Türkiye’s 2025 report card is poor; hopes rest on COP31
Composed of 16 civil society organizations working in the field of climate, the İklim Ağı (Climate Network) has prepared Türkiye’s 2025 Climate Report Card across 12 key indicators.
The report card notes that, once again in 2025, Türkiye failed to receive a passing grade due to policies that continued to offer incentives for coal-fired power plant companies instead of phasing out coal, and due to a new climate target that increases greenhouse gas emissions. It emphasises that, as host of COP31, Türkiye must set ambitious climate targets to demonstrate genuine climate leadership.
Summary of the Climate Report Card in 12 Points
Climate Law:
Civil society was excluded from the legislative process; the adopted law must be implemented in a manner that genuinely protects nature and society.
New Climate Target:
It increases emissions and lacks a fossil-fuel phase-out plan and adaptation policies, missing the opportunity to build a clean economy and a prosperous society.
Mining Law:
It opens natural areas to mining; the Akbelen case confirmed concerns; the law must be repealed.
Coal Subsidies:
New subsidies totalling USD 133 million are at public expense, exacerbating health impacts and delaying a just transition.
Governance:
Expert climate NGOs are excluded from decision-making mechanisms.
Renewable Energy:
While investments are increasing, regulations that disregard environmental impacts and fail to ensure environmental democracy pose serious risks.
Climate Impacts:
Record drought, rising flood and wildfire losses; lack of preparedness for the climate crisis is costing lives.
Just Transition:
Recognized in principle, but lacks a fossil fuel exit timeline and concrete mechanisms for workers and local communities.
Afşin Elbistan A Power Plant:
The EIA approval for a new unit does not serve the public interest.
Agriculture:
Extreme weather events and drought driven by the climate crisis reduced agriculture by 12.7% in 2025.
Nuclear Energy:
Costly, risky, and unable to resolve waste issues; nuclear projects should be abandoned.
COP31:
A major opportunity; genuine leadership requires ambitious targets, a coal phase-out, and participatory governance.
The Climate Report Card in Detail (12 Points)
1. Climate Law: It Protects Neither the Climate, Nor Nature, Nor Society
Although the Climate Law enacted in July has the potential to serve as an important instrument for climate policy, it contains serious shortcomings. The demands of civil society organizations working on climate issues were disregarded both during the drafting process and throughout parliamentary deliberations. While the law provides a legal basis for the net-zero emissions target, the nationally determined contribution, and the core principles of climate action, it fails to set concrete targets for ending fossil fuel use, does not present a clear roadmap for emissions reductions, and lacks a science-based, independent oversight mechanism. As a result of civil society efforts, references to the “net-zero emissions target” were added to provisions on emissions trading system design, and the concept of just transition was included in provisions on local climate action plans. There is now a strong demand that secondary legislation developed under this law contain robust safeguards.
2. Türkiye’s New Climate Target: Emissions Will Increase
Türkiye’s new Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC), commonly referred to as its climate target, aims to increase emissions rather than reducing them by 2035. The new NDC contains no plan whatsoever for phasing out fossil fuels. It also fails to introduce new targets related to expanding protected areas, climate adaptation, food security, or urban resilience to disasters. Yet, to build societal resilience against the climate crisis, Türkiye must begin reducing emissions immediately, expand protected areas including forests, wetlands, and seas, redesign cities to be climate-resilient, and scale up nature-based solutions.
3. The New Mining Law Must Be Repealed
Through the omnibus Mining Law No. 7554, Türkiye’s water resources, soils, olive groves, forests, and cultural heritage have been opened to mining activities, placing them at unprecedented risk. The first concrete implementation of this law was the uprooting of olive trees in Akbelen. The law must be urgently repealed.
4. Coal Subsidies Come at the Public’s Expense
The new subsidy package for domestic coal continues to channel public resources to polluting coal companies, hindering the expansion of clean energy while jeopardising public health and public finances. The additional USD 133 million allocated annually to coal-fired power plant operators is equivalent to the average annual income of 7,000 coal miners. This package delays just transition plans that would provide safeguards for workers facing layoffs in coal regions. Coal subsidies must be ended, and just transition mechanisms that protect workers and local communities must be established.
5. Civil Society Has No Voice in Climate Governance
Expert climate NGOs are absent from ministerial platforms established to discuss and shape climate policy. For example, while ministries, the business sector, and local governments are represented on the Climate Change and Adaptation Coordination Board (İDUKK, the highest-level climate policy body) expert civil society organisations and think tanks are excluded, despite having requested participation. Similarly, the Emissions Market Board and Advisory Board, which will determine ETS caps and prices, will be limited to ministries, business, investment, finance institutions, and a professional chamber.
