WEBVTT

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We are at a remarkable moment in time.

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We face over the next two decades

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two fundamental transformations

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that will determine whether the next 100 years

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is the best of centuries or the worst of centuries.

NOTE Paragraph

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Let me illustrate with an example.

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I first visited Beijing 25 years ago

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to teach at the People's University of China.

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China was getting serious about market economics

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and about university education,

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so they decided to call in the foreign experts.

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Like most other people,

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I moved around Beijing by bicycle.

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Apart from dodging the occasional vehicle,

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it was a safe and easy way to get around.

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Cycling in Beijing now

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is a completely different prospect.

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The roads are jammed by cars and trucks.

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The air is dangerously polluted

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from the burning of coal and diesel.

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When I was there last in the spring,

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there was an advisory for people of my age —

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over 65 —

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to stay indoors and not move much.

NOTE Paragraph

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How did this come about?

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It came from the way in which

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Beijing has grown as a city.

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It's doubled over those 25 years, more than doubled,

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from 10 million to 20 million.

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It's become a sprawling urban area

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dependent on dirty fuel, dirty energy,

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particularly coal.

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China burns half the world's coal each year,

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and that's why, it is a key reason why,

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it is the world's largest emitter

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of greenhouse gases.

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At the same time, we have to recognize

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that in that period China has grown remarkably.

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It has become the world's second largest economy.

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Hundreds of millions of people

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have been lifted out of poverty.

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That's really important.

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But at the same time, the people of China

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are asking the question:

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What's the value of this growth

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if our cities are unlivable?

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They've analyzed, diagnosed

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that this is an unsustainable path of growth

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and development.

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China's planning to scale back coal.

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It's looking to build its cities in different ways.

NOTE Paragraph

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Now, the growth of China

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is part of a dramatic change, fundamental change,

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in the structure of the world economy.

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Just 25 years ago, the developing countries,

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the poorer countries of the world,

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were, notwithstanding being
the vast majority of the people,

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they accounted for only about a third

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of the world's output.

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Now it's more than half;

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25 years from now, it will probably be two thirds

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from the countries that we saw 25 years ago

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as developing.

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That's a remarkable change.

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It means that most countries around the world,

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rich or poor, are going to be facing

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the two fundamental transformations

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that I want to talk about and highlight.

NOTE Paragraph

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Now, the first of these transformations

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is the basic structural change

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of the economies and societies

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that I've already begun to illustrate

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through the description of Beijing.

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Fifty percent now in urban areas.

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That's going to go to 70 percent in 2050.

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Over the next two decades, we'll see

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the demand for energy rise by 40 percent,

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and the growth in the economy and in the population

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is putting increasing pressure on our land,

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on our water and on our forests.

NOTE Paragraph

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This is profound structural change.

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If we manage it in a negligent

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or a shortsighted way,

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we will create waste, pollution, congestion,

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destruction of land and forests.

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If we think of those three areas that I have illustrated

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with my numbers — cities, energy, land —

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if we manage all that badly,

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then the outlook for the lives and livelihoods

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of the people around the world

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would be poor and damaged.

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And more than that,

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the emissions of greenhouse gases would rise,

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with immense risks to our climate.

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Concentrations of greenhouse gases

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in the atmosphere are already

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higher than they've been for millions of years.

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If we go on increasing those concentrations,

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we risk temperatures over the next century or so

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that we have not seen on this planet

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for tens of millions of years.

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We've been around as Homo sapiens —

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that's a rather generous definition, sapiens —

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for perhaps a quarter of a million
years, a quarter of a million.

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We risk temperatures we haven't seen

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for tens of millions of years over a century.

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That would transform the relationship

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between human beings and the planet.

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It would lead to changing deserts,

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changing rivers, changing patterns of hurricanes,

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changing sea levels,

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hundreds of millions of people,

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perhaps billions of people who would have to move,

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and if we've learned anything from history,

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that means severe and extended conflict.

NOTE Paragraph

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And we couldn't just turn it off.

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You can't make a peace treaty with the planet.

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You can't negotiate with the laws of physics.

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You're in there. You're stuck.

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Those are the stakes we're playing for,

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and that's why we have to make
this second transformation,

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the climate transformation,

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and move to a low-carbon economy.

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Now, the first of these transformations

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is going to happen anyway.

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We have to decide whether to do it well or badly,

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the economic, or structural, transformation.

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But the second of the transformations,

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the climate transformations, we have to decide to do.

