COP30 - World Leaders Summit recap: ‘What’s still missing is political courage’

At the opening planetary of the World Leaders Climate Action Summit yesterday, the UN Secretary General highlighted the dark reality of the rising temperatures but remained hopeful of the growth of the clean enery sector.

On the 6th November, world leaders, heads of state and minister came together in Belém, Brazil to kick-off the two-day World Leaders Climate Action Summit. Each head of delegation will take the floor in the Plenary Hall to deliver their speeches on climate change and their action plans. Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (pictured above left) called the upcoming conference ‘the COP of truth’. 

Upon President Lula’s opening address, the United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres (pictured above right) took to the stage and acknowledged that ‘we have failed to ensure we remain below 1.5 degrees.’

‘This is moral failure – and deadly negligence,’ said the UN Secretary-General, ‘If we act now, at speed and scale, we can make the overshoot as small, as short, and as safe as possible – and bring temperatures back below 1.5°C before century’s end.’

While the world temperatures are reaching record highs, the acceleration in the development and application of clean energy has revived hope. 

‘The United Nations will not give up on the 1.5 degrees goal. Because another truth is evident: we have never been better equipped to fight back,’ added Guterres, ‘A clean energy revolution has taken hold.’

‘Solar and wind are now the cheapest sources of power – and the fastest growing sources of electricity in history’, he added.

As innovation develops globally to better adapt to climate change, the economics have also shifted as investors continue to pour money into clean energy. For the Secretary-General what is missing is ‘political courage.’

He called for the urgency to turn commitment into action, to demonstrate a clear path to reaching the 1.3 trillion US dollars a year in climate finance for developing countries by 2035. To equip developing countries will be a climate justice package and a plan to close the adaptation finance gap.

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Image credit: Ueslei Marcelino/COP30