Andrew Forrest Goes On The Offensive At COP 28 – CleanTechnica

Sign up for daily news updates from CleanTechnica on email. Or follow us on Google News!

---

Andrew Forrest is the second wealthiest man in Australia. Known to all as Twiggy, he made his fortune in mining iron ore but has recently become a passionate — some might say ardent — advocate for replacing fossil fuels with renewables. He was one of the partners in the Sun Cable venture that wants to send renewable electricity from Australia to Singapore. He says his mining companies will be fossil fuel free by 2030. Quite naturally, that has brought him to the COP 28 climate conference in Dubai this week, where he is leading the effort to get an agreement that calls for phasing out fossil fuels.

Forrest is no shrinking violet, however. He has placed an ad simultaneously in New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Financial Times, Times of India, Australian Financial Review, and the Australian showing an ostrich with its head buried in the sand. The ad says in bold type, “Oil and gas, here is the science you’ve missed.” That could be considered a not so subtle dig at COP 28 president Sultan Al Jaber who said in a recent interview that there was no scientific basis for phasing out fossil fuels.

In an interview with The Guardian in Dubai, Forrest said COP 28 could have “enormous historic relevancy” if countries declared fossil fuels should be phased out, and not just “abated” through what he called the “old lie” of carbon sequestration. He addeds that the conference would be a “flop” if an agreement on that point was not reached.

“Look, I would have thought it’s unlikely that a call to phase out fossil fuel would get a lot of airplay because the petro-state and fossil fuel sector sent thousands and thousands of lobbyists here, and that is interesting. But what is more interesting for me is that the science is now cutting through and if people are saying they don’t know it, or they ignore it, then I do think they have blood on their hands.

“We need just a simple understanding that there’s only one question we should ask, which is: when are you going to stop burning fossil fuel? Any industrialist, any politician should receive that simple question. Not ‘what’s your net [zero] 2050 plan’ or ‘what is your going greener plan’, or any of that whitewash.”

A trained marine scientist, Forrest has this year given lectures focused on the increasing risk of “lethal humidity” — a level at which the human body struggles to cool down — and says he has lobbied the governments of big emitting countries to do something about it. This week, Fortescue published an open letter to “world leaders” signed by 60 scientists saying there was “scientific consensus that rising humidity and heat pose a serious and growing threat to humanity,” particularly in the heavily populated tropics and subtropics.

The letter and ads called for support for Forrest’s “positive power plan,” which calls for completely phasing out fossil fuels, replacing then with renewable energy, and introducing economic stimulants to encourage “green growth and transformation.” He said his goal in running the ads was “maintaining the momentum of truth” and “making sure that everyone understands that lethal humidity is upon us [and] it is killing people”.

“Over 3 billion people are exposed now. The time for excuses and prevarication is over. We have the solutions to phase out fossil fuel, and this is where we must go. If you say you can’t, then maybe you’re right — you can’t. But now’s the time for you to leave the stage and bring on someone who will.”

Forrest said as the founder, executive chairman and major shareholder of a company that had relied on fossil fuel energy to create wealth, he was “part of the problem.” He repeated a line he said he used during his lecture tour: “If you’re looking to put a head on a spike when lethal humidity really hits, well, start with mine. But don’t let off the other 999 who may not have acted as quickly as we have. I include myself in that because I’m not pointing the finger at everyone else, I’m saying I’m part of the problem too. But at least I’m changing.”

Fortescue now describes itself as the “world’s No 1 integrated green technology energy and metals company” and has set a target of eliminating its emissions entirely by 2030.

Forrest, Fortescue, And Green Ammonia

Andrew Forrest and Fortescue are in the business of extracting iron ore and shipping it to customers around the world. But Forrest is not content to use traditional ships that run on heavy bunker oil, so Fortescue has spent millions of dollars to convert a ship to run on green ammonia. The ship, complete with a bright green circle painted on its superstructure, has been renamed the Green Pioneer.

But it was not allowed into the harbor in Dubai. In fact, ammonia powered ships are not permitted in any of the world’s major ports and so while it is in Dubai, it is running on hydro-treated vegetable oil. Fortescue says the ship’s first ammonia fueled voyage is expected in February.

En route to Dubai, it stopped in Los Angeles but was denied entrance until Forrest got California governor Gavin Newsom on the phone. As Forrest told the Financial Times, Newsom then got on the horn and said, “If Dr Forrest wants to bring in a pollution-free ship into the Port of Los Angeles, I want it in, I want it in straightaway.” That’s the type of pressure which will come on, when solutions are available and people don’t act, Forrest said.

He is now on a mission to make green ammonia the fuel of choice for ocean going cargo ships. “If it was powered by fuels which are going to destroy this planet, destroy the future of your own children — diesel, bunker sea oil — then it’s ‘come on in, the water’s fine!’” he said. “‘Oh, no, a pollution-free ship? Stop right there, don’t come in!’”

Forrest and Fortescue CEO Mark Hutchinson say they will launch a 300 meter, 270,000 ton iron ore freighter fueled by green ammonia this decade. “it’s not optional, we have to do it,” Hutchinson said. Forrest intends to use his economic muscle to pressure the International Maritime Organisation and the ports to accept ships powered by green ammonia. “We will start calling out ports and regulated authorities if we don’t see really positive action within the next four months,” he vowed.

The Australian government’s climate change ambassador, Kristin Tilley, was on hand to welcome the boat to Dubai, and hailed it as “demonstration and evidence of what’s possible now. Fifteen years ago, it was a fantasy, it was someone else’s problem. Today we’re seeing vision and demonstration. In 15 years, that will be very clear delivery, progress, and near-achievement of what we’re aiming for,” she said.

“When I think about what government does, and the sort of meetings and discussions we sit in at the COPs, they’re in closed meeting rooms, no windows, talking about words, talking about plans. That stuff is really important, it’s what government does, but it’s nothing if we don’t actually see the evidence and the delivery that we do here today.”

Hutchinson said the prototype cost “tens of millions of dollars” to get onto the water, but that’s just a small part of the $6 billion Forescue plans to spend to decarbonize its business. “We did the same thing on the trucks and the trains. You build a prototype first, see if it works, doesn’t work. You try it again. This is our prototype. This is part of the capex we will spend on the decarbonization of the ships.”

Many large shippers, such as Maersk, are betting on green methanol to get their emissions down — at least in the short to medium term — but neither Hutchinson nor Forrest are buying it. With green methanol, “you’ve still got to release the CO2. So at the end of the day, even if it’s bio, you’re still releasing emissions into the atmosphere,” Hutchinson said. [My colleague Michael Barnard agrees about methanol but disagrees about green ammonia.]

Andrew Forrest was more forthright, as is his way. “E-methanol is like sustainable aviation fuel — it’s not a solution. We need massive scale energy for huge shipping, huge heavy industry. It’s not going to come out of competing with a food source. “It’s not going to happen. I mean, it’ll happen for greenwashing. But it won’t happen as a real solution. Real solutions are industrial — industrial scale ammonia production, industrial scale consumption, zero pollution.”

Australian climate change minister Chris Bowen toured the ship in Dubai this week and the US special presidential envoy for climate, John Kerry, is scheduled to headline an onboard event “to celebrate the beginning of the era of pollution free shipping” on December 8.

One can only wonder what the results of a climate conference headed by Andrew Forrest might be instead of one headed by an oil company chief executive.