Speaker 1: China's record breaking droughts is scorched fires breaking out around
Speaker 1: London as the Egypt is preparing to host the next
Speaker 1: POP Summit in November. With an hour of new pledges,
Speaker 1: commitments and prown justice for my people, I won't climate justice.
Speaker 1: We came forward to bear the responsibility of hosting COMP
Speaker 1: twenty seven in the five Guinness Climate Treach. Welcome to Zero.
Speaker 1: I'm Upshatrati and this is the first of our special
Speaker 1: episodes coming from Top twenty seven in Channel Shake Egypt.
Speaker 1: Over the next two weeks, we'll be bringing you regular
Speaker 1: updates from the largest climate conference in the world. And
Speaker 1: joining me for the first episode is Bloomberg contributing editor
Speaker 1: alegra Stratton Hi. Alegra Hi, Now, it's a big Thursday
Speaker 1: at COP twenty seven. What's your experience of COP being
Speaker 1: like so far? Well, it's very different from the COP
Speaker 1: twenty six that I worked for the UK government at.
Speaker 1: The environment is very different and I think it's importantly different.
Speaker 1: In Glasgow. Do you remember how west and cold it
Speaker 1: was in two weeks? And also it's the river on
Speaker 1: the River Clyde and the relevance of that is that
Speaker 1: it was you know, for a long time the center
Speaker 1: of ship building of a very carbon heavy industry, and
Speaker 1: that was a COP that was about mitigation. It was
Speaker 1: about many things, and there were obviously other aspects to it,
Speaker 1: but there was the drive to get countries to sign
Speaker 1: up to net zero. Three quarters of the world's countries
Speaker 1: did so, and mitigation was really the push. And now
Speaker 1: here in Charmel Shaik, you are in the desert. It's
Speaker 1: incredibly beautiful. We're very close to mountains, were also very
Speaker 1: close to the Red Sea, and there's just much more
Speaker 1: of an emphasis on the damage to the natural environment
Speaker 1: and it is an extremely beautiful surrounding. But it is
Speaker 1: uncomfortable wondering where the protesters must be. At COP twenty six,
Speaker 1: there were protests and they were valuable and they reminded
Speaker 1: everybody in that conference room and in the plenary sessions
Speaker 1: and in the very airless, windowless rooms. They did remind
Speaker 1: people that society cares about this agenda deeply. So they
Speaker 1: had a value. And we've been hearing from different activists
Speaker 1: and environmental groups also that they arrived here in Charnel Shaken,
Speaker 1: their room rents were raised and they didn't have places
Speaker 1: to go, and they had to scramble at last minute
Speaker 1: midnight on Saturday night and they're struggling to find places.
Speaker 1: So it's also been just logistically difficult for many activists.
Speaker 1: So now you were the spokesperson for a COP twenty
Speaker 1: six for the UK government said the scene coming out
Speaker 1: of Crop twenty six into now, how have things changed? Well,
Speaker 1: how things changed? We have Russia invaded Ukraine and so
Speaker 1: everything changed. You suddenly had the world diplomatic shoulders being
Speaker 1: put to the wheel of dealing with a not only
Speaker 1: the invasion of Ukraine, but also the effect that had
Speaker 1: on gas supplies and energy supplies, with clearly an impact
Speaker 1: on the kind of energy where every country is going
Speaker 1: to be using to heat its people this winter. That
Speaker 1: might have meant that it was the least auspicious environment
Speaker 1: in which to go into a COP and trying to
Speaker 1: deal with climate change and trying to change how we
Speaker 1: all use our energy. Actually, amazingly, the IEA, the International
Speaker 1: Energy Agency, the week before COP started, produced a report
Speaker 1: that showed quite the contrary that our energy consumption, the
Speaker 1: fossil fuels being used over the last year, have not
Speaker 1: gone up as much as everybody thinks. I think the
Speaker 1: figure they use is actually one percent, and that ninety
Speaker 1: percent of the new energy that has been procured. I
Speaker 1: mean you're nodding. Actually you know this stuff inside out,
Speaker 1: but about some listeners don't. The new energy that has
Speaker 1: been procured around the world is renewable. And when you look,
Speaker 1: actually take the time. We're all so focused on on
Speaker 1: the war effort, but actually when you look and you
Speaker 1: see the IRA in America, you've then got the EU's
Speaker 1: fit for fifty five pre the invasion of Ukraine, they
Speaker 1: wanted a renewable mix at fifty five percent. They now
Speaker 1: actually have upped that. And then in the UK we've
Speaker 1: also had our Energy Security Strategy which also upped the
Speaker 1: amount of renewables that the UK government want in its mix.
