The departing UN Sec’y General cared about climate change. Did he make a difference?

Brian Lehrer (0:05)

From WNYC, I'm Brian Lehrer. This is my Daily Politics Podcast. It's Tuesday, September 29th.

Now we'll turn to our Tuesday Health and Climate Segment.

This week, we're on the climate side with a warning from a man on his way out the door. Last week, the world arrived in New York City the way it does every September for the United Nations General Assembly and Climate Week. For António Guterres, it was his last one as UN Secretary General. The 77-year-old Portuguese diplomat took the job in 2017, just after the Paris Climate Agreement, and made climate his signature issue from the start, calling it the defining issue of our time. As Secretary General, he pushed to end oil and gas subsidies and promoted a ban on fossil fuel advertising. Nearly a decade on, none of that has happened. Emissions are at record highs, and by his own account, the world is, quote, far from reaching the level of commitment that is necessary. In fact, climate was one of four big themes in his final address to the General Assembly last Tuesday. Here's part of that speech.

António Guterres (1:15)

Three years ago in the mountains of Nepal, I sounded the alarm on accelerating glacier melts, warning that the rooftops of the world are caving in.

Some dismissed it all as overstating dangers. But as tragic events even have shown, impacts are arriving sooner, hitting harder, and spreading further than many anticipated. Now we face a near certain breach of the 1.5 degree limit with a supersized El Nino speeding straight for humanity.

Brian Lehrer (1:50)

Outgoing UN Secretary General António Guterres from his farewell speech to that office last Tuesday at the UN.

We'll hear a little more from him as we go. He's out on January 1st, and a successor will be chosen in the coming weeks. David Gelles, a reporter on the New York Times Climate Team, got Guterres on the phone for an exit interview. The Secretary General's parting assessment, things are getting dramatically worse. Joining us now to give us a closer look at that conversation and the issues involved is David Gelles who also leads the Times Climate Forward Newsletter and event series. David, thanks for coming on for this. Welcome back to WNYC.

David Gelles (2:28)

Thanks for having me, Brian.

Brian Lehrer (2:30)

So you know from over the years how strongly Guterres feels on these issues, about these issues. You got him on the phone the weekend before the General Assembly got underway.

What did you want to know climate wise going into that conversation?

David Gelles (2:46)

Well, he's not one for self introspection. He's not one who's really preoccupied with his own legacy. But I was really curious how 10 years after the Paris Climate Accord had been signed, he felt about the globe's progress.

This was, of course, the agreement 10 years ago where almost every nation in the world came together and said, we're going to do everything we can to try to limit global warming to not more than two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Well, as he said in that speech, we're almost at 1.5 degrees and we're headed well past two. So my question to him, my first question was, was the Paris Agreement a success or a failure? That's what I wanted to know. And he frankly had a mixed bag of reactions.

Brian Lehrer (3:42)

Such as?

David Gelles (3:43)

Well, on the one hand, he conceded that we are on a path to 1.5. We're there already. Two degrees seems likely, 2.53 degrees. And I know these are small numbers, but I know this audience also understands that we're talking about big changes to the Earth's climate as well. So we are still on a path for really dangerous warming, in the decades ahead. And yet, he was very quick to point out that without the Paris Climate Accord and all the work that has been done in the subsequent decade, we might have been on a path towards 3 degrees or even 4 degrees of warming. Which is to say that while emissions, as you noted, Brian, are still at record highs, and we've still got a ton of work to do and lots of problems to solve, we have made real progress in the past decade. The cost of renewable energy has fallen dramatically. Countries around the world are adopting wind and solar and batteries and electric vehicles in place of additional natural gas and coal and oil. And all of that is starting to change the trajectory. So by no means are we out of the woods yet, and things are not looking quite as bleak as they were a decade ago.

Brian Lehrer (5:04)