Speaker 1: Kiyota.
Speaker 2: I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
Speaker 2: daily podcast.
Speaker 3: Presented by The New Zealand Herald.
Speaker 2: The thirtieth UN Climate Conference begins this week.
Speaker 3: Nations will gather in Belem, Brazil for COP thirty. And
Speaker 3: while the.
Speaker 2: Trump administration isn't intending to send anyone, the US could
Speaker 2: still become the thorn in any deals side. So as
Speaker 2: the world's brightest climate mines converge on the city that
Speaker 2: sits just on the outskirts of the Amazon rainforest, experts
Speaker 2: asking whether anything substantial will come from these negotiations. Today
Speaker 2: on the Front Page, University of Otago Associate Professor Daniel
Speaker 2: Kingston is with us to discuss how important COP is.
Speaker 3: And why we should care.
Speaker 2: So, Daniel, tell me what is COP thirty.
Speaker 4: So cop COP stands for Conference of the Parties. So
Speaker 4: just to back up a bit about what that means.
Speaker 4: In nineteen ninety two, at the Earth Summit in Rio,
Speaker 4: most of the world's countries got together and signed a
Speaker 4: climate agreement called the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change,
Speaker 4: and so all countries in the world signed up to
Speaker 4: that and since that, since that treaty was signed, the
Speaker 4: signatories to that treaty have met every year since, and
Speaker 4: so that's a conference of the party who has been
Speaker 4: COP one, COP two, COP three and so on, and
Speaker 4: we're at thirty. The aim of that initial treaty back
Speaker 4: in nineteen ninety two was to prevent dangerous human interference
Speaker 4: with the climate system. That sounds great, but was just
Speaker 4: an intention. They didn't actually define what dangerous climate change
Speaker 4: was or how to prevent it. So the meetings since
Speaker 4: have been about trying to kind of, you know, make
Speaker 4: those definitions. What is dangerous climate change? How ambitious should
Speaker 4: we be, who should take the lead, who should should
Speaker 4: people some countries do more, do less? You know, how
Speaker 4: can we prevent dangerous climate change? So that's what these
Speaker 4: these meetings are all about.
Speaker 2: Given we've been concerned, at least a little bit concern
Speaker 2: for decades now about the effects of climate change on
Speaker 2: our earth. Does it worry you that the UN has
Speaker 2: now said it's virtually impossible to keep the international target
Speaker 2: of limiting global warming of one point five degrees celsius.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's pretty concerning. There are about kind of five
Speaker 4: or six or seven years go now. There was a
Speaker 4: special report by the Intergovernmental Panel on climate change, looking
Speaker 4: at kind of what dangerous climate change might be, and
Speaker 4: in particular looking at the threshold of one point five
Speaker 4: degree warming and two degree warming, and when we start
Speaker 4: to get above that one point five degree level is
Speaker 4: when we start to see some of the more serious
Speaker 4: impacts of climate change. So, according to the Paris Agreement
Speaker 4: which resulted from COP twenty one in twenty fifteen, I
Speaker 4: think there was an agreement from the world's countries that
Speaker 4: we would try to limit climate change to below two
Speaker 4: degrees or preferably at one point five degrees. So for
Speaker 4: now this report to come out to say that basically
Speaker 4: we've just about missed the boat, it's hugely concerning, Yes, is.
Speaker 3: There any way of backtracking or do you reckon that's it?
Speaker 4: To meet this goal our emissions as they were in
Speaker 4: twenty nineteen, would we need to cut by more than
Speaker 4: half to stop us reaching that one point five threshold
Speaker 4: by twenty thirty five That if you kind of think
Speaker 4: about the way the world's set up at the moment,
Speaker 4: the kind of the political environment, it's really not going
Speaker 4: to happen, almost certainly. And so that's that's kind of
Speaker 4: the conclusions of this report. But then you know, thinking
Speaker 4: after that, it is possible to kind of pull things
Speaker 4: back on track. Okay, just because we've you know, we
Speaker 4: may end up breaching that threshold, it doesn't mean that
Speaker 4: we can't pull it back to below that threshold at
Speaker 4: some point in the future. Right, The key thing is
Speaker 4: how far we're going to overshoot and how long that
Speaker 4: overshoot is going to last. For the more action we take,
Speaker 4: the quicker we take it, the less that overshoot is
Speaker 4: going to be, and.