Speaker 1: And there's others. There's there's South Korea, there's Japan, there's others.
Speaker 1: So so the context felt gloomy and felt like it
Speaker 1: would be hard for progress to be made, but actually
Speaker 1: it does look over the last twelve months that actually
Speaker 1: that that transition to a lower carbon economy has actually
Speaker 1: been continuing apace. And this COP has been set up
Speaker 1: by both the African COP and it's been called the
Speaker 1: Implementation COP, which is about taking all the promises, many
Speaker 1: many promises made over years, in probably decades for some
Speaker 1: and actually making them work. So what are the big
Speaker 1: things that you are keeping an eye out on over
Speaker 1: the next two weeks. I really like the implementation cop
Speaker 1: That phrase is up around the conference center. The reason
Speaker 1: I like it is that they're right. There was an
Speaker 1: awful lot of pledges made in Glasgow and the job
Speaker 1: for everybody is to see them translated into action. The
Speaker 1: thing I'm most excited about is this phenomenon or mechanism.
Speaker 1: Mechanism is the better word of JETPS. So just energy
Speaker 1: transition partnerships. It's really really complicated staff. These are high
Speaker 1: emitting coal nations trying to transition them, trying to support
Speaker 1: them across the lower carbon energy sources, but at the
Speaker 1: same time making sure that if you're going to help
Speaker 1: this big nations transition over to lower carbon, you're also
Speaker 1: going to try and help them with jobs and so on.
Speaker 1: I think we are all going to need to see
Speaker 1: more on cash, and I think cash as a as
Speaker 1: a bucket as they call it in diplomatic speak. But
Speaker 1: cash is around the hundred billion which was promised essentially
Speaker 1: a hundred years ago. I mean it was promised in
Speaker 1: twenty nine. I think it was then by Gordon Brown,
Speaker 1: which gives you some sense of quite how much life
Speaker 1: has been lived. Experimentiss I like that, you know that,
Speaker 1: but one hundred billion. The pledge was for it to
Speaker 1: be met by twenty twenty At top twenty six last
Speaker 1: year it became obvious that it will be met in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. That's money that the climate vulnerable nations
Speaker 1: really need pronto. They also then want clarity on what
Speaker 1: that money looks like post twenty twenty five. They also,
Speaker 1: on top of that, want a sense of money for
Speaker 1: adaptation within that pots of money. So I think these
Speaker 1: are rule reasonable questions for them to be asking at
Speaker 1: a time when their actual country is changing before their eyes.
Speaker 1: And of course money is going to be talked about
Speaker 1: a lot, because loss and damage is on the agenda
Speaker 1: for the first time here at COP twenty seven, after
Speaker 1: twenty six carbs. This is the first time they're talking
Speaker 1: about how to compensate developing countries for the damage is
Speaker 1: caused by climate change. Yes, the reason I am hesitating
Speaker 1: is that if you for somebody like John Kerry, the
Speaker 1: US Special Envoy, to be as set against loss and
Speaker 1: damage as he is I think tells you, with all
Speaker 1: his years of experience that politicking, that he feels that
Speaker 1: it is a bridge too far for America domestically, is
Speaker 1: probably the case for the UK domestically. Interestingly, today at Milliband,
Speaker 1: the Labor Minister, Shadow Minister for Climate Change twenty six,
Speaker 1: twenty seven and so on, he has said that there
Speaker 1: is moral responsibility of countries like the UK to to
Speaker 1: help with this issue. I just think that in the
Speaker 1: context of a huge spending reduction exercise in the UK
Speaker 1: in ten days time, it is it is important that
Speaker 1: the UK appears from the comments that are being released
Speaker 1: ahead of Prime Minister Isshi Sunac's visits. It's important that
Speaker 1: that ring fencing of the eleven point six billion on
Speaker 1: climate finance, that is ring fence that's protected money for
Speaker 1: this purpose, that still stands. I think that's important at
Speaker 1: a time when you know, let's be clear, the government
Speaker 1: will have been examining every expenditure item from first principles. Yeah, wonderful.