6. Afşin-Elbistan Coal Power Plant Project: No Public Interest
In 2025, insistence on building new coal-fired power plants continued. An expert report on the positive EIA (Environmental Impact Assesment) decision to add a 688 MW unit to the Afşin-Elbistan A Coal Power Plant concluded that the project lacks public interest and would cause serious harm tolocal communities and the environment. The Afşin–Elbistan basin is among Türkiye’s most polluted air basins, and residents have long endured unhealthy living conditions. The project must be urgently cancelled, and existing plants should be closed under a just transition program that leaves no one behind.
7. Climate Impacts Have Driven a Contraction in Agriculture
Increasingly frequent extreme weather events and drought linked to rising temperatures threaten food availability and access. Frosts, heatwaves, and other climate anomalies in 2025 led to unusual price increases in fruits. Water scarcity further undermined food production, raising prices for consumers. As a result, the agricultural sector contracted by 12.7% year-on-year in the third quarter of 2025, marking a record decline in recent years. To build a climate-resilient and nature-friendly agricultural system, agroecology must be adopted, regional plans must be developed accordingly, at least 30% of subsidies must be redirected toward nature-friendly practices, and regenerative farming techniques scaled up.
8. Nuclear Energy Is Both Costly and Dangerous
We view Türkiye’s insistence on adding new nuclear power plants in Sinop and Thrace, alongside Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant, with deep concern. Nuclear energy entails accident risks, unresolved radioactive waste issues, long construction periods, and remains among the most expensive forms of electricity generation. The state’s guaranteed price for electricity from Akkuyu is nearly twice the market price. New-generation reactors such as small modular reactors (SMRs) do not alter this reality; high costs and waste problems persist. Moreover, nuclear investments risk delaying far cheaper, faster-to-deploy renewable energy projects, such as solar and wind, that can reduce emissions today.
9. Transitioning to Renewables Without Sacrificing Nature Is Possible
Türkiye’s wind and solar capacity continued to grow in 2025, reaching 38.8 GW by the end of November and supplying 22% of electricity generation. While this is promising for the energy transition, the shift to renewables must not come at the expense of nature and agricultural lands. The omnibus Law No. 7554, adopted in July, creates serious risks for ecosystems, biodiversity, and local livelihoods by disregarding environmental impacts in natural, pasture, and forest areas, including protected areas. A 100% renewable energy system can be achieved through proper site selection that protects sensitive areas and safeguards local rights and livelihoods.
10. Just Transition Exists in Name, But Not in Practice
Although just transition is referenced in policy documents, no concrete implementation mechanism has yet been defined to protect workers and local communities during decarbonization. The just transition principle adopted in the Climate Law must be supported by a fossil fuel phase-out timeline and concrete policy instruments. A strong social dialogue that ensures stakeholder participation is essential, alongside gender equality, diversification of local economies based on regional conditions, and the provision of new skills and livelihood security for affected workers.
11. Climate-Related Disasters Are Intensifying
In 2025, the impacts of the climate crisis in Türkiye intensified markedly. According to the Turkish State Meteorological Service, total precipitation during the 2025 water year (1 October 2024 – 30 September 2025) was 422.5 mm, the lowest in 52 years. Data from the General Directorate of Forestry indicate that between 1 January and 17 August 2025, fires damaged 64,500 hectares of land, including agricultural areas, shrublands, roadsides, rural settlements, and forests. A 2025 study by Prof. Dr Murat Türkeş and Nami Yurtseven points to the further expansion of arid and semi-arid climate conditions. In response, climate resilience in cities must be strengthened through nature-based solutions, the extent and quality of protected areas enhanced, and compensation mechanisms established for loss and damage caused by disasters.
12. Hosting COP31: A Significant Opportunity
Although Türkiye did not receive a passing grade for its climate policies in 2025, hosting COP31 in 2026 represents a major opportunity to build a decarbonised and just economy. Genuine leadership is demonstrated not merely through hosting but is demonstrated through ambitious emissions-reduction targets, a clear coal phase-out strategy, nature-compatible renewable energy investments, robust adaptation policies, and participatory, human-rights-based governance. We expect Türkiye to adopt a decisive and equitable stance on the global phase-out of fossil fuels during COP31 negotiations.