Matt McGrath BBC 10 Sep 18;
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has said that if the world doesn't change course by 2020, we run the risk of runaway climate change.
Mr Guterres said he was alarmed by the paralysis of world leaders on what he called the "defining issue" of our time.
He wants heads of government to come to New York for a special climate conference next September.
The call comes amid growing concerns over the slow pace of UN negotiations.
Mr Guterres painted a grim picture of the impacts of climate change that he says have been felt all over the world this year, with heatwaves, wildfires, storms and floods leaving a trail of destruction.
Corals are dying, he said, the oceans are becoming more acidic, and there are growing conflicts over dwindling resources.
Concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are at their highest level in three million years.
Despite the fact that the world agreed on a plan to tackle climate change in Paris in 2015, Mr Guterres said the world is way off track to achieve the modest goals of the pact.
'Hogwash'
Despite the dire situation, the world could still tackle climate change effectively, he said. Saying it was too expensive to do so was "hogwash".
"For every dollar spent restoring degraded forests, as much as $30 can be recouped in economic benefits and poverty reduction," Mr Guterres said.
The world has the tools, and the ability. Renewables are cost-competitive with coal and oil, he said. By 2030, wind and solar could power more than a third of Europe.
But the lack of decisive political leadership was hampering everything, he said.
Calling for global leaders to meet with him at a special summit in New York in September next year, Mr Guterres argued this would give the world the push it needs at a critical moment.
It comes just before the countries that have signed the Paris agreement will review and increase their commitments to cut carbon.
Progress on that road is currently stalled. UN negotiators met in Bangkok last week to try and push the process forward. But arguments between rich and poor nations over money have seen tempers rise and ambition decline.
Delegates will meet again in Katowice in Poland in December to try to finalise the rule book for the Paris pact, but the omens are not good.
In his speech Mr Guterres warned that "we cannot allow Katowice to remind us of Copenhagen," referencing the infamous failed meeting in the Danish capital in 2009.
Many observers believe that the influence of US President Donald Trump's decision to withdraw from the Paris agreement and his general scepticism towards climate change and multilateralism has soured the atmosphere in the UN talks.
"The US attempts to slow down this process should come as no surprise," said Jesse Bragg from the non-governmental organisation, Corporate Accountability.
"It has a long history of watering down and undermining multilateral agreements. But, in leading the charge to block practically every discussion on finance for the Paris guidelines, the US administration is threatening the future of the agreement and multilateralism itself."
Mr Guterres says he is committing himself and the UN to the effort of transforming the political landscape to tame the threat of climate change. He pointed to the forthcoming report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on how to keep the world from warming by more that 1.5 degrees C, which he says will be a sobering assessment.
"We are careering towards the edge of the abyss," Mr Guterres said. "Our fate is in our own hands."
Fossil fuel dependence poses 'direct existential threat', warns UN chief
A rapid global shift to clean energy is needed to prevent runaway climate change, says António Guterres
Associated Press The Guardian 11 Sep 18;
United Nations secretary general António Guterres has warned that the world is facing “a direct existential threat” and must rapidly shift from dependence on fossil fuels by 2020 to prevent “runaway climate change”.
Guterres called the crisis urgent and decried the lack of global leadership to address global warming.
“Climate change is moving faster than we are,” Guterres said on Monday. “We need to put the brake on deadly greenhouse gas emissions and drive climate action.”
He said people everywhere are experiencing record-breaking temperatures and extreme heatwaves, wildfires, storms and floods “are leaving a trail of death and devastation”.
As examples, Guterres pointed to Kerala, India’s worst monsoon flooding in recent history, almost 3,000 deaths from Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico last year, disappearing Arctic sea ice, some wildfires so big that they send ash around the world, oceans becoming more acidic threatening food chains, and high carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere threatening food security for billions of people.
Guterres said scientists have been warning about global warming for decades, but “far too many leaders have refused to listen, far too few have acted with the vision the science demands”.
When some 190 nations signed the 2015 Paris agreement on climate change they agreed to limit the global temperature increase by 2100 to less than 2C and as close as possible to 1.5C.
“These targets were the bare minimum to avoid the worst impacts of climate change,” Guterres said. “But scientists tell us that we are far off track.”
“According to a UN study, the commitments made so far by parties to the Paris agreement represent just one-third of what is needed,” the secretary general said.
Guterres said the mountain that needs to be climbed is very high but not insurmountable.
“We need to rapidly shift away from our dependence on fossil fuels,” he said. “We need to replace them with clean energy from water, wind and sun. We must halt deforestation, restore degraded forests and change the way we farm.”
He appealed for leadership “from politicians and leaders, from business and scientists, and from the public everywhere” to break what he called the current “paralysis” and act now.
“If we do not change course by 2020, we risk missing the point where we can avoid runaway climate change, with disastrous consequences for people and all the natural systems that sustain us,” Guterres warned.
The alternative to moving to green energy, he said, “is a dark and dangerous future”.
Guterres said that when he addresses world leaders at their annual general assembly gathering in two weeks, he will tell them “that climate change is the great challenge of our time” and what is missing is leadership and a sense of urgency to respond.
He said an international meeting in Bangkok that ended on Sunday made some progress on negotiations to help reach an agreement in December in Poland on guidelines for implementing the 2015 Paris accord “but far from enough”.
“Nothing less than our future and the fate of humankind depends on how we rise to the climate challenge,” Guterres said. “Keeping our planet’s warming to well below 2C is essential for global prosperity, people’s wellbeing and the security of nations.”
He said that is why he will convoke a climate summit for world leaders in September 2019 “to bring climate action to the top of the international agenda”.
Guterres said technology is on the side of those seeking to tackle climate change.
He cited the rising use of renewable energy, saying “today, it is competitive with and even cheaper than coal and oil, especially if one factors in the cost of pollution”. And he singled out innovative programs in China, Sweden, Morocco, Scotland and Thailand.
Guterres also pointed to other signs of hope including oil-rich Saudi Arabia investing heavily in renewable energy and oil-rich Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the largest in the world, moving away from investments in coal, as well as in palm and pulp paper companies because of the forests they destroy.
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