Speaker 1: Thanks for going on the shore Leger, my pleasure. After
Speaker 1: the break we'll be hearing from one of the leading
Speaker 1: voices on loss and damage at COP twenty seven, Professor
Speaker 1: salimul Huck. Joining me now is Professor Sali Mulhuck. He's
Speaker 1: the director of the International Center for Climate Change in
Speaker 1: Development and one of the loudest voices championing climate vulnerable countries.
Speaker 1: We recorded the conversation in the beating heart of COP
Speaker 1: twenty seven in the blue zone, so please forgive us
Speaker 1: if you hear planes in the background, people talking, or
Speaker 1: somebody just walking past. Sali Mulhuck, Welcome, thank you, nice
Speaker 1: to be here. You've been at every COP meeting since
Speaker 1: the first one in nineteen ninety five. In fact, you
Speaker 1: were at the Rio Earth Summit in nineteen ninety two
Speaker 1: where the un f Triple C, which is the convention
Speaker 1: under which the COP meetings were created, happened. Do you
Speaker 1: think COP meetings over the last twenty seven versions have
Speaker 1: made any progress. They've certainly made progress. So what we
Speaker 1: are dealing with is a planetary scale problem without a
Speaker 1: planetary government. We have two hundred governments around the world
Speaker 1: on planet Earth. Something that is a global problem like
Speaker 1: climate change, requires every country to come together, and the
Speaker 1: only way that can be done is under the United Nations.
Speaker 1: And the good news is that thirty years ago we
Speaker 1: came together and we agreed. We have a treaty. Every
Speaker 1: single country agreed to take actions to tackle climate change.
Speaker 1: And then every year we come together at these Conferences
Speaker 1: of Parties to take stock of where we are in
Speaker 1: terms of fulfilling the agreements that we made. Unfortunately, we're
Speaker 1: not doing enough, We're not doing everything we said we
Speaker 1: would do, and so these meetings are opportunities to see
Speaker 1: how we can accelerate action, how we can do better,
Speaker 1: how we can do more, how we can go faster,
Speaker 1: and we are expecting that to happen here in Charmelshak
Speaker 1: as well. So the egypt Presidency says as many as
Speaker 1: forty five and people are registered to come to the
Speaker 1: COP meeting here in Charmel Shake. How have COP meetings
Speaker 1: changed That forty five thousand figure is a large number,
Speaker 1: But from the time that you've been coming to COP meetings,
Speaker 1: what has been the visible change for you? The original
Speaker 1: Conferences of Parties were meant for government officials to come
Speaker 1: together and review progress and agree on new actions that
Speaker 1: they would take together. It was involving a few thousand
Speaker 1: government officials and they'd meet most of the time behind
Speaker 1: closed doors and negotiate over very arcane language which is
Speaker 1: unintelligible to the rest of the people. But then over
Speaker 1: time many more people started coming. I myself am not
Speaker 1: a negotiator. I come as an observer, and there are
Speaker 1: many such observers, and we do lots and lots of
Speaker 1: side events and activities. There are networks of young people,
Speaker 1: networks of scientists, networks of farmers and indigenous people and
Speaker 1: women's groups, and many many more who come to the
Speaker 1: cop to network. And so what you find nowadays is
Speaker 1: that in addition to the core negotiators, there are a
Speaker 1: periphery of many other coalitions of the willing. And that
Speaker 1: really is what you should keep your eyes on because
Speaker 1: as of the last few years from the Paris Agreement.
Speaker 1: The key about the Paris Agreement is that we needed
Speaker 1: governments to come together to agree it. But we don't
Speaker 1: have to rely on governments alone to do everything. Altogether.
Speaker 1: A few governments, together with other actors, companies, CEOs, mayors
Speaker 1: of cities can get together and decide to do something.
