If you think the line "with great power comes great responsibility" applies only to Spider-Man, Bill Gates would like you to think again.
The philanthropist and co-founder of Microsoft (MSFT) has long been a champion of environmental causes, including Breakthrough Energy, a climate-technology investment initiative that Gates launched in 2015 at the UN Climate Change Conference in Paris.
Gates appeared at the the group's three-day inaugural summit on Oct. 18, which, he tweeted, hosted "a gathering in Seattle where scientists, inventors, entrepreneurs, public officials, and corporate leaders from around the world will talk about what it’s going to take to get to net-zero emissions."
'Unrealistic and Unfair'
"Low- and middle-income countries are building aggressively to achieve the standard of living their people aspire to -- and they should be," Gates wrote in an essay on his personal blog.
"Many countries in Europe and North America filled the atmosphere with carbon to achieve prosperity, and it is both unrealistic and unfair to expect everyone else to forgo a more comfortable life because that carbon turned out to change the climate."
Three-quarters of the global population lives in emerging economies like Brazil, China, India, and South Africa, Gates said, "and although historically they played a very small role in causing climate change, they are now responsible for two-thirds of total greenhouse-gas emissions."
China by itself emits more than one quarter, he said, "so solutions can’t be dependent on unique conditions in a single country or region."
"They have to work in all countries, or the temperature will continue to rise," he wrote. "We use so much energy, and we have invested so much in the machinery to generate it. Now, in the span of about 30 years, we have to decommission it all and start over again with clean technologies."
He added that Russia's war in Ukraine and the energy crisis it caused "are putting pressure on the growing climate consensus on the continent."
'Avoid a Climate Disaster'
"Some countries have recently invested in new fossil-fuel projects, which only trades one major problem for another," he said. "Ultimately, net zero and energy security are two sides of the same coin. Clean-energy innovations are the only way to achieve either one."
Gates said that many critical clean technologies aren’t yet anywhere near cheap enough to compete.
"We need sustainable liquid fuels for long-haul transportation; affordable ways to capture CO2 directly from the atmosphere; additional sources of renewable energy to keep up with global demand that will double or triple as we electrify more and more process," he said.
Gates said that this will give other countries that didn’t have much to do with causing climate change a chance to stop emitting greenhouse gases while growing their economies and raising their standard of living.
"I am optimistic about what people are capable of in a crisis, and in the long run, I wouldn’t bet against us," he wrote. "Unfortunately, we don’t have the luxury of a long run. We have already achieved many energy breakthroughs. We need to achieve more, faster, to avoid a climate disaster."
