By – Dr. Manasi Sinha,
Asst. Professor, Dept. of Political Science
Easwari School of Liberal Arts, SRM University, Andhra Pradesh,
The 30th Conference of the Parties (COP30) to the UNFCC convenes in Belém, Brazil, amidexpectations of renewedcommitments under the Paris Agreement. Yet, the summit’s storyline shifted dramatically by an unprecedented influx of 1,602 fossil fuel lobbyists, surpassing previous records and outnumbering delegates from nearly all nations except the host, Brazil, which has fielded 3,805 participants. A report by Kick Big Polluters Out (KBPO), a coalition of 450 organisations, spotlighted the growing corporate influence of climate diplomacy.
The lobbyists, representing industrial giants such as ExxonMobil, BP, and TotalEnergies, are frequently folded into official delegations, particularly from Global North, rather than remaining outside observers. For instance, France has approved 22 fossil fuel delegates, including five from TotalEnergies. The International Emissions Trading Association alone accounts for 60 delegates.
Overall, the lobby’s footprint at COP30 have risen sharply compared with COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan and is particularly ironic given COP30’s being hosted in the Amazon rainforest – the very ecosystem often cited as a global‘climate-stabiliser.’ Far from non-partisan observers, these envoys advocate for industries that perpetuate fossil fuel expansion, thereby influencing outcomes that favour incremental reforms over transformative change.
Critical negotiations on carbon markets, just transitions, loss-and-damage finance risk having major political decisions buried beneath intricate technical jargon. Climate justice advocates warn that intensive lobbying risks introducing loopholes, weakening accountability and steering outcomes towards incremental adjustments rather than transformative change. The 2025 Global Carbon Budget, unveiled at the summit, projects a 1.1 per cent rise in fossil CO₂ emissions this year, perpetuating a cycle of record highs and widening the gap between scientific urgency and diplomatic outcomes.
India’s sits at the centre of these tensions. Its fossil emissions growth is expected to slow compared with 2024 (1.4% in 2025, down from 4% in 2024), yet the country still contributes around 8% of global fossil fuel emissions and leans heavily on coal for both power and industry.While equity and common but differentiated responsibilities are prioritized in India’s nationally determined contributions (NDCs), but an increasingly corporate-dominated negotiations and interests threaten to erode these principles, pushing towards “net-zero” frameworks that obscure ongoing extraction.
Concerns have been raise that if “net-zero” frameworks are primarily driven by corporate actors, it may favor accounting strategies, trade-offs and speculative technologies over tangible reduction in fossil fuel use. The problem extends beyond who are featured in official photographs, it rather problematises, who writes the text for climate action and who attends the informal meetings where key decisions are made. The balance of power moves from vulnerable communities to dominant groups, when lobbyists outnumber and have greater resources than many national teams.
For the Global South, this surge in lobbying exacerbates long-standing asymmetries of power and voice. Small island states and least developed countries, which bear negligible responsibility for emissions yet face trillion-dollar adaptation costs, find their voices marginalised amid corporate receptions and backroom dealings. Indigenous communities in Amazonia, mobilising outside the restricted “blue zone,” highlight this exclusion, contrasting sharply with the privileged access granted to polluters. COP29 in Baku had already revealed how corporate envoys and trade associations steered conversations on carbon markets and so-called “transition fuels.” Under the pretext of an “Implementation COP,” COP30 seems to deepen this capture.
India, routinely positioned as a bridge between North and South, has an opportunity to raise these concerns. Working with like-minded countries, it could use COP30 to press for systemic reforms within the UNFCCC process:a mandatory, publicly accessible register of lobbyists and corporate actors; clear conflict-of-interest rules limiting direct fossil industry involvement in core negotiating spaces; and stronger links between climate finance, technology cooperation to verifiable phase-down pathways rather than to hazy corporate net-zero pledges. Such a stance would be consistent with India’s long-standing commitment for climate justice and equity in multilateral forums and could bolster domestic policies emphasising renewable energy and efficiency gains.
Ultimately, unchecked fossil fuel influence risks transforming climate multilateralism into yet another site where extractive interests are normalized and democratic scrutiny thinned to a whisper. In India, this demands vigilant monitoring of engagements with fossil fuel companies in international forums; parliamentary and regulatory agencies to enactstringent conflict-of-interest norms in climate policy making; and deepen our solidarities with Global South and Indigenous movements for an equitable fossil phase-out. Without new rules, COP30 will not read as an “implementation” summit, instead, as another moment when the climate regime prioritise access for polluters over the voice of vulnerable people, a choice we must contest relentlessly in India’s own political arenas.