Speaker 1: And we have many such coalitions and every day they'll
Speaker 1: be making announcements on what they're doing. And to me,
Speaker 1: that's really the message from Charmel Shake is the doers,
Speaker 1: the actors, telling you what they're doing, telling all of
Speaker 1: us what they're doing, and hopefully we can stimulate them
Speaker 1: to do more, and then the negotiators have to come
Speaker 1: to a decision on what everybody can agree to. One
Speaker 1: of the design flaws in the process is that a
Speaker 1: decision in the cop requires consensus, and so we can
Speaker 1: only get consensus around the lowest common denominator to take
Speaker 1: a little bit of action, not the kind of action
Speaker 1: that we really need from everybody, and so many actors
Speaker 1: can make progress after governments have agreed to a baseline
Speaker 1: action required. One of the biggest topics that's going to
Speaker 1: be talked about here where government action is going to
Speaker 1: be crucial because there has been none so far, is
Speaker 1: the subject of loss and damage. What does loss and
Speaker 1: damage mean? Loss and damage is now a new phenomenon
Speaker 1: that is taking place which adds to previous actions that
Speaker 1: we needed to take for mitigation that is reducing emissions
Speaker 1: and then adaptation, which is preparing for the impacts of
Speaker 1: climate change, both of which are being done assuming that
Speaker 1: we can prevent climate change. Unfortunately we've failed. Climate change
Speaker 1: is now happening as of this year. The inter Governmental
Speaker 1: Panel on Climate Change who assess the science, have given
Speaker 1: unequivocal evidence that they can detect climate change impacts and
Speaker 1: losses and damages due to those impacts happening as we speak.
Speaker 1: A good example is the floods in Pakistan that took
Speaker 1: place just recently. Fifty percent of that has been attributed
Speaker 1: to have been caused because of human induced climate change.
Speaker 1: And under the Paris Agreement, governments have agreed to do
Speaker 1: something about loss and damage, not specifically what, But since
Speaker 1: that agreement in twenty fifteen, nothing has happened on loss
Speaker 1: and damage right, Not that nothing has happened, Some things
Speaker 1: have happened. There are three ways in which loss and
Speaker 1: damage we have agreed to address. The first is what
Speaker 1: we call averted, which is prevented from happening, and that
Speaker 1: maps on to mitigation, reduce emissions so we won't have
Speaker 1: impacts of higher temperatures. The second one is minimize, which
Speaker 1: maps on to adaptation. If you adapt, you minimize. The
Speaker 1: third one is address, and that we have not done.
Speaker 1: We have done work on averting and minimizing, but we
Speaker 1: now have to address and address boils down to money.
Speaker 1: The people who are suffering the impacts need to be
Speaker 1: given some sort of funding to recover from those impacts,
Speaker 1: and that's what we are demanding me right, and so
Speaker 1: over the next two weeks, what do you think would
Speaker 1: be your best outcome on loss and damage? So the
Speaker 1: best outcome we hope we will achieve is negotiate an
Speaker 1: agreement to set up what we are calling the finance
Speaker 1: facility for loss and damage. It does not have to
Speaker 1: be detailed out in any detail, but we do need
Speaker 1: to agree to set it up. Then we can take
Speaker 1: another year, come back in COP twenty eight in Abu
Speaker 1: Dhabi and work out the details. And there are very
Speaker 1: valid questions to be associated with it, namely, where would
Speaker 1: money come from, how much money is needed, who would
Speaker 1: handle the money, who would get the money, All legitimate
Speaker 1: questions which would need a fair degree of research and
Speaker 1: options to be put together, and those we can then
Speaker 1: come back in COP twenty eight and work out the
Speaker 1: details and negotiate something that makes sense for everybody. Now,
Speaker 1: the first two steps were averting and minimizing and towards
Speaker 1: that there was going to be one hundred billion dollars
Speaker 1: being given broadly called climate finance, very vaguely, not really
Speaker 1: explained that hundred billion dollars has never happened. Annually, that
Speaker 1: figure they're getting closed two hundred billion dollars, but they've
Speaker 1: never reached it. This is rich countries having to give
Speaker 1: that money to poor countries. If they can't give hundred
Speaker 1: billion dollars, which they are read upon many many years ago,
Speaker 1: why do you think they'll be able to agree upon
Speaker 1: even more money to be given for addressing laws in damage. Well,
Speaker 1: we are hopeful that they will do the right thing
Speaker 1: because it's the right thing to do, and not be
Speaker 1: miserly because they feel that they don't have enough money
Speaker 1: to spare all right, And so we are appealing to them,
Speaker 1: out of a sense of responsibility, to take that responsibility
Speaker 1: and accept that responsibility and then talk to us about
Speaker 1: how they can fulfill that responsibility. At the moment they're
Speaker 1: refusing to take responsibility, that's not acceptable. Now. Moral outrage
Speaker 1: does work sometimes, but often at the scale at which
Speaker 1: we are talking, where it's two hundred countries, where there's
Speaker 1: hundreds of billions of dollars worth of money to be
Speaker 1: talked about, will moral outrage be enough? It certainly isn't enough. Now,
Speaker 1: there's no moral responsibility taken by the rich countries at all.
