imagine that you walk into a room the
temperature of the room is maybe 15 16
16 and a half degrees it doesn’t really
make a difference to you right it’s
quite chilly for a room but let just
half of the grief of centigrade half a
degree of temperature change makes a big
difference for our world it makes a big
difference for our future that’s why I’m
here today I’d like to talk to you about
half a degree of warming and about our
capacity to actually deal with the
consequences just for the record it’s
now well established by science that
climate change is real the earth
temperatures are rising they’re rising
quickly it’s because of human activities
and the consequences are dire but just
how dire those consequences will be was
not precisely known until recently about
one and a half year ago about hundreds
experts including myself worked for the
IPCC the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change on the reports on the
consequences of global warming of one
and a half degrees centigrade now you
might wonder why one and a half degrees
well there’s a story here you may also
know that’s in December 2015 in Paris
the world leaders gathered to agree
among each other what to do about
climate change so all the world leaders
all the country leaders came together
and talked about climate change that’s
actually quite quite special and what’s
even more special is that they managed
to agree on something they agreed on the
Paris agreements and the Paris agreement
says that we should jointly keep
temperature rise to well below two
degrees centigrade and pursue efforts to
so there’s not really a target in there
right they said well below two or one
and a half and they didn’t really know
what the difference would be so they
asked the scientist to give them some
answers so that’s what we worked on for
the past year and a half and it was
quite a lot of work actually
we finished the report last month
October 2018 and I’m gonna tell you
something about the conclusions I will
start with the bad news
and hopefully ends with some good news
so the first conclusion was that we are
already at one degree warmer the earth
is already one degree centigrades warmer
than before we started emitting lots of
greenhouse gases and we are feeling the
consequences in the Netherlands we had a
nice and long and very sunny summer but
other people have not been so lucky we
had devastating forest fires in
California very recently we had
tremendous floods in southern India
which cost hundreds of lives we’ve seen
droughts in southern Africa
unprecedented hurricanes in North
America as it was so hot in the
Netherlands last summer I was sitting at
home and I was thinking to myself it has
really started it is now upon us and it
was chilling frankly despite the heat
another conclusion of the IPCC report is
what exactly is the difference between
one and a half and two degrees and also
there we have some pretty strong
conclusions it makes a huge difference
it’s essentially the difference between
manageable disaster and out rights
catastrophe for instance the world’s
coral reefs they’re quite pretty to look
at
but it’s not just pretty that they are
they actually support the life of many
many people around the world not just
for their food in the food systems that
they provide but also for their income
because of tourism for instance the IPCC
report concluded that at 2 degrees of
warming
Oh coral reefs in the world’s will
disappear completely
we will not see them anymore at one and
a half degrees at least some of them
would be left so that’s some good news
another example sea level rise we’re
here in Amsterdam already a few metres
below sea level so we’re kind of used to
it in a two-degree scenario the sea
level would in the year 2100 s be 10
centimeters higher than in a one and a
half degree scenario and in the longer
run this difference movie would be much
bigger so 10 centimeters about that
there’s much it doesn’t really look like
much but if you are what the manager
here in the Netherlands you know it
makes a difference and if you look at
live in a Pacific atoll like the people
on the picture right here in the nation
of Tuvalu you know it makes a big
difference actually for them it’s the
difference between having a country and
not having a country at all I can go on
with the consequences stronger
hurricanes an ice-free Arctic every
hundred years in a two-degree scenario
every 10 years every 10 years in a
two-degree scenario every hundred years
in a one and a half degree scenario more
forest fires more droughts extinction of
species probably a vast increase in the
amount of displaced people because parts
of the world’s would become
uninhabitable and that will cause a lot
of refugees what we’ve seen so far might
just be the start fortunately there are
also some positive conclusions in the
IPCC report there is still hope we can
still keep temperature rise below 1.5 C
we can still do it we haven’t crossed
the threshold we have to agree on very
big changes and we have to do them right
now by 2050 in 30 years we would have to
reduce our co2 emissions to zero
globally not just in a developed country
globally and this will require lots of
changes in the way we live but in a way
it’s also a good thing because at least
we still have something to choose
if we decide for one and a half degrees
and changing our lives to do this and
it’s quite imaginable to live well in a
1.5 C consistent way at least we will
avoid a lot of the chaos that we would
be calling upon ourselves if we go to
two degrees or even more which is what
we are bound to right now so we can
still choose the future that we want so
the IPCC basically summarized three
things first we’re already at one degree
warming and if we continue at the same
pace we will exceed one and a half
degrees by about 2040 so in 20 years
