Global Warming Happening Faster Than Previously Thought

ALOK SHARMA, PRESIDENT, 26TH UN CLIMATE CHANGE CONFERENCE: The report that the IPCC has put out is obviously hugely comprehensive, and it is based on the science and the science is very clear. Exactly, as you said, in your introduction, it is humanity, which is responsible for the climate change that we’re seeing around the world. What the report does conclude that there is still a window open, the door is still slightly ajar in terms of us taking the actions to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. But I’m afraid that door is going to close pretty soon unless we take action now. And that’s why as part of the work that my team and I are doing on COP26, we are asking every country to come forward with ambitious emissions reduction targets, and also then follow that through with action as well.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: So that’s where it gets, you know, where the sort of rubber meets the road, doesn’t it? There’s promises and there’s action. I spoke to John Kerry, former Secretary of State now climate czar under the Biden administration. He obviously as you know, organize the US and part of the COP25 in Paris. This is what he said to me about promises. Let’s just — let’s just listen.

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JOHN KERRY, U.S. SPECIAL ENVOY ON CLIMATE CHANGE: We’re not on a track. Even if we did everything that we promised to do all of us in Paris, we still would have a rise in the Earth’s temperature that is unacceptable, somewhere between 2.5 and 3.5 degrees. That’s catastrophic. So we obviously have to accelerate. And the Paris Agreement contemplated that countries would come together several years down the road and make a judgment about where we are and then raise ambition. So Glasgow is definitively about raising ambition.

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AMANPOUR: So Alok Sharma, you know, it was there laid it out all these countries, you know, 196 or so signed on, now you have to corral them into actually meeting these promises. And I guess that’s where many of us, you know, we sort of despair. If you can’t get, you know, China and India who still believe in coal, or Russia and Australia and Saudi Arabia and all the rest of it, who are busy pouring out fossil fuels. What is it that you can say to them at this point, to get them to meet these promises and pledges for basic, you know, human survival?

SHARMA: Well, Glasgow, of course, is about raising the ambition bar. And it’s the first piece in the in the ratchet mechanism that was set in place in the Paris Agreement. Now, if you if you look Christiane, when the UK took on the COP26 presidency, less than 30%, of the global economy was covered by a net zero commitment. We’re now at 70%. So that is progress. But of course, we need all countries to step forward with that net zero commitment by the middle of the century.