Speaker 1: So that's the first step. Money comes a long way
Speaker 1: after that. Responsibilities you have to start with and they
Speaker 1: have to take it. And I'll give you an example
Speaker 1: last year in Glasgow, inside the UNFCC in COP twenty six,
Speaker 1: not a single country inside the COP offered any money.
Speaker 1: Mister Biden came and offered zero dollars. Uncle La Markel
Speaker 1: came and offered zero euros. Boris Johnson, the host, offered
Speaker 1: zero pounds. But outside the COP, in the city of Glasgow,
Speaker 1: in the country of Scotland, which has its own government,
Speaker 1: its own parliament, its own first Minister, Miss Nicholas Sturgeon,
Speaker 1: she actually put two million pounds on the table for
Speaker 1: lost and damage. She's not a party to the UNFCC,
Speaker 1: but she is a government. She took responsibility. She said,
Speaker 1: Scotland benefited from the Industrial Revolution, became rich because of it,
Speaker 1: but it also recognizes that there are ancillary impacts that
Speaker 1: were unintended that happened because of the emissions of their
Speaker 1: greenhouse gasses. They take responsibility and they offered two million,
Speaker 1: not a huge amount of money, but more than every
Speaker 1: other leader offered to provide to the victims of climate change.
Speaker 1: There is accepted moral responsibility and they invited other governments
Speaker 1: to do that. Now, the only other government while we
Speaker 1: were in Scotland that rose to the occasion was the
Speaker 1: Province of Wallonia in Belgium. They offered a million euros.
Speaker 1: Since then, one of the parties to the UN Framework Convention, Denmark,
Speaker 1: has actually broken ranks with the European Union and offered
Speaker 1: a hundred million kroner. So that's what we want more
Speaker 1: countries to come forward and take responsibility. Let's come back
Speaker 1: to loss and damage. Now, you said something that's very important.
Speaker 1: Pakistan had about thirty billion dollars of damage caused by
Speaker 1: the flooding that happened over the summer. How much of
Speaker 1: that should rich countries be paying for? And how is
Speaker 1: that calculated? So the calculations are done by a branch
Speaker 1: of the climate scientists called attribution scientists. It used to
Speaker 1: take them a long time to make these calculations and
Speaker 1: they come back a year later saying how much additional
Speaker 1: damage was attributable to human induce climate change. They're getting
Speaker 1: much better now and they can now produce their calculations
Speaker 1: within a matter of days. Of fast moving events like
Speaker 1: floods and cyclones, and they have attributed half the damage
Speaker 1: in Pakistan to the fact that global temperature is already
Speaker 1: raised over one degree centigrade attributable to human induceclimate change.
Speaker 1: So the point we're making is that what used to
Speaker 1: be one hundred percent natural events are no longer one
Speaker 1: hundred percent natural events. They are being exacerbated, not caused,
Speaker 1: but exacerbated by the fact that global temperature has gone
Speaker 1: up by over one degree attributable to human emissions. And
Speaker 1: therefore there is a responsibility of the polluters who emitted
Speaker 1: those greenhouse gases to offer some support to the victims
Speaker 1: of their pollution. So pollution does not have it's not victimless.
Speaker 1: There are victims, and they exist, they're happening today, so
Speaker 1: there's a responsibility to help them. Now, these global negotiations
Speaker 1: require two hundred governments to come to a consensus. That means,
Speaker 1: just by design, that progress is slower than it needs
Speaker 1: to be. How is the climate change negotiation doing relative
Speaker 1: to other types of negotiations under the United Nations? Is
Speaker 1: there more progress or less progress on climate change? Well,
Speaker 1: I think the UN Framework Convention is a very good
Speaker 1: example of all countries coming together and agreeing to do things.
Speaker 1: It's a bad example of them actually doing what they
Speaker 1: promise to do. So they make promises and then they
Speaker 1: fail to keep those promises, sometimes for legitimate reasons, sometimes
Speaker 1: less legitimate reasons. But there are other flora as well.
