Developing countries cannot realistically abandon fossil fuels without greater access to affordable financing and technology to support their transition to cleaner energy, Türkiye’s energy chief said Thursday as the country hosted U.N. climate talks.
“Access to technology, access to affordable finance are the key things. Without that, to tell the people you don’t need to consume coal, you don’t need to consume other fossil fuels, it doesn’t make any sense,” said Energy and Natural Resources Minister Alparslan Bayraktar told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
“We need to produce this electricity. We would like to make it with renewables. We would like to make it with nuclear,” he said on the sidelines of the COP31 meeting in the Mediterranean resort of Antalya.
“But of course, to develop nuclear power plant(s), it’s a huge amount of finance required. And when you talk to international financial institutions, they are still hesitant about nuclear.”
Türkiye has been expanding its clean energy capacity as it seeks to curb its heavy reliance on energy imports. It has also stepped up hydrocarbon explorations in the Black Sea and in the country’s south.
Bayraktar earlier announced he had met with crude-rich Venezuela’s oil minister on pursuing joint projects, while Türkiye has also signed other agreements on the issue with several countries, Somalia notable among them.
On Monday, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan celebrated the fact that Türkiye had made a new oil discovery on its territory.
Bayraktar said such moves were not at odds with Türkiye’s goals of going carbon neutral by 2053 and slashing oil consumption by half a million barrels a day by 2040.
In the meantime, “we need 700,000 barrels of oil. We still need 57 BCM (billion cubic meters) of gas,” he said.
“And I don’t want to rely on just imported resources. I want to produce my own oil and gas … So that’s why we are investing in Venezuela. That’s why we are investing in Africa, Libya, Iraq.
“We need to respect the right of development” of all countries, he said.
The energy minister also lamented the absence of several European countries from the summit – and singled out France for criticism.
“Unfortunately, where is President (Emmanuel) Macron? He is one of the leading figures in the global effort to fight climate change,” Bayraktar said.
