Today’s announcement comes after the Netherlands, Germany and Spain confirmed their participation in the initiative earlier this week and alongside confirmations from Belgium and Sri Lanka today. The French development bank — AFD — had already signed up to the statement, but not the French government as a whole.

The new report finds that wealthy nations — the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Norway, and Australia — planning to approve and subsidize new fossil fuel projects which undermines their recent claims of leadership in addressing the climate crisis.

With launch of 'Beyond Oil & Gas Alliance', countries and regions forge first diplomatic initiative to phase out fossil fuel extraction. Civil society applauds the creation of BOGA and asks countries: Where is your plan to stop producing the fossil fuels that are driving the climate crisis?

"Gov. Newsom has made key strides, and it’s exciting to see California joining BOGA’s second tier — but to align with science and justice, he must announce a full ban on new oil and gas permits," said Rees.

This increases the number of signatories to 30 and the annual average of potential public finance shifted out of fossil fuels and into clean energy to at least USD 23.6 billion per year. This equals 37% of annual public finance for fossil fuels provided by G20 countries and the Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) between 2018 and 2020.