Speaker 1: There is a United Nations General Assembly where all countries
Speaker 1: come together. In the General Assembly, unlike the UN Framework Convention,
Speaker 1: decisions can be made by a jority of countries. In
Speaker 1: the UN Frame or Convention, it has to be unanimous,
Speaker 1: it has to be by consensus, so we always end
Speaker 1: up by having the lowest common denominator as decisions and
Speaker 1: progress is always slower. In the UN General Assembly, they
Speaker 1: also have the Security Council, which can vote down or
Speaker 1: veto a decision even if the majority of countries have
Speaker 1: made them absolutely so. One of the reasons why the
Speaker 1: Conference of Parties is particularly important for the more poorer,
Speaker 1: vulnerable countries is that it's the only forum in which
Speaker 1: they have a seat at the table. Security Council does
Speaker 1: not include them. The G seven does not include them,
Speaker 1: the G twenty does not include them. They're not even
Speaker 1: invited as observers. The UNFCC COP once a year is
Speaker 1: the only place where they can sit around the table
Speaker 1: with all the big guys and actually say something. They
Speaker 1: may not listen, but at least we get to say it.
Speaker 1: Sometimes we actually get to persuade them to do something. Now.
Speaker 1: One moment where that pursue Asian worked was at the
Speaker 1: Paris Agreement, where before countries were agreeing to a two
Speaker 1: degree celsius swarming goal, but because of persistent and motivated individuals,
Speaker 1: especially from island nations, it was possible to add the
Speaker 1: one point five degree celsius goal to the Paris Agreement.
Speaker 1: Seven years on, there is conversations that one point five
Speaker 1: degree celsius might be impossible. Do you think so? Well?
Speaker 1: The one point five degree goal was I would say
Speaker 1: the pinnacle of achievement of the vulnerable countries, including the
Speaker 1: island countries and the least developed countries, to persuade both
Speaker 1: the rich countries and even the big developing countries like
Speaker 1: China and India to agree to a one point five
Speaker 1: degree goal because they were not actually in agreement at
Speaker 1: the beginning of the COP twenty one. Over the two
Speaker 1: weeks we were in Paris, we managed to persuade every
Speaker 1: single country to agree to adopt one point five as
Speaker 1: a target. That was a great achievement. We hope that
Speaker 1: would drive back. It did drive some action, but not enough,
Speaker 1: and every single day now we are slipping away from
Speaker 1: being able to stay below one point five. But even
Speaker 1: if we don't manage one point five, every fraction of
Speaker 1: a degree counts, So it's not as if two is
Speaker 1: another magic figure. One point five one is a magic figure,
Speaker 1: one point five two is a magic figure, one point
Speaker 1: five three is a magic figure. Every incremental amount of
Speaker 1: temperature rise means lots and lots of people dying, losing
Speaker 1: their livelihoods, and being forced to migrate. So the impacts
Speaker 1: of climate change are now real. They're happening. They will
Speaker 1: happen at bigger and bigger scales. Unfortunately in the near term.
Speaker 1: We can still prevent the huge scales in the long term,
Speaker 1: but the near term middle level scales are inevitable and
Speaker 1: are going to happen now. One thing that happened after
Speaker 1: one point five degrees celsius was agreed upon as a
Speaker 1: goal is that a series of big reports came out
Speaker 1: trying to explain to the world what a one point
Speaker 1: five degree celsius warming would look like. Because nobody had
Speaker 1: figured out what that would look like, and then they
Speaker 1: said what needs to be done to reach one point
Speaker 1: five degree celsius. And that's where net zero by twenty
Speaker 1: fifty the target comes through, where reducing carbon dioxide emissions
Speaker 1: to net zero by twenty fifty would allow the world
Speaker 1: to keep warming below one point five degree celsius. That
Speaker 1: target has then been taken, as you explain, by sub
Speaker 1: government actors. So it's not just national governments, it's also
Speaker 1: regional governments. It's also corporations, and that certainly has galvanized
Speaker 1: people to come up with plans to reach those goals.
Speaker 1: If one point five degree celsius is dead, should net
Speaker 1: zero by twenty fifty be dead too? I don't think
Speaker 1: I won't call it dead. I'll call it on life support.
