The EU Will Back a COP31 Pledge to Electrify. It Will Not Say the Power Must Be Clean

The European Union will support the headline energy pledge of COP31, three diplomats have told Politico. The promise, drafted by the Turkish and Australian hosts, is to raise electricity's share of global energy use to 35 per cent by 2035. The share today is about a fifth. Until Monday a handful of member states were still holding out. Some objected because the pledge does not say the electricity has to be clean. Others did not want a new international number while the EU's own energy argument is unfinished. The diplomats, speaking anonymously about a private discussion, said a consensus has now been reached. They also said the formal act of support still has to pass further bureaucratic steps before it is official.

That gap is the story. Countries that want faster climate action have argued in Antalya that electrification only counts if the new power comes from sources that do not add to the warming. Governments that want room for coal and gas prefer a target that counts the kilowatt and stays quiet about the fuel. The wording unveiled in September took the second path. An EU consensus to sign it does not rewrite the sentence. It means the bloc has decided, for now, that a number without the word clean is a number it can live with. Britain's argument at home is the same argument in a smaller room. Louise Haigh is expected on Wednesday to cut the 2030 electric-car share from 80 per cent to about 60. A mandate with a lower number is still a mandate. A pledge that does not name the fuel is still a pledge. Both will be described as ambition by the people who drafted them.

Erdogan, Guterres, and the wars next door

President Erdogan met UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres on the sidelines in Antalya on Tuesday. The Turkish account of the meeting put Iran and the war in Ukraine at the front of it. Erdogan said Turkey was working with countries in the region to stop a further escalation between Tehran and Washington, and that Ankara was ready to support diplomacy aimed at ending the fighting in Ukraine. Gaza, Cyprus and Libya were also on the list. He said preparations for the summit were complete and that he hoped Antalya would be a turning point on the climate. The leaders' meetings proper are due on Wednesday and Thursday. The technical argument over the pledge is what the officials are doing while the leaders' planes are still in the air.

Ukraine's water, and Dublin's Friday

Ukraine is at the summit with its own pavilion for a fifth time, under the title Ukraine Is the Solution. The exhibit is built around water: the Black Sea that joins Ukraine and Turkey, rivers damaged in the war, the destruction of the Kakhovka reservoir, and the practical work of restoring systems under fire. Officials have scheduled more than 70 events, from decentralised energy to demining and the marine environment. President Zelensky set the delegation on 6 November. It is led by Oleksandr Kravchenko, minister of economy and environment. Kyiv's three tests for any climate text are territorial integrity, money for recovery, and technical help. Ukrainian campaigners want Russia blocked from counting occupied Ukrainian land in its emissions inventory. A climate document that treats occupied ground as ordinary territory would, in their argument, launder a military fact into a greenhouse-gas table.

On Monday this newspaper filed the opening with a second half that is still true on Tuesday. EU leaders meet in Dublin on Friday and Saturday, and they have not yet agreed who speaks for the Union on Ukraine. American officials said on Tuesday they would seek what they called a final end to the war, beginning with trilateral talks in Abu Dhabi. Monday's edition had those talks down for Wednesday. The American description this morning is of a first substantive negotiation getting under way this week. Dublin's other clock is the public sector strike, still set for Thursday unless the pay talks close it. Antalya has a pledge that is almost signed and a war that is not. The electricity target will be easier to agree than the question of who is allowed to speak for Europe when the talks turn, as they keep turning, from kilowatts to the battlefield.