Speaker 2: What kind of things can be down I guess from
Speaker 2: a larger governmental level to a smaller level. I mean,
Speaker 2: is me washing my yogurt caps before putting them in
Speaker 2: the recycling bin, doing anything to get us below that level.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so there's pretty much a linear relationship between more
Speaker 4: carbon in the atmosphere and more global warming. So from
Speaker 4: that sense, yeah, everything really does make a difference, you know,
Speaker 4: whether it's just like turning off a light, you know,
Speaker 4: when you leave a room, whether that's driving your car less,
Speaker 4: taking one fewer international flight, you know, right up to
Speaker 4: the kind of the top of government decisions around you know,
Speaker 4: national level emissions. It all makes a difference, and no
Speaker 4: one's powerless even if it might seem kind of trivial,
Speaker 4: you know, like recycling versus chucking out your yogurt pots.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what's the significance of COP thirty being held in Brazil?
Speaker 4: There's some symbolism from it, I suppose, So as I
Speaker 4: mentioned that first global climate treaty, the UNFCCC, was signed
Speaker 4: in Rio in Brazil, So there's some history of hosting
Speaker 4: successful major international conferences in Brazil. And obviously it's home
Speaker 4: to the Amazon rainforest and majority of that rainforest, which
Speaker 4: is the biggest rainforest rainforest area in the planet, and
Speaker 4: it's hugely important from you know, from a biodiversity perspective,
Speaker 4: but also from the climate system. It's so big that
Speaker 4: it effectively generates its own climate and also has an
Speaker 4: influence on the global climate system. So when we think
Speaker 4: about tropical rainforest loss, we're actually influencing the global climate
Speaker 4: system as that system kind of shrinks and becomes degraded.
Speaker 4: So there's a lot of yeah, I guess, symbolism from
Speaker 4: holding it there.
Speaker 2: And that information that we know about the Amazon is
Speaker 2: that while we were planting so many trees a few
Speaker 2: years back, wasn't it something like we were going to
Speaker 2: plant like a million trees or something.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's not unrelated. So as a plant grows, it
Speaker 4: sucks out carbon from the atmosphere. So in theory, right,
Speaker 4: the more trees you plant, the more carbon you get
Speaker 4: out of the atmosphere. And so this country and others
Speaker 4: do use that sort of kind of a forestation process
Speaker 4: to meet some of their climate goals. It's not as
Speaker 4: simple as that, you know. It depends what happens once
Speaker 4: that tree is finished growing, right, if you chop it
Speaker 4: up and burn it, then you're just putting that carbon
Speaker 4: back into the atmosphere, so that there's kind of not
Speaker 4: so much of an overall wind there. Old old growth,
Speaker 4: existing forests, you know, and native trees are often much
Speaker 4: more important kind of preserving what we've got. There's a
Speaker 4: huge amount of carbon locked up in the Amazon rainforest,
Speaker 4: and the system as a whole sucks out carbon from
Speaker 4: the atmosphere at the moment, so it's holding back the
Speaker 4: level of climate change that has happened. But as it
Speaker 4: starts to shrink and as it starts to get degraded,
Speaker 4: it has the potential to switch to a carbon source.
Speaker 4: Right when you chop down those trees, when you change land,
Speaker 4: use that area starts being a net emitter of carbon
Speaker 4: instead of a net absorber. So yeah, dancing trees is good,
Speaker 4: but it's not quite that simple.
Speaker 1: Looking around the world, what other governments have weakened existing
Speaker 1: legislated domestic climate targets?
Speaker 5: The reality is is that you know, we are reasssing
Speaker 5: on all countries are continually reassissing the target. So this
Speaker 5: specific So meny to your question because every country has
Speaker 5: different mixes. And again, as I see New Zealand's mix
Speaker 5: is very different.
