The head of the UN climate agency stated that humanity has two years left “to save the world” by drastically altering the way it releases emissions that trap heat. It also has a shorter window of time to act to get the funding for such a bold transformation.
Simon Stiell, the executive climate secretary of the United Nations, acknowledged on Wednesday that his warning may sound dramatic, given that governments around the world have until 2025 to come up with new and stronger plans to reduce carbon pollution.
Additionally, elections are being held this year in nearly half of the world’s population, and Washington will play host to important global finance meetings. Action, he stressed, is “essential” in the next two years.
There is still an opportunity to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through the implementation of new national climate strategies. However, we urgently want these more robust preparations,”
Laptops 1000Stiell stated during a speech at the London think tank Chatham House. In a not-so-subtle allusion to this year’s election cycle, he implied that powerful individuals are not the only ones who should be concerned about climate change.
“Exactly who gets to save the world in two years? Every person on the earth is the solution, according to Stiell. “A growing number of individuals from all walks of life and economic backgrounds are calling for action on climate change, largely because they are seeing the effects of the crisis on their daily budgets and daily lives.”
Droughts that devastate crops have made it more urgent to take decisive action to reduce emissions and support farmers in adapting, which might improve food security and reduce hunger, he said.
According to Stiell, reducing emissions from fossil fuels will improve health and result in significant cost savings for both people and governments.
Not everyone believes that these alerts will be beneficial.
‘Two years to save the world’ is meaningless rhetoric — at best, it’s likely to be ignored, at worst, it will be counterproductive, said Michael Oppenheimer, an international affairs professor and climate scientist at Princeton University.
The United States government estimates that last year’s air temperatures reached record highs for carbon dioxide and methane, while experts estimate that global carbon dioxide emissions increased by 1.1%. Global temperature monitoring organizations concluded that last year was by far the hottest year on record.
Climate change-related “gross inequalities between the world’s richest and poorest countries and communities” will be further entrenched, according to Stiell, if carbon dioxide and methane emissions from burning coal, oil, and natural gas don’t start a sharp decline.
Money is at the root of everything.
The World Bank and other major international development organizations were hosting meetings shortly before Stiell’s speech.
At these meetings, poorer countries—led by Kenyan President William Ruto and Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley—were pressing for significant changes to the mechanisms that provide loans to developing countries, particularly those that have been affected by natural disasters brought on by climate change.
Laptops 1000Stiell demanded “a quantum leap this year in climate finance” in tandem with that push. He said that the nations that are most in need of debt relief are spending $400 billion on debt finance rather than on mitigation and preparedness for future climate change.
In addition to loans, he demanded increased funding from banks, the International Maritime Organization, and the G20, which consists of the 20 largest economies in the world. According to him, those nations are accountable for 80% of global emissions that trap heat.
“As it was during the Great Financial Crisis, G20 leadership must be at the centre of the solution,” Stiell stated.
Trillions of dollars are managed daily by finance ministers, CEOs, investors, and development bankers. Money needs to be moved from the energy and infrastructure of the past to a more robust, cleaner future, according to Stiell. “And to guarantee that the most impoverished and susceptible nations reap the rewards.”
Officials stated that the November climate talks in Baku, Azerbaijan, are a critical step towards solving the climate funding crisis before the end of the year.
Timing and money are the key factors, and Stiell is “absolutely right,” according to veteran climate analyst Alden Meyer of the European research tank E3G.
According to him, “whether we can get on the trajectory of sharp emissions reductions needed to avoid much worse climate impacts than those we are already suffering today” will be determined by the carbon action plans that are turned in by the end of the next year.
“Climate finance related to carbon policy is on the line,” stated Nancy Lindborg, head of the David and Lucille Packard Foundation, at the Skoll World Forum, an ideas conference in Oxford, England. “With so many elections and places where democracies are on the brink.”
According to Climate Analytics CEO Bill Hare, Stiell was “listening to the science,” which states that to reach the goal of the Paris Climate Accord, which is to limit global temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit), global emissions must be cut in half by the end of the decade.
“Governments are not even close to that, and a shocking number of them continue to encourage the development of new fossil fuels,” Hare stated. If we want to see significant reductions by 2030, we must see a major strengthening of action now, including a speedier ramp-up of renewables, electric vehicles, and batteries. It will cost more the longer we wait.
