Guterres warns climate crisis is ‘outrunning’ world, calls for urgent shift from fossil fuels
On international cooperation, Guterres warned that trade barriers, technology monopolies and geopolitical rivalries could make the global energy transition more expensive and leave billions of people behind
ANTALYA, November 11, 2026 – United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has warned that the climate crisis is advancing faster than global efforts to contain it, calling for urgent action to accelerate the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy.
Guterres said global emissions reached record levels in 2025, while rising temperatures and increasingly severe climate disasters continued to threaten lives, livelihoods and economies worldwide.
“Our first climate duty is to tell the truth. The brutal truth is that the climate crisis is outrunning us,” Guterres said while addressing the COP31 Leaders’ Summit in Antalya, Türkiye, on Wednesday.
He noted that the last four years had been the hottest on record, warning that the world was heading towards potentially devastating consequences if governments failed to accelerate climate action.
The UN chief said exceeding the 1.5 degrees Celsius global warming threshold agreed under the 2015 Paris Agreement was now inevitable, but stressed that countries could still limit the scale and duration of the overshoot.
“Science is not telling us to surrender. It’s telling us to fight harder,” he said, adding that decisive leadership was needed to prevent a temporary breach of the temperature target from becoming permanent.
Guterres identified three major lessons from the past decade, including the rapid growth of renewable energy, the declining economic case for fossil fuels and the slow pace of global climate action.
He cited the expansion of solar power, which he said accounted for nearly three-quarters of the growth in global electricity demand last year, compared with just one per cent of global electricity generation a decade ago.
He also noted that electric vehicles were gaining ground, with nearly one in every three new cars expected to be electric this year, compared with one in every 100 a decade ago.
According to Guterres, clean energy has become the cheapest source of new electricity in most parts of the world, demonstrating the potential for a rapid transition despite political and economic resistance.
He argued that dependence on fossil fuels was increasingly exposing countries to economic and energy insecurity, particularly because three-quarters of the world’s population live in countries that import fossil fuels.
“It’s time to accelerate a science-aligned, just, orderly and equitable transition to renewables,” he said.
However, he accused fossil fuel interests of deliberately undermining climate action through misinformation, policy delays and efforts to avoid accountability.
“The dinosaurs did not have a lobby. But fossil fuels do,” Guterres said, urging governments to end their dependence on coal, oil and gas.
He warned that global emissions needed to decline by approximately six per cent annually, but existing national climate plans, including conditional commitments, would deliver at best only a third of the required reductions.
Even if fully implemented, the current plans would leave the world facing global warming of more than 2.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the century, potentially triggering dangerous and irreversible climate tipping points.
Guterres called for a new Climate Justice Compact to address inequalities in climate financing and ensure developing countries have the resources needed to transition to clean energy and adapt to climate change.
He observed that emerging and developing economies outside China account for nearly two-thirds of humanity but receive less than one-fifth of global clean-energy investment.
He added that many developing countries pay two to three times more to borrow than developed economies, making investments in renewable energy and climate resilience increasingly expensive.
“We cannot demand that countries transform their economies while denying them the means to do so,” he said.
The proposed Climate Justice Compact would be anchored on four pillars: accelerating a just transition away from fossil fuels, protecting people from climate impacts, providing adequate and affordable financing, and strengthening international cooperation.
On the energy transition, Guterres urged governments to align their policies, investments and infrastructure development with the 1.5 degrees Celsius target.
He called for an end to new coal projects and oil and gas infrastructure that would undermine the temperature goal, alongside reduced methane emissions and increased investment in renewable energy, electricity grids, energy storage and clean electrification.
Citing the United Nations Environment Programme’s Emissions Gap Report, he said global renewable energy capacity must at least triple from 2025 levels by 2035, while unabated coal power must decline by at least 75 percent.
By 2040, he said, unabated coal power should be almost completely phased out, while oil and gas consumption should fall by approximately one-third.
He also called for credible national roadmaps to guide the transition, with measures to protect workers and communities dependent on fossil fuel industries.
On climate adaptation, Guterres said rising temperatures had made protecting vulnerable populations a matter of survival.
He called for a new generation of national adaptation plans, supported by the international community, and urged governments to ensure every person worldwide was covered by an early warning system.
He further called for stronger protection of communities against floods, droughts and rising sea levels, as well as faster and more accessible support for countries experiencing climate-related loss and damage.
On financing, the UN Secretary-General urged developed countries to deliver at least US$ 300 billion annually by 2035 and establish clear plans to at least triple adaptation finance by the same year.
He also called for the US$ 1.3 trillion climate finance goal to translate into actual funding reaching developing countries.
Guterres urged multilateral development banks to go beyond their Baku commitment of providing US$ 120bln annually by 2030, calling on shareholders to strengthen their lending capacity, mobilise private investment and provide more innovative financing instruments.
He also called for increased contributions to the Green Climate Fund and the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage.
The UN chief further urged governments to tax windfall profits made by fossil fuel companies to help vulnerable countries recover from climate disasters.
He said the nine largest oil companies had earned US$95 billion in profits in the previous quarter alone, while the Loss and Damage Fund had received approximately US$ 600 million.
“That is what these companies made in about 14 hours,” he said.
“Polluters must pay,” he added.
On international cooperation, Guterres warned that trade barriers, technology monopolies and geopolitical rivalries could make the global energy transition more expensive and leave billions of people behind.
He urged countries to strengthen cooperation in areas such as electricity grids, critical minerals, methane reduction and early warning systems, stressing that the success of climate negotiations should be measured by practical action on the ground.
“Negotiations matter – but success must be measured on the ground. Implementation is essential,” he said.
Guterres also recognised the contribution of young people, scientists, Indigenous Peoples, civil society organisations and Small Island Developing States, describing them as the conscience of the global climate struggle.
He pledged to continue advocating for climate action after leaving office as UN Secretary-General next year.
“I will not stop telling the truth. And I will not stop fighting for it,” he said, promising to stand alongside climate activists and vulnerable communities.
He said the world still had an opportunity to build cleaner economies, fairer societies and a safer future through decisive climate action.
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