from now we will most of us will live to
see that and our children certainly will
the difference secondly the difference
between one and a half and two degrees
is huge in terms of impacts every little
bit of warming matters and thirdly we
can still limit warming by the end of
the century to one and a half degrees we
can still avoid all these consequences
so it seems to make a lot of sense to
take action right and you’ve probably
all heard what you can do it’s all over
the news all the time you can eat less
meats and use less dairy you can
transport yourself by bicycle electric
vehicles more public transports you
should probably insulate your house and
make them hyper efficient source your
energy from low carbon sources solar
winds potentially nuclear energy and we
should clean up our industries to make
our products low-carbon and I’d really
like to tell you to do all these things
and you should but there’s still a bit
of a problem here I don’t know if you
ever tried to renovate your house in a
low-carbon way I did and it’s actually
quite hard where do you get the low
carbon building materials which steel
companies producing low carbon steel
technically it’s possible it’s not
happening if you want to cycle
everywhere here in Amsterdam it’s
probably very possible but in many
places of the world the infrastructure
just isn’t there
it’s not safe to cycle everywhere or
it’s roundup
let’s look down on culturally if we want
to limit warming to one and a half
degrees we need to change the systems
that we live in as well and in order to
do that we need policy we need the
change in finance and we need a
different direction of technological
innovation but there’s one thing that I
would really like to emphasize something
that is generally a bit underestimated
that is not talked about so much and
that is capacity do we actually have the
capacity the human skills the education
systems the skills of our entrepreneurs
in our and our workers of our civil
servants to actually make this change I
don’t think we have we need a much
bigger set and spreads a global spread
of capacity in order to make this happen
I’ll illustrate this with an example the
country of Indonesia it’s a big country
250 million people even more by now it
had a pretty steady economic growth is
actually quite going quite well with
Indonesia 5 percent per year or so over
the past 10 to 15 years and it’s
although there’s still widespread
poverty in Indonesia there’s also a
rising middle class a lot of people are
leading a much more high-quality life
they’re buying cars they can afford
themselves air-conditioned homes they
have appliances fridges but the
interesting thing is almost none of
these appliances none of these cars are
actually manufactured in Indonesia
everybody’s buying them from abroad from
China maybe Europe they’re importing it
into Indonesia and how is Indonesia
paying for those imports it’s exporting
lots of raw materials an example is palm
oil you’ve probably heard about the
plantations that are going at the
expense of lots of pristine rainforest
also contributing to climate change but
what you probably didn’t know is that
Indonesia is one of the world’s biggest
exporters of coal and coal is one of the
most polluting fossil fuels so Indonesia
essentially is
exporting climate change and the really
interesting part is that actually
Indonesia is not even benefiting that
much okay they had nice economic growth
but they’re not adding much value to
their own natural resources the added
value is happening in countries like
China and the United States where
actually the skills exist to add value
so the core problem again in Indonesia
to modernize its own economy is capacity
the education system just isn’t geared
up for that and if Indonesia is not even
able to do this in the conventional
economy what will happen if we need to
switch to a completely green economy as
well
this will have to have to happen very
very fast this is not a problem that is
unique to Indonesia unfortunately it
happens in more countries of the world
we need much more human capacity to make
this happen but it’s really Indonesia’s
own business to have the capacity to
develop its own economy right it’s up to
them but that’s actually all of our
business to develop the skill sets to
stay below 1.5 C it is in all of our
interest to do this so the conclusion is
we should really work on this capacity
development together we need
international collaboration to do this
now back to the Paris agreements
actually the parties the countries in
the Paris agreement agreed to develop
this capacity together it’s in the Paris
agreements the problem is the countries
are not doing it and we are not even
holding them to their responsibility in
order to limit warming to 1.5 C we need
much more capacity in the world without
that countries will not develop their
prosperous and green economies that we
need and our one-and-a-half the green
target will be out of sight in no time
and we now know what that means
so in order to stay below 1.5 C all of
us all of you should things change
things in your personal lives but also
in your professional lives many of you
will have international networks many of
you have jobs that actually matter for
this space you
teachers or you might be working in a
car factory or elsewhere you can do
things in your professional life as well
to make a change please ask yourself to
do that and share experience with each
other talk with each other about what
it’s like to live in a warming world and
what it’s like to prevent worse we can
still stay below 1.5 C but we have to
build capacity to do that this will not
happen by itself or on its own we are
now at a time that we have the last
final half a degree and it’s critical
for our survival that we make this
happen thank you
