.”"
Bob Berwyn reports for Inside Climate News April 24, 2026.
SEE ALSO:
"Countries To Gather In Colombia For Summit Aimed At Breaking Fossil Fuel Reliance" (AP)
