UN Climate Chief at NY Climate Week: Defining the New Era of Climate Action; Getting Behind Paris and Stepping it up at COP30 and Beyond

Below are remarks delivered by UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell at New York Climate Week on 22 September 2025, during a flagship event hosted by Mission 2025, focused on the rise of the new economy, and launching the new Inside COP30 podcast series, by Outrage & Optimism.

Friends,

People often ask me: what needs to happen from here?

In truth, many things. But let me boil it down.

This new era of climate action must be about bringing our process closer to the real economy: accelerating implementation and spreading the colossal benefits of climate action to billions more people.

Connecting the cabinet rooms closer to the boardrooms to the living rooms is how we supercharge climate action, and get this job done.

No easy task. But together we [have built] an extraordinary foundation.

Because if we look past the noise, the facts show a world aligning with the Paris Agreement.

Investment in renewables has increased ten-fold in ten years.

The clean energy transition is booming across almost all major economies, and hit 2 trillion dollars last year alone.

But this boom is uneven. Its vast benefits are not shared by all.

Meanwhile, climate disasters are hitting every economy and society harder every year.

So we need to step it up. And we need to step it up fast.

The good news is we're not waiting for miracles.

The economics are on our side. Today, over 90% of new renewables cost less than the cheapest new fossil option.

The technologies and solutions already exist.

Clean power, electrification, efficiency and storage, resilience-building.

The toolkits are there, and being put to work.

But to ramp up implementation, we need that toolkit in every nation's hands.

Because the next step is to extend this Paris-alignment country by country, sector by sector, across every stream of finance - using the next Global Stocktake as the timeline to get there.

To succeed in a fast-changing world, we must enhance the force-multipliers.

Take industrial transformation: the clean industry underpins stronger economies, more resilient supply chains, lower costs and lower emissions.

Yet 1.6 trillion dollars worth of projects remain idle.

That is wasted potential.

In the next five years we can unleash huge progress - powered by innovators and entrepreneurs, enabled by Paris-aligned governments, creating millions of good jobs.

That is why I fully support Build Clean Now - a global initiative to fast-track clean industry shifts, led by the Industrial Transition Accelerator, being launched later this afternoon.

The same principle applies to AI.

AI is not a ready-made solution, and it carries risks. But it can also be a game-changer. So we now need to blunt its dangerous edges, sharpen its catalytic ones, and put it astutely to work.

I echo the Secretary-General: if you run a major AI platform, power it with renewables, and innovate to drive energy efficiency.

Jobs and livelihoods must be protected. Done properly, AI releases human capacity, not replaces it. That is our approach within the Secretariat, as we explore how AI can improve our own work.

Most important it is powered to drive real-world outcomes: managing microgrids, mapping climate risk, guiding resilience planning. And this is just the beginning.

As this new era of implementation gathers pace, we must also keep evolving, and striving towards faster, fully-inclusive, higher-quality decisions that tie the formal process ever-closer to real economies and real lives.

I have asked senior experts to examine how our process could be improved, within our mandates from Parties. Later this year I'll receive their ideas and feedback. Any wish to pursue, we will consult on them in 2026, foremost with Parties who ultimately own this process.

But friends, should we also never lose sight of how far we've come.

Imperfect, yes - but recent COPs have delivered concrete results and global steps forward.

Without UN climate cooperation, we were heading for 5 degrees of heating - an impossible future. Today we are closer to 3 degrees. Still too high - but bending the curve. Later this year we will see how much closer the next round of plans gets us to 1.5.

We will also release a status report on adaptation efforts, and an initial picture of implementation from transparency reports.

The Roadmap to 1.3 trillion is also expected from the COP29 and COP30 Presidencies before the COP.

We must be clear-eyed in recognizing what all this data tells us - both the risks and the opportunities.

And then it's all eyes on COP30.

What must it do?

It must respond - to the state of the NDCs, to the roadmap to 1.3 trillion dollars annually of accessible finance, deployable at speed and scale, to progress made and where acceleration is most needed. It must show climate multilateralism continues to deliver: with strong outcomes across all negotiations.

It must spur faster and wider implementation, across all sectors and economies, especially those not yet pricing in climate risks and opportunities.

And it must leave no-one behind. That means delivering for the most vulnerable in all regions, especially emerging and developing countries.

And it must speak more clearly to billions more people - showing that bold climate action means better jobs, higher living standards, cleaner air, healthier lives, secure food, affordable energy and transport.

This is the story of the new economy rising, and this COP30 podcast series by Outrage and Optimism, is a great chance to tell it to more people around the world.

Friends, let's also recognize that the world's climate story doesn't begin or end at COP30. Every COP builds on the last. That is how we forge progress and deliver real results.

Every COP has its challenges. And there are always naysayers. But they are only the story if we make them the story.

Right now we need to reaffirm, sending a stronger, unmistakable signal: the world is still rock-solid behind Paris, and fully on-board for climate cooperation - because it works, and together we will make it work faster.

Not only at COP, but here in New York, at the G20, at Pre-COP, and in every forum.

So let's keep it up, and let's step it up. Humanity cannot afford to let it stumble.

Let's Recognize. Reaffirm. Respond. This is the path to, through, and beyond Belém.

I thank you.