Speaker 1: I appreciate that our missions profile is very different to
Speaker 1: countries that aren't is relying on agriculture and don't have
Speaker 1: the renewable energy source.
Speaker 4: Sorry sorry, just let me.
Speaker 1: Ask that minister that can you name a single country?
Speaker 1: Can you name a single country that has weakened existing
Speaker 1: legislated domestic climate targets?
Speaker 5: As I said, I'm not aware of that point. But
Speaker 5: what I am aware of the world leading in that sense.
Speaker 2: What are New Zealand's updated emissions targets for COP thirty
Speaker 2: and how significant are they do you think?
Speaker 4: Yeah? So, just to back up slightly, under the Paris Agreement,
Speaker 4: each country that signed up to that has to submit
Speaker 4: emission reduction plans periodically and so the latest round of
Speaker 4: these has been happening this year. And so New Zealand
Speaker 4: did submit an updated emissions reduction plan. Their previous one
Speaker 4: was a fifty percent reduction in what our emissions were
Speaker 4: in two thousand and five, and we'd achieved that fifty
Speaker 4: percent reduction by twenty thirty, so that upgraded plan isn't
Speaker 4: much of an upgrade. It's kind of from fifty percent
Speaker 4: by twenty thirty to fifty one to fifty five percent
Speaker 4: by twenty thirty five, so it's kind of it's met
Speaker 4: those goals from Paris, but it's a it's a pretty
Speaker 4: small increase really, and that compares with the UK, which
Speaker 4: has committed to an more than an eighty percent reduction
Speaker 4: from their nineteen ninety levels. Even rapidly industrializing countries like
Speaker 4: Brazil have submitted more more ambitious targets than New Zealand have.
Speaker 4: And I guess you might think, you know, fifty percent
Speaker 4: is a pretty hefty reduction, right, and it would be
Speaker 4: great if we could, you know, if we actually achieved that,
Speaker 4: that's great, But in the bigger context of what's going
Speaker 4: on in that one point five degree threshold, that we're
Speaker 4: going to miss No one's taking enough action, enough major
Speaker 4: action right now. Everyone needs to be more ambitious. So
Speaker 4: to see such a small kind of ratcheting up from
Speaker 4: the New Zealand government was pretty disappointing. I suppose Do.
Speaker 2: You think it's disappointing or realistic? Could we actually bump
Speaker 2: that up to eighty.
Speaker 3: Well or is that just posturing?
Speaker 4: Yeah? I guess that's an important point, right Promises need
Speaker 4: to be kind of followed up by action. We have
Speaker 4: seen a kind of what's the the I guess we
Speaker 4: might say backsliding. Maybe I don't think of the more
Speaker 4: polite term than that right now. You know, in terms
Speaker 4: of climate policy the last few years, there are a
Speaker 4: number of emission reduction plans in place from the previous
Speaker 4: government and they've been mostly kind of let go by
Speaker 4: the current government without any replacement, you know, by alternative ideas.
Speaker 4: If you know, you might not have liked the kind
Speaker 4: of the clean car rebate, the UTAX, but if you're
Speaker 4: going to get rid of that, then what are you
Speaker 4: going to replace it with? And I don't think we've
Speaker 4: seen kind of enough ambition from the current government to
Speaker 4: kind of well, okay, if we're not going to do that,
Speaker 4: then then what are we going to do? You know,
Speaker 4: and then the idea, well, you know, drilling for you know,
Speaker 4: allowing more drilling for oil in the context in this
Speaker 4: current context again kind of it doesn't match the urgency
Speaker 4: of the situation.
Speaker 3: Because the situation is urgent.
Speaker 2: You mentioned the UK there, UK Prime Minister Kirs Darma
Speaker 2: has told world leaders that the consensus is gone on
Speaker 2: fighting climate change.
