UN chief: Climate goals not enough
ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates — U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres took his global message urging immediate climate action to officials in the United Arab Emirates on Sunday, where production of hydrocarbons remains a key driver of the economy.
Guterres is calling on governments to stop building new coal plants by 2020, cut greenhouse emissions by 45% over the next decade and overhaul fossil fuel-driven economies with new technologies like solar and wind.
The world, he said, “is facing a grave climate emergency.”
In remarks, he painted a grim picture of how rapidly climate change is advancing, saying it is outpacing efforts to address it.
He lauded the Paris climate accord, but said even if its promises are fully met, the world still faces what he described as a catastrophic three-degree temperature rise by the end of the century.
Arctic permafrost is melting decades earlier than even worstcase scenarios, he said, threatening to unlock vast amounts of methane, a greenhouse gas.
“It is plain to me that we have no time to lose,” Guterres said. “Sadly, it is not yet plain to all the decision makers that run our world.”
Guterres was in Abu Dhabi fresh off the G-20 summit in Osaka, Japan. There, he appealed directly to heads of state of the world’s main emitters to step up their efforts. The countries of the G-20 represent 80% of world emissions of greenhouse gases, he said.
At the meeting, 19 countries expressed their commitment to the Paris agreement, with the only the United States dissenting.
In 2017, President Donald Trump pledged to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris climate agreement as soon as 2020, arguing it disadvantages American workers and taxpayers.