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Those two transformations face us

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in the next two decades.

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The next two decades are decisive

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for what we have to do.

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Now, the more I've thought about this,

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the two transformations coming together,

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the more I've come to realize

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that this is an enormous opportunity.

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It's an opportunity which we can use

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or it's an opportunity which we can lose.

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And let me explain through those three key areas

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that I've identified: cities, energy and land.

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And let me start with cities.

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I've already described the problems of Beijing:

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pollution, congestion, waste and so on.

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Surely we recognize that in many of our cities

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around the world.

NOTE Paragraph

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Now, with cities, like life but particularly cities,

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you have to think ahead.

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The cities that are going to be built —

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and there are many, and many big ones —

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we have to think of how to design them

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in a compact way

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so we can save travel time 
and we can save energy.

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The cities that already are 
there, well established,

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we have to think about renewal
and investment in them

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so that we can connect ourselves much better

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within those cities, and make it easier,

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encourage more people, to live closer to the center.

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We've got examples building around the world

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of the kinds of ways in which we can do that.

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The bus rapid transport system in Bogotá in Colombia

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is a very important case of how to move around

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safely and quickly in a non-polluting way

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in a city: very frequent buses,

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strongly protected routes, the same service, really,

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as an underground railway system,

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but much, much cheaper

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and can be done much more quickly,

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a brilliant idea in many more cities

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around the world that's developing.

NOTE Paragraph

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Now, some things in cities do take time.

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Some things in cities can happen much more quickly.

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Take my hometown, London.

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In 1952, smog in London killed 4,000 people

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and badly damaged the lives of many, many more.

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And it happened all the time.

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For those of you live outside London in the U.K.

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will remember it used to be called The Smoke.

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That's the way London was.

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By regulating coal, within a few years

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the problems of smog were rapidly reduced.

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I remember the smogs well.

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When the visibility dropped to [less] than

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a few meters,

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they stopped the buses and I had to walk.

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This was the 1950s.

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I had to walk home three miles from school.

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Again, breathing was a hazardous activity.

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But it was changed. It was changed by a decision.

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Good decisions can bring good results,

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striking results, quickly.

NOTE Paragraph

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We've seen more: In London, we've
introduced the congestion charge,

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actually quite quickly and effectively,

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and we've seen great improvements

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in the bus system, and cleaned up the bus system.

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You can see that the two
transformations I've described,

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the structural and the climate,

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come very much together.

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But we have to invest. We have to invest in our cities,

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and we have to invest wisely, and if we do,

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we'll see cleaner cities, quieter cities, safer cities,

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more attractive cities, more productive cities,

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and stronger community in those cities —

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public transport, recycling, reusing,

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all sorts of things that bring communities together.

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We can do that, but we have to think,

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we have to invest, we have to plan.

NOTE Paragraph

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Let me turn to energy.

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Now, energy over the last 25 years

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has increased by about 50 percent.

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Eighty percent of that comes from fossil fuels.

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Over the next 20 years,

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perhaps it will increase by another 40 percent or so.

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We have to invest strongly in energy,

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we have to use it much more efficiently,

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and we have to make it clean.

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We can see how to do that.

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Take the example of California.

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It would be in the top 10 countries in the world

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if it was independent.

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I don't want to start any —

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(Laughter)

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California's a big place.

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(Laughter)

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In the next five or six years,

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they will likely move from

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around 20 percent in renewables —

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wind, solar and so on —

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to over 33 percent,

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and that would bring California back

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to greenhouse gas emissions in 2020

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to where they were in 1990,

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a period when the economy in California

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would more or less have doubled.

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That's a striking achievement.

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It shows what can be done.

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Not just California — the 
incoming government of India

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is planning to get solar technology

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to light up the homes

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of 400 million people

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who don't have electricity in India.

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They've set themselves a target of five years.

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I think they've got a good chance of doing that.

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We'll see, but what you're seeing now

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is people moving much more quickly.

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Four hundred million, more than the population

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of the United States.

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Those are the kinds of ambitions now

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people are setting themselves

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in terms of rapidity of change.

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Again, you can see

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good decisions can bring quick results,

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and those two transformations,
the economy and the structure

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and the climate and the low carbon,

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are intimately intertwined.

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Do the first one well, the structural,

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the second one on the climate

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becomes much easier.

NOTE Paragraph

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Look at land,

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land and particularly forests.

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Forests are the hosts to valuable

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plant and animal species.