Speaker 3: Would you agree with him?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I certainly think we're in a different position to
Speaker 4: where we were, you know when the Paris Agreement site
Speaker 4: was signed, you know, or maybe even four or five
Speaker 4: years ago. Right, Governments change, and government priorities change, and
Speaker 4: the extent to which they can bring along their populations
Speaker 4: with them change. We're certainly not in the same position
Speaker 4: that we were before. And you know, at the present moment,
Speaker 4: those kind of that international community isn't as aligned as
Speaker 4: it has been.
Speaker 2: How difficult is it to have a big conference like this,
Speaker 2: obviously the biggest climate change conference in the world. We're
Speaker 2: talking about moving forward, we're talking about or getting onto
Speaker 2: the same page and not having the US at the table.
Speaker 4: Well, the you know, the second I think the second
Speaker 4: biggest emitter globally at the moment. So it's obviously a
Speaker 4: big hole, right if they're pulling out of the whole system.
Speaker 4: I guess there's a timescale issue here in this. You know,
Speaker 4: the political cycle in the US last for five years
Speaker 4: in terms of a presidential term. But what we're looking
Speaker 4: at here is something that's carrying on for decades, you know,
Speaker 4: through to and beyond the end of the century. So
Speaker 4: there will be kind of, you know, variations in how
Speaker 4: much different countries can commit to this, but that you know,
Speaker 4: there is a sense of kind of following the pack here, right.
Speaker 4: If everyone's doing it, then you become the kind of
Speaker 4: the odd ball, the standout if you're not doing it.
Speaker 3: Even China's getting on board, aren't.
Speaker 4: They, Yeah, exactly exactly. So, like China is the biggest
Speaker 4: emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, but they're also
Speaker 4: they have the most renewable electricity generation installed in the world.
Speaker 4: They're installing more than anywhere else, and that the cost
Speaker 4: of renewable energy is cheaper and cheaper all the time,
Speaker 4: to the point where you know, in many situations it's
Speaker 4: cheaper to generate electricity renewably than it is from fossil fuels.
Speaker 4: So things keep turning and there are kind of bumped
Speaker 4: along the way, you know, associated with political cycles, but
Speaker 4: it's going one way in the end, and so I
Speaker 4: guess it's up to the rest of the international community
Speaker 4: to kind of stick with it.
Speaker 6: But global warming not happening. You know, it used to
Speaker 6: be global cooling. If you look back years ago, in
Speaker 6: the nineteen twenties and the nineteen thirties, they said global
Speaker 6: cooling will kill the world. We have to do something.
Speaker 6: Then they said global warming will kill the world. But
Speaker 6: then it started getting cooler, so now they could just
Speaker 6: call a climate change because that way they can't miss
Speaker 6: climate change, because if it goes higher or lower, whatever
Speaker 6: the hell happens, is climate change. It's the greatest con
Speaker 6: job ever perpetrated in the world, in my opinion.
Speaker 3: What would you like to see come out of COP.
Speaker 4: Thirty Recognition of the urgency of the situation? Really, you know,
Speaker 4: there are lots of kind of you know, big picture
Speaker 4: and also technical things that are going to be discussed there,
Speaker 4: from just kind of the general kind of feel of
Speaker 4: the room around the urgency to some much more specific actions,
Speaker 4: you know, around energy generation, finance, tropical rainforests and so on.
Speaker 4: But just that sort of that combined will to do
Speaker 4: something that came out of the Paris Agreement, just to
Speaker 4: kind of see that bolstered.
Speaker 2: I guess do you reckon that when they signed the
Speaker 2: Paris Agreement all those years ago that they actually thought
Speaker 2: that it was going to be this bad.
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 2: I don't know, you know what I mean though, it's
Speaker 2: just like imagine I can imagine all of them.
Speaker 3: But you know, there's some some media about it.
Speaker 2: People are saying all the earth is warming, and you know,
Speaker 2: they go and sign this document and go haha, like
Speaker 2: look at this document, and then we get up to
Speaker 2: it right up to Cop thirty and everyone's.
