Transition to renewable energy key issue at COP 31 talks

UN climate negotiations beginning in Turkey next week follow a year marked by environmental disasters, including heat waves across Europe and catastrophic flooding in Nepal. A key issue at this year's talks will be the implementation of pledges to phase out fossil fuels. It's very clear the reason we are seeing the breach of 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming is because we avoided The absolutely fundamental question of how climate change happened and what's responsible, the source of the problem, and that's fossil fuels, coal, oil and gas. So if you look at the convention or Paris Agreement, they don't deal with it. Negotiators at the COP31 summit will be looking at how to ensure implementation of earlier pledges and how to deliver funds to poorer nations to help them transition to renewable energy. There's always two topics in the climate negotiations that are relevant and difficult. The first one is who produces emissions, how much. That is difficult enough. But what is even more complicated is the other issue, and that is who pays. And on this one, we are particularly in a difficult situation because the U.S., as the largest contributor, has dropped out. And there's no other player who can jump in. Cleaner, cheaper, renewable energy is gaining global attention. But the transition away from fossil fuels is still too slow. Renewable energy is booming. Technology is improving. And the economies of clean energy increasingly make sense without anyone having to make a moral argument for it. And that gives me a lot of hope. Of course, the other story is very terrifying. And that is the climate impacts that are happening, that are accelerating much faster than our political and our financial systems are responding to. And that gives us reason to worry. But that doesn't mean we lose hope. COP 31 kicks off on Monday. The Leaders' Summit later in the week will bring heads of state together to present national commitments and try to advance solutions to the increasingly urgent climate crisis.