temperature of the room is maybe 15 16
16 and a half degrees it doesn’t really
make a difference to you right it’s
quite chilly for a room but let just
half of the grief of centigrade half a
degree of temperature change makes a big
difference for our world it makes a big
difference for our future that’s why I’m
here today I’d like to talk to you about
half a degree of warming and about our
capacity to actually deal with the
consequences just for the record it’s
now well established by science that
climate change is real the earth
temperatures are rising they’re rising
quickly it’s because of human activities
and the consequences are dire but just
how dire those consequences will be was
not precisely known until recently about
one and a half year ago about hundreds
experts including myself worked for the
IPCC the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change on the reports on the
consequences of global warming of one
and a half degrees centigrade now you
might wonder why one and a half degrees
well there’s a story here you may also
know that’s in December 2015 in Paris
the world leaders gathered to agree
among each other what to do about
climate change so all the world leaders
all the country leaders came together
and talked about climate change that’s
actually quite quite special and what’s
even more special is that they managed
to agree on something they agreed on the
Paris agreements and the Paris agreement
says that we should jointly keep
temperature rise to well below two
degrees centigrade and pursue efforts to
so there’s not really a target in there
right they said well below two or one
and a half and they didn’t really know
what the difference would be so they
asked the scientist to give them some
answers so that’s what we worked on for
the past year and a half and it was
quite a lot of work actually
we finished the report last month
October 2018 and I’m gonna tell you
something about the conclusions I will
start with the bad news
and hopefully ends with some good news
so the first conclusion was that we are
already at one degree warmer the earth
is already one degree centigrades warmer
than before we started emitting lots of
greenhouse gases and we are feeling the
consequences in the Netherlands we had a
nice and long and very sunny summer but
other people have not been so lucky we
had devastating forest fires in
California very recently we had
tremendous floods in southern India
which cost hundreds of lives we’ve seen
droughts in southern Africa
unprecedented hurricanes in North
America as it was so hot in the
Netherlands last summer I was sitting at
home and I was thinking to myself it has
really started it is now upon us and it
was chilling frankly despite the heat
another conclusion of the IPCC report is
what exactly is the difference between
one and a half and two degrees and also
there we have some pretty strong
conclusions it makes a huge difference
it’s essentially the difference between
manageable disaster and out rights
catastrophe for instance the world’s
coral reefs they’re quite pretty to look
at
but it’s not just pretty that they are
they actually support the life of many
many people around the world not just
for their food in the food systems that
they provide but also for their income
because of tourism for instance the IPCC
report concluded that at 2 degrees of
warming
Oh coral reefs in the world’s will
disappear completely
we will not see them anymore at one and
a half degrees at least some of them
would be left so that’s some good news
another example sea level rise we’re
here in Amsterdam already a few metres
below sea level so we’re kind of used to
it in a two-degree scenario the sea
level would in the year 2100 s be 10
centimeters higher than in a one and a
half degree scenario and in the longer
run this difference movie would be much
bigger so 10 centimeters about that
there’s much it doesn’t really look like
much but if you are what the manager
here in the Netherlands you know it
makes a difference and if you look at
live in a Pacific atoll like the people
on the picture right here in the nation
of Tuvalu you know it makes a big
difference actually for them it’s the
difference between having a country and
not having a country at all I can go on
with the consequences stronger
hurricanes an ice-free Arctic every
hundred years in a two-degree scenario
every 10 years every 10 years in a
two-degree scenario every hundred years
in a one and a half degree scenario more
forest fires more droughts extinction of
species probably a vast increase in the
amount of displaced people because parts
of the world’s would become
uninhabitable and that will cause a lot
of refugees what we’ve seen so far might
just be the start fortunately there are
also some positive conclusions in the
IPCC report there is still hope we can
still keep temperature rise below 1.5 C
we can still do it we haven’t crossed
the threshold we have to agree on very
big changes and we have to do them right
now by 2050 in 30 years we would have to
reduce our co2 emissions to zero
globally not just in a developed country
globally and this will require lots of
changes in the way we live but in a way
it’s also a good thing because at least
we still have something to choose
if we decide for one and a half degrees
and changing our lives to do this and
it’s quite imaginable to live well in a
1.5 C consistent way at least we will
avoid a lot of the chaos that we would
be calling upon ourselves if we go to
two degrees or even more which is what
we are bound to right now so we can
still choose the future that we want so
the IPCC basically summarized three
things first we’re already at one degree
warming and if we continue at the same
pace we will exceed one and a half
degrees by about 2040 so in 20 years
from now we will most of us will live to