Speaker 4: Like, guys, yeah, I mean Paris was a huge, kind
Speaker 4: of a huge achievement, right. It was a big step forward.
Speaker 4: But at the same time, it was only words, right,
Speaker 4: and they probably knew that when it came to actually
Speaker 4: kind of dealing with the nitty gritty of it actually
Speaker 4: doing stuff, that it was going to get more difficult. Yeah,
Speaker 4: the way it always is.
Speaker 2: I guess what concrete impacts of climate change are already
Speaker 2: being observed in New Zealand.
Speaker 4: Well, it's getting warmer. If you look at the temperature records,
Speaker 4: you can see that. Maybe you can't feel it kind
Speaker 4: of day to day, but we see it in other
Speaker 4: aspects of the environment, you know, in terms of our
Speaker 4: snowcover shrinking, our glaciers shrinking year on year. We see
Speaker 4: it around extreme of e So you know, floods are
Speaker 4: a particularly obvious one. The Auckland Anniversary weekend floods and
Speaker 4: Cyclone Gabrielle. They were all worse because of climate change
Speaker 4: because they occurred in a warmer atmosphere.
Speaker 2: And.
Speaker 4: You know, there's some scientific uncertainty around just how much
Speaker 4: worse they were, but they were definitely worse. So you know,
Speaker 4: that means they're kind of the flooding that came with it,
Speaker 4: infrastructure damage, the loss of life, you know, impacts on
Speaker 4: kind of you know, food production as well. There are
Speaker 4: you know, quite substantial impacts you know, associated with those
Speaker 4: events that were worse because of climate change. And we
Speaker 4: see droughts as well becoming more intense internationally as well.
Speaker 4: Just you know, the past kind of week or so,
Speaker 4: Hurrican Melissa in the Caribbean, there was sixteen percent more
Speaker 4: rainfall in that because of climate change. Winds were seven
Speaker 4: percent stronger because you know, it was happening in a
Speaker 4: warmer atmosphere, So yeah, we don't have to look too
Speaker 4: far to see those sort of concrete impacts.
Speaker 2: And what climate solutions or innovations would you like to
Speaker 2: see the most in New Zealand. What can we really
Speaker 2: harness and make our own and really lead the world in.
Speaker 4: We're going kind of slightly into my kind of personal
Speaker 4: opinion now rather than my kind of professional expertise for
Speaker 4: current scientist. But look, we've got most of the technology
Speaker 4: available to deal with this, right. Electric cars are pretty
Speaker 4: good and they're getting better. Rooftop solar is cheap, right,
Speaker 4: it's just an upfront cost, just as there's an upfront
Speaker 4: cost to buying a new car. We need help to
Speaker 4: kind of make those initial steps and a lot of
Speaker 4: that has to come from kind of from a government level.
Speaker 4: But the technology, a lot of the technology is there
Speaker 4: to make a huge impact on our emissions. There's amazing
Speaker 4: new kind of innovations going on in agriculture as well,
Speaker 4: in terms of kind of the methane that gets emitted
Speaker 4: from dairying, for instance. We just need more of a
Speaker 4: push and to kind of to make it easier to change,
Speaker 4: but also the kind of the messaging around it. There
Speaker 4: are huge opportunities around kind of reducing greenhouse gases. It
Speaker 4: doesn't have to be seen as a cost and negative
Speaker 4: thing when it can actually lead to a kind of,
Speaker 4: you know, huge additional beneficial changes as well as just
Speaker 4: limiting climate change.
Speaker 2: It's not enough anymore just to be cleaning out your
Speaker 2: yoga caps.
Speaker 4: Yeah, just recycling by itself isn't going to cut it.
Speaker 3: No, thanks for joining us, Daniel.
Speaker 4: No problem, Nice to talk to you.
Speaker 2: That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You
Speaker 2: can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
Speaker 2: at endzed hair dot nz. The Front Page is produced
Speaker 2: by Jane Ye and Richard Martin, who is also our editor.
Speaker 2: I'm Chelsea Daniels. Subscribe to The Front Page on iHeartRadio
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