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They hold water in the soil

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and they take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere,

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fundamental to the tackling of climate change.

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But we're losing our forests.

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In the last decade, we've lost a forest area

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the size of Portugal,

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and much more has been degraded.

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But we're already seeing

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that we can do so much about that.

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We can recognize the problem, but we can also

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understand how to tackle it.

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In Brazil, the rate of deforestation

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has been reduced by 70 percent

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over the last 10 years.

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How? By involving local communities,

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investing in their agriculture and their economies,

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by monitoring more carefully,

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by enforcing the law more strictly.

NOTE Paragraph

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And it's not just stopping deforestation.

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That's of course of first and fundamental importance,

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but it's also regrading degraded land,

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regenerating, rehabilitating degraded land.

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I first went to Ethiopia in 1967.

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It was desperately poor. In the following years,

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it suffered devastating famines

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and profoundly destructive social conflict.

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Over the last few years, actually more than a few,

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Ethiopia has been growing much more rapidly.

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It has ambitions to be a middle-income country

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15 years from now

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and to be carbon neutral.

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Again, I think it's a strong ambition

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but it is a plausible one.

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You're seeing that commitment there.

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You're seeing what can be done.

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Ethiopia is investing in clean energy.

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It's working in the rehabilitation of land.

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In Humbo, in southwest Ethiopia,

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a wonderful project

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to plant trees on degraded land

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and work with local communities

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on sustainable forest management

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has led to big increases in living standards.

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:04.550 --> 00:13:08.414
So we can see, from Beijing to London,

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from California to India,

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from Brazil to Ethiopia,

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we do understand

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how to manage those two transformations,

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the structural and the climate.

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We do understand how to manage those well.

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And technology is changing very rapidly.

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I don't have to list all those things

00:13:28.937 --> 00:13:30.828
to an audience like this,

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but you can see the electric cars,

00:13:33.122 --> 00:13:36.206
you can see the batteries using new materials.

00:13:36.206 --> 00:13:38.601
You can see that we can manage remotely now

00:13:38.601 --> 00:13:42.156
our household appliances on our
mobile phones when we're away.

00:13:42.156 --> 00:13:43.963
You can see better insulation.

00:13:43.963 --> 00:13:45.886
And there's much more coming.

NOTE Paragraph

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But, and it's a big but,

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the world as a whole

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is moving far too slowly.

00:13:52.670 --> 00:13:55.212
We're not cutting emissions in the way we should.

00:13:55.212 --> 00:13:57.923
We're not managing those structural transformations

00:13:57.923 --> 00:14:00.152
as we can.

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The depth of understanding of the
immense risks of climate change

00:14:03.391 --> 00:14:06.970
are not there yet.

00:14:06.970 --> 00:14:09.101
The depth of understanding

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of the attractiveness of what we can do

00:14:11.586 --> 00:14:15.250
is not there yet.

00:14:15.250 --> 00:14:18.748
We need political pressure to build.

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We need leaders to step up.

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We can have better growth,

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better climate, a better world.

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We can make,

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by managing those two transformations well,

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the next 100 years the best of centuries.

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If we make a mess of it,

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we, you and me, if we make a mess of it,

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if we don't manage those transformations properly,

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it will be, the next 100 years

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will be the worst of centuries.

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That's the major conclusion

00:14:53.227 --> 00:14:56.358
of the report on the economy and climate

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chaired by ex-President Felipe Calderón of Mexico,

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and I co-chaired that with him,

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and we handed that report yesterday

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here in New York, in the United Nations Building

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to the Secretary-General of the U.N.,

00:15:08.822 --> 00:15:10.088
Ban Ki-moon.

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We know that we can do this.

NOTE Paragraph

00:15:14.193 --> 00:15:17.575
Now, two weeks ago,

00:15:17.575 --> 00:15:20.975
I became a grandfather for the fourth time.

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Our daughter —

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(Baby cries) (Laughter) (Applause) —

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Our daughter gave birth to Rosa here in New York

00:15:36.621 --> 00:15:39.626
two weeks ago. Here are Helen and Rosa.

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(Applause)

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Two weeks old.

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Are we going to look our grandchildren in the eye

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and tell them that we understood the issues,

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that we recognized the dangers and the opportunities,

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and still we failed to act?

00:16:06.831 --> 00:16:10.310
Surely not. Let's make the next 100 years

00:16:10.310 --> 00:16:12.116
the best of centuries.

NOTE Paragraph

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(Applause)