Picture: supplied
This year has been a masterclass in climate destruction and this planet is in the final countdown to limit a global warming rise of 1.5 degrees Celsius.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres made the comment at the opening of the 29th Conference of the Parties (COP29) to a UN convention on climate change in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan.
“We are in the final countdown to limit global temperature rise to 1.5°C and time is not on our side,” he said.
“With the hottest day on record, the hottest months on record, this is almost certain to be the hottest year on record.”
Guterres says 2024 has been “a masterclass” in climate destruction with natural disasters “supercharged by human-made climate change”.
“No country is spared … the rich cause the problem, the poor pay the highest price. Oxfam finds the richest billionaires emit more carbon in an hour and a half than the average person does in a lifetime.”
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. Picture: UN
But he also outlined causes for hope, telling COP29 that it is “time to deliver”.
“Humanity is behind you: a poll by the University of Oxford and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) finds that, globally, 80 per cent of people around the world want more climate action,” he says.
Guterres says that in 2023, the money spent on green and renewable energy overtook that spent on fossil fuels with solar and wind the cheapest sources of electricity.
“Doubling down on fossil fuels is absurd. The clean energy revolution is here. No group, no business and no government can stop it.”
He urged attendees at COP29 to focus on three priorities:
- Reducing global emissions by 9 per cent every year so that by 2030 they are down 43 per cent on 2019 levels. “All countries must do their part and the G20 must lead,” he says.
- Secondly, do more to protect people. “The most vulnerable are being abandoned to climate extremes. Now more than ever finance promises must be kept. Developed countries must race the clock to double adaptation finance to at least $40 billion a year by 2025.”
- Third is finance. “Developing countries eager to act are facing many obstacles: scant public finance; raging cost of capital; crushing climate disasters; and debt-servicing that soaks up funds,” he says. “COP29 must tear down the walls of climate finance. Developing countries must not leave Baku empty-handed.”
Guterres believes there are five elements needed for success: a lot more money, greater transparency around spending, innovative energy sources, funding commitment to developing countries and boost lending capacity.
COP29 will run in Baku until November 22.
