The new UN climate chief is taking the fight personally

TANZANIA – For the new UN climate chief, the battle is personal.

As a former engineer who says he knows “how to make things work and get them done”, Simon Steele was not just what he did before becoming a senior UN official, but where.

Steele was the minister of environment and climate resilience in the small island nation of Grenada until he began his job as executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change a few weeks ago. Now his job is to make sure the world halves emissions of heat-trapping gases – which help trigger unprecedentedly frequent weather disasters – in just eight years, or as he puts it, after two World Cups or two Olympics.

“Living half my life in a climate-vulnerable nation gives me a deep appreciation,” Steele, 53, said in an interview with The Associated Press. “I’ve been through two hurricanes (Ivan in 2004 and Emily in 2005). I have seen my country leveled by hurricanes. I have seen the sea level rise around my ankles. … And I’ve also been in government, finding solutions and being responsible as a leading policy maker on how to build a more sustainable nation with the limited resources we have.”

And Grenada, which had losses that doubled its annual gross domestic product, is far from alone. In Pakistan, for example, a third of the country is under water.

“Billions of dollars in damage, lives lost, millions displaced. How do they recover from this?” Steele asked from the 10th floor of U.N. headquarters, overlooking the East River. Rich polluting countries will have to pay to help poorer countries that are victims of a climate like his, he said. he.

Making polluters pay for what their emissions have done is just as important as reducing what comes out of smokestacks and tailpipes, Steele said. High-emitting countries reimbursing poorer and vulnerable nations – called “losses and damages” in the world of climate negotiations – is now so important that it is one of the four pillars of the fight against climate change. Others reduce emissions, adapt to a warmer and wilder world, and rich nations financially support poor nations to develop green energy and adapt.

“The loss and damage needs to be addressed,” Steele said. “It’s a very difficult conversation, but it’s a conversation that needs to be had. Positions have softened over the years from non-acceptance and refusal to discuss this to the point where these are now items on the negotiating agenda. So this is a step forward.”

Rich nations pledged several years ago to spend $100 billion a year in aid to poor nations to help them adapt to climate change and develop cleaner energy systems, but not as compensation for the damage. However, even these promises, especially on the part of the United States, have not been fulfilled. Steele hopes they’re getting closer.

Coming from a country heavily affected by climate gives him a “deep understanding”, but Steele says his new job means he “also has to consider the positions of some of these richer nations” and bring all together.

Poorer countries see an ally.

“It’s a huge job and it’s good to see someone from a climate-vulnerable country taking the helm. As a Grenadian, he does not need to be reminded of what is at stake,” said Mohammed Addou of the Power Shift Africa think tank. “For too long, the perspectives of the global north have influenced climate negotiations and led to stalling and inaction. We are starting to see that change, but it really needs to be accelerated.”

Since 2015, small island nations with little economic and political power have used their moral authority to extract major concessions from the rest of the world, said longtime climate negotiations analyst Alden Meyer of the E3G think tank.

In the 2015 Paris Agreement, the small island nations forced the rest of the world to agree to a tougher temperature target to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) from pre-industrial times and a mechanism that requires nations to increase their emissions reduction targets every five years, Mayer said.

“They have a clear moral authority and are showing they can build pressure on the bigger players,” Meyer said.

Steele is staying in a hotel in Germany, where the UN climate agency is based, until international climate talks in Egypt in November. He is not so much focused on the gains from the upcoming climate talks as he is on something longer term. He said he was aiming for 2030 and the need for drastic cuts in pollution to keep temperatures from exceeding the 1.5 degree target – something that looks less likely because it is only a few tenths of a degree away and fast approaching. The world has already warmed 1.1 degrees Celsius (2 degrees Fahrenheit) since pre-industrial times.

“We tend to look at incremental progress. And incremental progress won’t get us the transformational changes we need,” Steele said.

Taking that 2030 goal and “working backwards will actually increase the pressure,” Steele said. “So it doesn’t mean kicking the can down the road. It’s the complete opposite. He brings the box forward right at our feet. … We are close to running out of time.”

Because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the energy crisis it caused, the countries backed away from their commitments to phase out coal, Steele said. “But hopefully this is a temporary regression and these countries will accelerate as the crisis subsides, which will happen.”

The United States, the second-largest carbon polluter, has taken a “big step forward” and is sending a signal to the rest of the world with the Deflation Act that President Joe Biden signed this summer. China, the largest carbon emitter, is also doing more, Steele said.

“Is this as far as they have to go? Is it as fast as it should be? No. But it takes a collective effort,” Steele said.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres regularly ratchets up the rhetoric. This week he called on nations to introduce a tax on fossil fuel companies’ windfall profits, which could then be used to compensate victims of climate change and people facing high energy and food prices.

Steele said Guterres’ role was that of a “truth teller” in carrot-and-stick negotiations with countries, while his new job was that of an arbitrator, “bringing the parties together.”

“It’s difficult. It’s frustrating,” Steele said. “But ultimately the critical focus is meeting the goal of limiting global temperatures to 1.5 degrees. And that requires extraordinary action.”

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