Bold Mexican climate targets raise question: Really?

In an interview with EcoAméricas, Fernanda Ballesteros argues that Pemex must be central to Mexico's climate strategy. "The government should use its influence to align the state oil giant with national climate goals, incorporating explicit just transition measures into the company's operations."

Mexico has set an ambitious goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by more than a third in the next decade, but the pledge is at odds with the government’s loyalty to the state-run oil and gas sector and the fossil-fuel-guzzling state electric utility, climate and energy experts say.

Mexico in November vowed at the COP30 climate conference in Brazil to reduce emissions of global warming gases to between 364 and 404 megatons (Mt) of carbon dioxide equivalents by 2035 and to reach zero net emissions by 2050. Contained in a document outlining Mexico’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) to the global climate struggle, the new targets at first glance stand out for their ambition compared with those of many other top-20 greenhouse gas emitting nations. Collectively, the world’s countries have pledged far smaller greenhouse gas reductions than are needed to meet the Paris Agreement goal of keeping global warming below 2 degrees Celsius.

Experts, however, say Mexico’s new emissions target is impossible unless the country stops promoting state-owned fossil-fuel production, ramps up renewable energy output, significantly increases its fleet of electric vehicles and expands carbon sequestration.

“I don’t see a way this can be achieved,” says Oscar Ocampo, economic development director for the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness in Mexico City. The new targets are not binding, he notes, adding, “They’re empty words.”

A top-ten polluter

Mexico produces 1.5% of the world’s greenhouse gases, placing it among the top dozen global climate polluters and second in Latin America. The country’s emissions continue to rise, albeit more slowly than they would have in the absence of emissions-reduction efforts. Net emissions—total emissions less those absorbed by “sinks” such as forests—reached 574 Mt of carbon dioxide equivalents in 2024, according to an inventory published by Mexico’s National Institute of Ecology and Climate Change.

Under the new NDC, sectors that emit the most greenhouse gases will make the largest cuts, starting with transportation and electricity generation, which represent 42% of emissions. At the same time, the government has vowed to reduce deforestation in Mexico—in recent years totaling at least 125,000 hectares (309,000 acres) annually—to zero by 2035, increasing the country’s capacity to absorb carbon dioxide.

Experts are skeptical. On one hand, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, a climate scientist, has vowed to boost renewable energy, a departure from her green-power-averse predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

The NDC calls for "clean" energy output to grow from about 24% of power generation today to 43% within a decade. On the other hand, Sheinbaum has also extended López Obrador’s fealty to the state-owned oil company, Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex), and the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE), Mexico’s state utility. Their activities collectively account for more than a quarter of Mexico’s emissions.

The government continues to put Pemex’s survival ahead of its environmental priorities, experts say, budgeting US$14 billion this year to service the company’s debt and approving increased hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

Reliance on carbon-intensive industries has legislative support. Reforms passed in March by the Mexican Congress ensure 54% of the grid’s electricity will be generated by the CFE, whose power stations rely heavily on fossil-fuel feedstocks. The reforms turned Pemex and the CFE into public companies and gave the government more control over energy regulation and transmission—an unsettling development for investors in wind and solar, which currently generate 12% of Mexico’s energy.

Shadow of Pemex

By simultaneously promoting renewables and propping up Pemex and the CFE, the president is trying to “have it a little bit both ways,” says Fernanda Ballesteros, the Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI) country manager for Mexico, (an independent, non-profit organization that supports informed, inclusive decision-making about natural resources and the energy transition).

Instead, says Ballesteros, the government should use its financial leverage over Pemex to demand tough reforms and cuts in methane emissions caused by flaring gas. The oil giant last year pledged to cut methane emissions by 30% by 2030, stop routine flaring, and operate as a net-zero company by 2050. But Pemex trails other state oil companies in emissions reductions, she says, and is effectively setting Mexico’s climate agenda. “This sends a really strong and unfortunate message,” she adds.

Meanwhile, the NDC’s promise to cut emissions in the transportation sector seemed hollow after the government decided to slap tariffs of 50% on Chinese-made cars as of January, experts say. China makes about a tenth of new cars sold in Mexico, most of them electric.

Some targets Mexico announced in Brazil rehash commitments made a year ago or more. The pledge to reach net-zero deforestation was first announced in 2015, says Anaid Velasco, head of research and public policy at the Mexican Center for Environmental Law in Mexico City. “It’s a target they’ve been repeating, repeating, repeating,” Velasco says.