see that and our children certainly will
the difference secondly the difference
between one and a half and two degrees
is huge in terms of impacts every little
bit of warming matters and thirdly we
can still limit warming by the end of
the century to one and a half degrees we
can still avoid all these consequences
so it seems to make a lot of sense to
take action right and you’ve probably
all heard what you can do it’s all over
the news all the time you can eat less
meats and use less dairy you can
transport yourself by bicycle electric
vehicles more public transports you
should probably insulate your house and
make them hyper efficient source your
energy from low carbon sources solar
winds potentially nuclear energy and we
should clean up our industries to make
our products low-carbon and I’d really
like to tell you to do all these things
and you should but there’s still a bit
of a problem here I don’t know if you
ever tried to renovate your house in a
low-carbon way I did and it’s actually
quite hard where do you get the low
carbon building materials which steel
companies producing low carbon steel
technically it’s possible it’s not
happening if you want to cycle
everywhere here in Amsterdam it’s
probably very possible but in many
places of the world the infrastructure
just isn’t there
it’s not safe to cycle everywhere or
it’s roundup
let’s look down on culturally if we want
to limit warming to one and a half
degrees we need to change the systems
that we live in as well and in order to
do that we need policy we need the
change in finance and we need a
different direction of technological
innovation but there’s one thing that I
would really like to emphasize something
that is generally a bit underestimated
that is not talked about so much and
that is capacity do we actually have the
capacity the human skills the education
systems the skills of our entrepreneurs
in our and our workers of our civil
servants to actually make this change I
don’t think we have we need a much
bigger set and spreads a global spread
of capacity in order to make this happen
I’ll illustrate this with an example the
country of Indonesia it’s a big country
250 million people even more by now it
had a pretty steady economic growth is
actually quite going quite well with
Indonesia 5 percent per year or so over
the past 10 to 15 years and it’s
although there’s still widespread
poverty in Indonesia there’s also a
rising middle class a lot of people are
leading a much more high-quality life
they’re buying cars they can afford
themselves air-conditioned homes they
have appliances fridges but the
interesting thing is almost none of
these appliances none of these cars are
actually manufactured in Indonesia
everybody’s buying them from abroad from
China maybe Europe they’re importing it
into Indonesia and how is Indonesia
paying for those imports it’s exporting
lots of raw materials an example is palm
oil you’ve probably heard about the
plantations that are going at the
expense of lots of pristine rainforest
also contributing to climate change but
what you probably didn’t know is that
Indonesia is one of the world’s biggest
exporters of coal and coal is one of the
most polluting fossil fuels so Indonesia
essentially is
exporting climate change and the really
interesting part is that actually
Indonesia is not even benefiting that
much okay they had nice economic growth
but they’re not adding much value to
their own natural resources the added
value is happening in countries like
China and the United States where
actually the skills exist to add value
so the core problem again in Indonesia
to modernize its own economy is capacity
the education system just isn’t geared
up for that and if Indonesia is not even
able to do this in the conventional
economy what will happen if we need to
switch to a completely green economy as
well
this will have to have to happen very
very fast this is not a problem that is
unique to Indonesia unfortunately it
happens in more countries of the world
we need much more human capacity to make
this happen but it’s really Indonesia’s
own business to have the capacity to
develop its own economy right it’s up to
them but that’s actually all of our
business to develop the skill sets to
stay below 1.5 C it is in all of our
interest to do this so the conclusion is
we should really work on this capacity
development together we need
international collaboration to do this
now back to the Paris agreements
actually the parties the countries in
the Paris agreement agreed to develop
this capacity together it’s in the Paris
agreements the problem is the countries
are not doing it and we are not even
holding them to their responsibility in
order to limit warming to 1.5 C we need
much more capacity in the world without
that countries will not develop their
prosperous and green economies that we
need and our one-and-a-half the green
target will be out of sight in no time
and we now know what that means
so in order to stay below 1.5 C all of
us all of you should things change
things in your personal lives but also
in your professional lives many of you
will have international networks many of
you have jobs that actually matter for
this space you
teachers or you might be working in a
car factory or elsewhere you can do
things in your professional life as well
to make a change please ask yourself to
do that and share experience with each
other talk with each other about what
it’s like to live in a warming world and
what it’s like to prevent worse we can
still stay below 1.5 C but we have to
build capacity to do that this will not
happen by itself or on its own we are
now at a time that we have the last
final half a degree and it’s critical
for our survival that we make this
happen thank you
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