Climate worries drive U.N. plan to use renewables
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday launched a five-point plan to jump-start broader use of renewable energies, hoping to revive world attention on climate change as the U.N.’s weather agency said greenhouse gas concentrations, ocean heat, sea-level rise, and ocean acidification reached record highs last year.
In his plan, which leans into the next U.N. climate conference taking place in Egypt in November, Guterres called for fostering technology transfer and lifting of intellectual property protections in renewable technologies, like battery storage.
Such ambitions — as with his call for transfers of technologies aimed to fight COVID-19 — can cause innovators and their financial backers to bristle: They want to reap the benefits of their knowledge, investments and discoveries — not just give them away.
Secondly, Guterres wants to broaden access to supply chains and raw materials that go into renewable technologies, which are now concentrated in a few powerful countries.
The U.N. chief also wants governments to reform in ways that can promote renewable energies, such as by fast-tracking solar and wind projects.
Fourth, he called for a shift away from government subsidies for fossil fuels that now total a half-trillion dollars per year.
That’s no easy task: Such subsidies can ease the pinch in many consumers’ pockets — but ultimately help inject cash into corporate coffers too.
Finally, Guterres says private and public investments in renewable energy must triple to at least $4 trillion a year. He noted that government subsidies for fossil fuels are today more than three times higher than those for renewables.
“We must end fossil fuel pollution and accelerate the renewable energy transition before we incinerate our only home,” Guterres said. “Time is running out.”