Climate Week NYC: UN Climate Chief on AI, Energy & COP30

"If we look past the noise, the facts show a world aligning with the Paris Agreement," says Simon Stiell, Executive Secretary of UN Climate Change, at Climate Week NYC 2025. 

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

Simon explained: "To succeed in a fast-changing world, we must harness the force-multipliers."

AI, clean energy, finance and COP30 were all topics on the table, and Simon gave advice for leaders around the world to continue making progress on sustainability.

Fundamentally, Simon expresses that leaders must continue to stand behind sustainability progress and continue working together: "Let’s Recognise. Reaffirm. Respond. This is the pathway to, through and beyond Belém."

Sustainability progress so far

"The clean energy transition is booming across almost all major economies, and hit USD$2tn last year alone," Simon says. 

"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 toolkit is there and being put to work." 

The next step, Simon explains, is to extend alignment with the Paris agreement "country by country, sector by sector, across every stream of finance" and use the next Global Stocktake as the timeline to achieve this.

"We should also never lose sight of how far we’ve come. Imperfect, yes – but recent COPs have delivered concrete results and global steps forward," Simon says.

"Without UN climate cooperation, we were heading for 5 degrees of heating – an impossible future.

"Today we are closer to 3. 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."

Industrial and AI transformation

"Clean industry underpins stronger economies, more resilient supply chains, lower costs and lower emissions," Simon says. "Yet US$1.6tn 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."

The same principle, Simon believes, applies to AI.

"AI is not a ready-made solution and it carries risks. But it can also be a game-changer. 

"We now need to blunt its dangerous edges, sharpen its catalytic ones and put it astutely to work."

He says that, done properly, AI can release human capacity instead of replacing it and that the Secretariat is taking this approach to improve its own work.

"Most important is its power to drive real-world outcomes: managing microgrids, mapping climate risk, guiding resilient planning. This is just the beginning," Simon explains.

What happens next at COP30

The Baku to Belém Roadmap to 1.3T is a plan to mobilise at least US$1.3tn annually by 2035 to support climate action in developing countries.

It was adopted at COP29 and is being developed by the COP29 and COP30 Presidencies to present solutions by COP30 in Belém. 

The Roadmap aims to address the finance gap left by the COP29 agreement on the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG) and will explore reforms in multilateral finance, improve access to funds and unlock large-scale investments. 

"We must be clear-eyed in recognising what all this data tells us – both the risks and the opportunities," Simon says.

COP30, he believes, "must respond" to the state of the NDCs, to the finance roadmap, 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.  

"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."

Simon also explains that despite naysayers, missing goals or lacking progress, "the world’s climate story doesn’t begin or end at COP30".

"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."