By Havalin Haskell, ’26, Environmental Studies
Let’s just say it most definitely is “dedicated to advancing the COP29 Presidency’s vision and priorities for climate action.”
On Thursday, Megan and I ventured to the Green Zone, which is open to civil society/the general public, because we weren’t badged for the Blue Zone.
What is the Green Zone?
The Green Zone is an area aimed to engage the public, private sectors, media, youth, NGOs, as well as delegates operated and established by the COP29 Presidency.
In the past, according to both my professors who have been collectively to 18 COPs, the Green Zones typically have lots of NGOs as well as private sector stakeholders.
Additionally, my professors were saying that in the past, there used to be way more protests and advocacy movements outside the Green Zone and COP venue. As you can see, there were a couple protests outside of the green zone area.
But over the past couple COPs, since they have been in countries under authoritarian regimes, protesting has been drastically stifled. This is the third year in a row a country hosting the climate summit has been accused of oppression and curtailing the legal right to protest.
Thoughts on the Green Zone:
After seeing it for myself, I would argue that this COP’s Green Zone aligns perfectly with the UNFCCC description of the space: “dedicated to advancing the COP29 Presidency’s vision and priorities for climate action.”
It was predominantly composed of exhibits from private sector stakeholders, specifically corporations in the energy, fossil fuel, and finance industry, showcasing their quote on quote green initiatives: COP29 Partner SOCAR, (State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic), (Azchemco (Azerbaijan Chemical Company), GE Verona, Deloitte, Silkway West Airlines ect.
Azerbaijan being a petrostate has had myriads of influences on the COP and a real point of contention across the board.
Walking into both the Blue and Green Zones, outside and inside, the “COP29 Partners” are boldly displayed: Acwa Power, SOCARGreen, Azersun (holding company), Giltex (textile company), Nio (car company), Silkway West Airlines, to name a few.
Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev actually used his opening speech at COP29 to deny the labeling of Azerbaijan as a petrostate. He called out Western media, climate activists, and critics of Azerbaijan’s oil and gas industry, calling them ‘hypocritical” since the United States is the world’s biggest oil producer.
He overall delivered a strong criticism of Western governments that purchase his country’s gas while condemning its fossil fuel-dependent economy.
“Oil and gas are a gift from God, just like the sun, wind, and minerals,” he said.
The COP29 website states, in regards to the organizations represented in the Green Zone: “their inventions, solutions, and entrepreneurial spirit are crucial to the success of COP29 in Azerbaijan.”
However, to what extent is it all greenwashing and detrimental to the cause of COP29? To what extent is it good to have these fossil fuel companies at the table and not?
These have been some of the central questions at the heart of COP29.
The SOCARGreen pavilion proudly touted its goal to be “net-zero by 2050,” amidst its futuristic, modern green world mock-ups, working to entirely gloss over and negate the fact that they are missing their goal of emission reductions set to be achieved by 2030.
One of the main sections of the Green Zone was a massive diorama dedicated to highlighting the Baku White City Project of the Azerbaijan Development Company.
The Baku White City is located in the Xətai-Khatai district of Baku and was previously known as the “Black City.” It was the industrial center of “the glorious history of oil production” and the name derived from the pollution, smoke and soot of the factories and refineries in the area. This project transformed the area of Baku from “ecological disaster to sustainable environment” according to the exhibit. It spoke of the thousands of tons of “contaminated soil” that were removed from the district. To where? Who knows.
When doing research on the Baku White City to try and answer questions like these, one hits a dead end pretty quickly––the media and information available about this project are extremely limited to sites sanctioned by the Azerbaijan government.
Interestingly, the only other prominent country presence in the Green Zone was Turkey, which has a massive pavilion showcasing its sustainable efforts and climate action along with national pride. Once again, this is an example of when geopolitics seep into the COP29 space, as upon looking it up, this presence of Turkey alongside Azerbaijan in the Green Zone reflects these two nations’ tight alliance. Former Azerbaijani president Heydar Aliyev often described the two countries as being “one nation, two states.”
The Art Pavillion of the Green Zone consisted of traditional Azerbaijani basket weaving and the art of Shebeke, geometric colored glass compositions, primarily used in the architecture of palaces and mosques. Primarily in the southern area of Azerbaijan, Masalli, the ancient tradition of weaving with reeds gave women a way to work and earn money outside of traditional farming, and there was a woman doing a demonstration in the exhibit.
While there was no real connection presented between these traditional art forms of Azerbaijan and climate change, it served as an avenue, I think, for us foreign COP-goers to learn more about the rich cultural traditions of the host country.
The coolest part about the Green Zone for me had to be seeing the couple of educational exhibits, specifically framed to engage and educate the youth on the climate crisis. Seeing so many kids running around was quite a stark contrast to our past couple days at COP, being surrounded by adults significantly older than us.
For example, there was one section of the youth educational pavilion, titled “Forces of Change.” It had a wall of pegs where kids could “vote for the sustainability goal and change agent that will bring the biggest global impact.” I felt a rush of emotion in seeing a young Azerbaijani girl walk up to the selection of pegs, choose one, and put it up on the wall.
However, while it was impactful to see children interacting with these activities, placing pegs on this wall, I then realized that it’s all in English, and therefore not as accessible to the Azerbaijani local kids as it should be. It almost defeats the purpose and leaves me perplexed. Why not have these educational exhibits in Azerbaijani?
Overall, seeing the wider Azerbaijan public interacting with the Green zone and being surrounded by the topic of climate change, albeit greenwashed, was, in my opinion, a significant positive aspect of this sector of COP29. There were groups of locals everywhere interacting with the exhibits, catching up at the pavilion tables, and even playing games––there were backgammon and chess boards in the center Azerbaijan exhibit. A sense of community did radiate throughout the space.
This community extended within the “extreme hang out zone” where I observed a mix of what looked like delegates, specifically coalitions of youth delegates collaborating on their computers with locals sitting down for tea and snacks.
We also saw where the COP29 Daily Show is filmed––this is a new initiative put on by COP29 aimed to “pop the bubble” that is COP, and distill down the daily highlights of note.
There was also a “COP29 Shop” within the Green Zone, which sold various COP29 merch- t-shirts, tote bags, stickers, magnets, pins- along with other Azerbaijani souvenirs. The place was mayhem, a zoo of people in a shopping craze. Another example of the oxymoron-esque nature of COP, a reminder we live in a commodified, capitalistic system, even at the world’s largest annual climate summit.
Overall, Megan and I both agreed we were glad we went to the Green Zone to check it out, but weren’t as impressed or engaged with it as we thought we would be. We only spent about an hour in it until we felt like we had interacted with the space enough, something we both didn’t expect.
