The era of “global boiling” is here, with United Nations scientists warning that drastic steps are needed to prevent climate change catastrophe. But Bill Gates is still optimistic that it won’t get to that.
The Microsoft co-founder said he is “glass half-full” when it comes to preventing the worst of climate change’s devastating impacts, on the second day of the COP28 summit.
Speaking on stage in Dubai where more than 160 world leaders convened for the 28th year to discuss the ever-growing threat of global warming, Gates said he believed there were many encouraging climate solutions, with the caveat that such innovation requires support from policymakers and business leaders.
“Now, we need to take what looks very promising and scale it up, build the pilot plants, prove those out,” the billionaire philanthropist told CNBC’s Tania Bryer, as reported by the publication. “And that requires government policies, it requires the big corporations to come in and so all these different communities that have to come together, they are represented here.”
“It is a super important issue,” he added, but “it’s definitely glass half-full.”
Cop 28: All talk, no action?
Gates is famously optimistic, having previously described the personality trait as his superpower. So it would be easy to gloss over his sentiments as yet another leader looking at a crisis with rose-tinted glasses.
After all, conferences such as COP28 are often criticized for being all talk and no action. “The COP has turned into a PR event, where leaders are giving beautiful speeches and announcing fancy commitments and targets, while behind the curtains governments of the Global North countries are still refusing to take any drastic climate action,” climate activist Greta Thunberg said previously.
However, Gates insisted that the globe needs platforms such as Cop28—and its mass reach with around 70,000 delegates from 198 countries—for answers.
“You know, I think 70,000 people and it seems like, 'Wow, do we need that many?' But in fact, a lot of meetings here will be where those companies get the backing and the kind of experience of big companies, the government help, and [where] these entrepreneurs are going to come together,” Gates said.
“And so, facilitating the speed of innovation and the speed of the scale-up, that’s my big hope for COP28.”
Balancing concern and optimism
What’s more, the world’s fourth richest man proved he’s not blindly optimistic, admitting that society is “falling short of our aspirations in many areas”. But he doubled down that the conference is providing a space for business leaders and influential figures to connect and drive progress.
“We haven’t gone as fast as we’d like and yet particularly, if you see in the innovation pavilion, these smaller companies, the ideas cover all the areas of emissions. And there’s hope that many of these clean approaches given time won’t cost extra,” Gates added, pointing to the decreasing cost of solar electricity and EV batteries.
“And so, that same magic of invention and scale up, if we apply that broadly... I have hope that despite these delays and incredible complexity that the message coming out of these meetings does help drive progress,” Gates said.
His balancing act of concern and optimism was echoed by the UN’s former climate chief earlier at the Cop28 summit.
“We have to keep the outrage really high because we are so darn late,” Christiana Figueres said, while pointing to weak government policies aimed at cutting back pollution and the $7 trillion with which they directly and indirectly subsidize fossil fuels.
However, she added that there were grounds for optimism that could prevent individuals from descending into "a dark rabbit hole”, like the increasing affordability of renewable energy and the growth of electric cars.
“I do make a conscious choice every morning to say ‘yes, I know what all the bad news is’—that’s easy to get because that just screams at you from whatever news feed you have—but also, what is positive that is going out there? What are the disruptive pieces that are real, strong evidence of the fact that this is changing?”
