--- title: What Sultan Al Jaber's Oil Lobbying Means for COP28 description: Al Jaber has used his position as COP28 president to lobby for oil deals. That makes his job leading the U.N. climate talks much harder. canonical: https://time.com/6340659/sultan-al-jaber-oil-lobbying-cop28/ author: Justin Worland article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2023-11-29T15:31:16.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-24T16:45:46.410Z article:section: Climate og:title: What Sultan Al Jaber's Oil Lobbying Means for COP28 og:description: Al Jaber's role as president of the U.N. climate talks just got a lot more difficult. og:url: https://time.com/6340659/sultan-al-jaber-oil-lobbying-cop28/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc7ccea8093544f41/698a42cadb29875218269995/sultan-al-jaber-cop28-climate-president-oil-lobbying.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: UNFCCC SB58 Bonn Climate Change Conference og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: What Sultan Al Jaber's Oil Lobbying Means for COP28 twitter:description: Al Jaber's role as president of the U.N. climate talks just got a lot more difficult. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc7ccea8093544f41/698a42cadb29875218269995/sultan-al-jaber-cop28-climate-president-oil-lobbying.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # What Sultan Al Jaber's Oil Lobbying Means for COP28 > Sponsored content. 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It reaches 40,000 subscribers with a 34.2% open rate and a 2.1% click rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I follow the energy transition as a business story? Future Proof covers climate and energy as an economic and business story rather than only an environmental one. It publishes every Friday and is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who writes Future Proof? Justin Worland, a senior correspondent at TIME and an award-winning climate journalist, writes Future Proof. #### Is Future Proof free? Yes. Future Proof is free at time.com/newsletters.  by [Justin Worland](https://time.com/author/justin-worland/)  ## Justin Worland Senior Correspondent Nov 29, 2023 3:31 PM UTC  Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, President-Designate of the UNFCCC COP28 climate conference and CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, speaks at a side event at the UNFCCC SB58 Bonn Climate Change Conference on June 8, 2023 in Bonn, Germany. Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, President-Designate of the UNFCCC COP28 climate conference and CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, speaks at a side event at the UNFCCC SB58 Bonn Climate Change Conference on June 8, 2023 in Bonn, Germany. Sascha Schuermann—Getty Images  by [Justin Worland](https://time.com/author/justin-worland/)  ## Justin Worland Senior Correspondent Nov 29, 2023 3:31 PM UTC Alarm bells sounded earlier this week for observers of this year’s U.N. COP28 [climate](https://time.com/section/climate/) conference following the revelation that oil CEO Sultan Al Jaber had used his position as president of the talks to push his company’s fossil fuel interests. Leaked slides, [published by the BBC](https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-67508331), show his talking points for meetings with climate envoys from other countries that include offers to develop oil and gas projects. For some, the report was a realization of their greatest fears. In their view, [Al Jaber](https://time.com/collection/time100-climate/6333127/sultan-al-jaber/) is using the climate platform to disguise a dirty, polluting agenda. For others, it was shocking but not surprising. Al Jaber is, after all, the CEO of the state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), and continues to oversee the 3 million barrels of oil the country produces every day. In the past, outrage over Al Jaber being appointed to lead COP28 has led to calls for him to resign from that role, which he has summarily rejected. Now, of course, with the international conference kicking off on Nov. 30, it’s too late for such a move. But that doesn’t mean the revelation doesn’t matter. The unyielding criticism—intensified by the latest news—has placed Al Jaber and his team under enormous pressure to deliver a deal at the talks that acknowledges the urgency of cutting fossil fuels, including oil and gas. A failure to do so would not just spell trouble for efforts to address climate change but also for the whole United Nations climate process. To make sense of the hubbub over Al Jaber’s talking points, it’s helpful to understand the role of COP president and how Al Jaber has approached it. Every year, the country hosting the U.N. climate talks designates an official from its own government to serve as COP president. These figures are typically government ministers, but they are meant to put aside their own national interest to find mutual agreement between the nearly 200 countries that participate in the talks. It’s because of the impartial nature of the role that Al Jaber’s promotion of national interest—in this case fossil fuel deals—has triggered such an outcry. **Read more:** [_What Happens When You Put a Fossil Fuel Exec in Charge of Solving Climate Change_](https://time.com/6335225/sultan-al-jaber-cop28-interview/) In my conversations with Al Jaber ahead of COP, he sought to underscore that his role is to push countries to come to an agreement, not to issue edicts. “I will be calling on all parties to engage in a collaborative manner, and to propose a solution,” he told me. “I will not be dictating.” And yet as COP president he has significant sway to decide whose views to prioritize. Any single country can veto the deals that emerge and deciding who to listen to on particular elements of negotiation can pose a gargantuan task—one that often leaves delegates disappointed. We’ve seen this play out before. Two years ago, at COP26 in Glasgow, then-COP president Alok Sharma, who had served as U.K. Secretary of State for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy, made a decision in the final hours of COP to replace language referring to a “phase out” of coal to language referring to a “phase down” at the insistence of China and India. Other countries were not given a chance to respond before the deal was gavelled in, and Sharma was left to apologize through tears for the way the change occurred. The drumbeat of criticism on Al Jaber may not have led him to resign, but it certainly has created pressure on the COP presidency to prove that it isn’t acting to favor the UAE’s oil and gas business. To do that, Al Jaber will have to thread a difficult needle, moderating not just the UAE’s interests but also those of influential oil-rich countries like Saudi Arabia that are keen to limit the scope of language seeking to phase out fossil fuels. In September, I asked Al Jaber about the stream of criticism pointed at him. “I am genuine in addressing this,” he told me. “If you don't want to believe me, all they have to do is just wait until the COP happens. And only then I will show them.” The opportunity to make good on that is now upon us. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/6340659/sultan-al-jaber-oil-lobbying-cop28/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/6340659/sultan-al-jaber-oil-lobbying-cop28/"},"headline":"What Sultan Al Jaber's Oil Lobbying Means for COP28","datePublished":"2023-11-29T15:31:16.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-24T16:45:46.410Z","description":"Al Jaber has used his position as COP28 president to lobby for oil deals. 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