U.N. climate conference in Azerbaijan puts petrostate in the spotlight

A pumpjack looms over dozens of small hillside buildings, large buildings and a tall spire visible above them in the distance

By Emma Burrows

Nov. 9, 2024 7:53 PM PT

The spotlight is on Azerbaijan as the small petrostate in the South Caucasus prepares to host the U.N.’s biggest climate conference, which opens Monday.

Diplomats from around the world are descending on the capital, Baku — a birthplace of the oil industry — for COP29, the annual summit on how to avoid increasing threats from climate change.

The world’s first oil fields were developed  in Baku in 1846, and Azerbaijan led the world in oil production in 1899.

Sandwiched between Iran to the south and Russia to the north, Azerbaijan is on the Caspian Sea and was part of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1991. Azerbaijan exports mainly oil and gas, two of the world’s leading sources of planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions. President Ilham Aliyev described the resources in April as a “gift of the gods.”

Aliyev is Azerbaijan’s authoritarian leader. The son of the former president, he has been in power for more than two decades, overseeing a crackdown on freedom of speech and civil society. Authorities would not grant the Associated Press permission to report in the country ahead of the conference.

Aliyev has said it is a “big honor” for Azerbaijan to host the conference. He has also said he wants his country to use more renewable energy at home is so that it can export more oil and gas abroad.

In Baku, the signs of fossil fuel addiction are everywhere

In metal cages next to Azerbaijan’s Aquatic Palace sporting venue are pumpjacks — a sign says they extract just over 2 tons of oil a day. Others pump away elsewhere, sucking up oil in view of one of Baku’s religious and tourist sites, the Bibi-Heybat Mosque, which was rebuilt in the 1990s after it was destroyed by Bolsheviks almost 80 years ago.

Aliyev said he sees Azerbaijan’s selection to host COP29 as “a sign of respect” from the international community and a recognition of what the country is doing around green energy.

Some of those plans involve developing hydropower, solar and wind projects in Karabakh, a region populated by ethnic Armenians before most fled to Armenia after a lightning military offensive by Azerbaijan in September 2023.

Aliyev said in a speech in March that his country is in the “active phase of green transition” but that “no one can ignore the fact that without fossil fuel, the world cannot develop, at least in the foreseeable future.”

Mukhtar Babayev, Azerbaijan’s environment minister and former vice president of the state energy company Socar, will serve as conference president for the climate talks. Babayev said in April he wants this “oil and gas country of the past” to show the world a green path with its efforts to ramp up renewable energy, especially wind power.

He said he believes this COP summit must build on  last year’s agreement  to transition away from fossil fuels and pave the way for countries to come together in 2025 for beefed-up and financed plans to clamp down on heat-trapping gases.

But some observers doubt those commitments.

Multiple organizations say Azerbaijan’s talk of renewable energy amounts to greenwashing — giving the impression that the country is doing more than it is to combat climate change.

Claims of greenwashing and civil society crackdowns abound

While many countries including the United States and last year’s host, the United Arab Emirates, grapple with the challenges of transitioning away from fossil fuels, Azerbaijan has historically not been proactive in that regard, said Kate Watters, executive director at Crude Accountability, which monitors environmental issues in the Caspian Sea region.

Environmental monitoring in Azerbaijan is dangerous, she said, referencing a crackdown on civil society that has seen people detained and has effectively snuffed out any real opposition.

There’s no effective mechanism in Azerbaijan for locals to ring alarm bells about exposure to pollutants from the oil and gas industry, Watters said. She referenced health issues such as rashes and sicknesses that residents may experience living near the Sangachal oil and gas terminal, just outside Baku, but indicated that their concerns are not heard.

Azerbaijani government officials did not respond to numerous requests from the Associated Press for comment.

Babayev, the environment minister, has pointed to Azerbaijan experiencing higher-than-normal temperatures, saying he wants states to come together to improve plans to stop the emission of gases that contribute to global warming. But his country has been criticized for failing to clamp down on exactly that.

Analysis from Global Witness, a nonprofit organization, found the volume of gas flared at oil and gas facilities in Azerbaijan has increased by 10.5% since 2018.

Gas flaring is a major source of soot, carbon dioxide and methane emissions, contributors to global warming. Flaring takes place when excess gas released by oil drilling is burned off rather than collected. Human rights groups and investigative journalists have blamed the practice for some of Azerbaijanis’ health issues, including around the Sangachal terminal.

“We’re heading into a COP where even the host isn’t bothering to do the basic functions of climate diplomacy,” Louis Wilson, head of fossil fuels investigations at Global Witness, told AP.

The Paris climate agreement requires countries to submit plans to combat climate change. Azerbaijan’s latest update, in 2023, was rated “critically insufficient” by a group of climate scientists in September. It’s expected that the country will submit an updated plan this year.

Amid war, Europe turns to Azerbaijan for gas

Azerbaijan owns Shah Deniz — one of the largest gas fields in the world — and BP announced in April the start of oil production from a new offshore platform in the Caspian Sea.

The nation’s natural resources have transformed it into a geopolitical player, and Baku has said it will increase its fossil fuel production over the next decade.

Before Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Moscow supplied some of 40% of Europe’s natural gas through four pipelines. Most of that was later cut off.

That meant opportunity for Azerbaijan: The European Union struck a deal later that year to double its imports of Azeri gas to 20 billion cubic meters a year by 2027. But it’s not clear whether Azerbaijan can meet that demand, and there are disagreements over the terms of the deal.

“The more renewable sources we have, the more natural gas we will save,” Aliyev said in March, calling such saved fuel “an additional contribution to the Southern Gas Corridor” of pipelines from the Caspian Sea to Europe.

Officials in Azerbaijan have argued that it is unfair to criticize Baku for producing more fossil fuels when there is a demand for them across Europe and as national governments endeavor to keep fuel prices low for citizens.

Azerbaijan’s hosting of COP29 will turn the spotlight on the nation, which makes most of its money from selling fossil fuels — but it may also highlight Europe’s — and the world’s — continuing dependence on them.

Burrows writes for the Associated Press.