Long time climate activist Al Gore was present in Dubai

Former vice-president Al Gore, of course, was on stage Sunday, December 3 at the United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP 28) in Dubai. Presenting data on emissions and pollution, throwing in some basics on the atmosphere and using common language, he recapitulated on the origins of the climate crisis, with 162 million tons of manmade pollution being poured in the sky every day. He affirmed the current energy trapped in the atmosphere by manmade pollution is the equivalent to detonating 750,000 Hiroshima-class atomic bombs every day, 365 days a year.

With graphs and numbers Mr. Gore called attention to the worsening of the crisis as time goes by. This year is the hottest ever measured with instruments, as well as November being the hottest November ever registered. He also referenced UN Secretary General António Guterres opening statement for COP 28, “The science is clear: The 1.5-degree limit is only possible if we ultimately stop burning all fossil fuels. Not reduce. Not abate. Phaseout – with a clear timeframe aligned with 1.5 degrees”. On the matter of the success or failure of the international meeting, he considered that only the commitment of phasing out of fossil fuels would be a success. He asserted the climate crisis is mainly a fossil fuel crisis.

The famous advocate to fight climate change also referenced record high temperatures around the world, with some regions, like the Middle East and North Africa being driven to be physiologically uninhabitable. Regarding the heat in the ocean, in the last twenty years the amount of it has increased dramatically, impacting the behavior of ocean-based storms, with 2023 being the first year in history with category 5 cyclonic storms present in all the tropical ocean basins around the planet. An example is Hurricane Otis, which hit Acapulco in Mexico last October, which went from tropical storm to category 5 hurricane in such a short time span (some hours), there was little time for warning and evacuation, with devastating impacts.

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Extreme rain events were also an important part of his presentation. According to his information, a million and a half people have been driven from their homes due to floodings in Africa. On September 7, Hong Kong also suffered a rain bomb, the largest rain fall ever measured, 154 mm of rain in one hour. Likewise, the city of Derna in Libya was flooded and destroyed. Thousands died after heavy rainfall caused two city dams to collapse. Mr. Gore sustained these tragedies are becoming commonplace. Droughts and fires were also in his assessment.

COP 28 has, at its core, the Global Stocktake, an evaluation of how much progress countries have achieved in their commitments towards their Paris Agreement goals. The former vice president of the United States, while promoting the importance of Climate TRACE data, group to which he belongs, accused countries of not submitting important information for the climate agreements.

According to him, 71 countries have not submitted any data on emissions for any of the years covered by the stocktake, and 101 nations have submitted no inventories of emissions for any of the past five years. Ultimately, he said, no nation had emitted an emissions inventory for 2022 yet. Climate TRACE would share the categories for those countries starting from the day of his presentation.

Gavin McCormick, Climate Trace co-founder, showcased the works and usefulness of the platform to make emissions information publicly available. The online site allows users to explore sources of emissions by real world facilities and data. Derived from satellite image analysis, algorithms and other resources, the organizations data effort seeks to have a complete stocktake on emissions from Annex 1 and non-Annex 1 countries, independently produced and not self-reported.

Al Gore concluded the exposition by distributing responsibilities among China, India, Russia, and the United States, as well as some other countries, industries, and companies on some of the most polluting and harmful activities worldwide. He also exposed oil and gas companies’ practices on misinformation on their responsibility on warming climate. With these new tools, like Climate TRACE, he assured information on emissions and pollution will be harder to hide, while those responsible for climate change easier to pinpoint.

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