Speaker 1: And as I said, every incremental change matters, right, So
Speaker 1: it's not as if we're going to fall off a
Speaker 1: cliff at one point five still be around, a lot
Speaker 1: of people will suffer, but then we can still manage
Speaker 1: to stop it at one point five one and then
Speaker 1: one point five two, all right, So we will keep
Speaker 1: on fighting to keep the temperature rising below two degrees
Speaker 1: and at least the companies and the governments that have
Speaker 1: committed to net zero by twenty fifty, If they meet
Speaker 1: those goals, then they would have done them morally right
Speaker 1: thing to word one point five degree sources, even if
Speaker 1: the global goal is not met. Absolutely so. One of
Speaker 1: the outcomes of the Paris Agreement is that while we
Speaker 1: needed the nearly two hundred countries that are in the
Speaker 1: UN Framework Convention to agree to the agreement, we don't
Speaker 1: need all of them to implement it. Implementation can be
Speaker 1: done by anybody you and I can decide to implement
Speaker 1: a part of the Paris Agreement. Kids around the world
Speaker 1: are implementing parts of the Paris Agreement. Companies around the
Speaker 1: world are doing it. So implementation can be done by
Speaker 1: what we call coals of the willing who want to
Speaker 1: take action. Net zero by twenty fifty is such a
Speaker 1: coalition that the race to zero that's taking place. We
Speaker 1: need to make it go faster, We need more people
Speaker 1: to join it, but it's certainly moving in the right direction.
Speaker 1: One other way to think about progress is that when
Speaker 1: the Paris Agreement happened, the world had the possibility of
Speaker 1: getting as much as five degrees celsius of warming. If
Speaker 1: we think two degrees celsius is catastrophic. Five degrees celsius
Speaker 1: is mayhem. Now despite not enough action, the worst case
Speaker 1: outcome being talked about is three degrees celsius, which is
Speaker 1: still pretty bad. But what does that progress feel like
Speaker 1: where you have avoided the worst of the worst possibilities. Well,
Speaker 1: I would put that to the achievement of the UN
Speaker 1: Framework Convention. Without it, we would be still heading for
Speaker 1: five degrees. A business is usual from the time Wet
Speaker 1: thirty years ago would take us on a five degree pathway.
Speaker 1: A UNFCC treaty followed by the Paris Agreement moved us
Speaker 1: theoretically towards a one point five degree in less than
Speaker 1: two degrees. We are heading above two degrees, maybe in
Speaker 1: the two point five to three degree range business is
Speaker 1: usual today, But if we can ratchet that down or
Speaker 1: ratchet up the actions to reduce emissions, we can certainly
Speaker 1: stay below two degrees. One point five may not be
Speaker 1: reachable anymore politically, but two degrees is certainly reachable. And
Speaker 1: I'll give you one major advance that is outside the UNFCC,
Speaker 1: but it is relevant, and that is the global economy
Speaker 1: moving away from fossils. It's happening at speed. Now. The
Speaker 1: renewable energy world is faster, more efficient, cheaper, and it's
Speaker 1: just going to blow out all the fossil fuel investments. Already,
Speaker 1: coal is non viable. Nobody can invest in coal and
Speaker 1: make money. Petroleum will follow, and natural guests will follow that,
Speaker 1: and that will be the big transition. That was a
Speaker 1: great conversation. Thank you for laying out the stakes and
Speaker 1: for giving us an idea of what to expect over
Speaker 1: the next two weeks. Thank you very much for having me.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening to Zero. If you like
Speaker 1: the show, please rate, review and subscribe, Tell a friend
Speaker 1: or tell a COP twenty seven delegate. If you've got
Speaker 1: a suggestion for a guest or topic or something you
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Speaker 1: zero pod at Bloomberg dot net. Also, there's good news
Speaker 1: this week. For the next two weeks during COP twenty seven,
Speaker 1: the paywall on Bloomberg Green has been lifted. You can
Speaker 1: head to Bloomberg dot com slash green to read all
Speaker 1: our latest climate coverage and everything in the archives for
Speaker 1: absolutely free. Zero's producer is Oscar Boyd and senior producer
Speaker 1: is Christine riscoll Our. Theme music is composed by Wanderley.
Speaker 1: If you want to hear more from Allegra and me,
Speaker 1: we'll be on our sister podcast In the City, hosted
Speaker 1: by Bloomberg TV anchor Francine Laqua, on Thursday this week.
Speaker 1: Listen and subscribe. I'm Akshatrati back later this week with
Speaker 1: more from COP twenty seven.