STORY: UN chief urges global action to tackle extreme heat
SHOOTING TIME: July 25, 2024
DATELINE: July 26, 2024
LENGTH: 00:02:01
LOCATION: UN Headquarters
CATEGORY: ENVIRONMENT

SHOTLIST:
1. various of the press briefing room
2. various of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres walking to podium
3. SOUNDBITE 1 (English): ANTONIO GUTERRES, UN Secretary-General
4. various of the press briefing room
5. SOUNDBITE 2 (English): ANTONIO GUTERRES, UN Secretary-General

STORYLINE:

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday called for global action to tackle extreme heat, as "extreme temperatures are no longer a one day, one week or one month phenomenon."

SOUNDBITE 1 (English): ANTONIO GUTERRES, UN Secretary-General
"Earth is becoming hotter and more dangerous for everyone, everywhere. Billions of people are facing an extreme heat epidemic -- wilting under increasingly deadly heatwaves, with temperatures topping 50 degrees Celsius around the world. That's 122 degrees Fahrenheit and halfway to boiling. Extreme heat is increasingly tearing through economies, widening inequalities, undermining the Sustainable Development Goals and killing people. Heat is estimated to kill almost half a million people a year, and that's about 30 times more than tropical cyclones. But the good news is that there are solutions."

The UN chief announced a global call to action with four areas of focus: caring for the most vulnerable; stepping up protections for workers; boosting the resilience of economies and societies using data and science; and fighting the "disease" -- "the madness of incinerating our only home," the addiction to fossil fuels, and climate inaction.

He urged that leaders across the board must wake up and step up, including governments as well as the private sector, cities and regions, noting that "all countries must deliver by next year nationally determined contributions -- or national climate action plans -- aligned to limiting global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius."

Noting that the International Energy Agency has shown fossil fuel expansion and new coal plants are inconsistent with meeting that limit, Guterres urged countries to phase-out fossil fuels, "fast and fairly."

SOUNDBITE 2 (English): ANTONIO GUTERRES, UN Secretary-General
"The G20 must shift fossil fuel subsidies to renewables and support vulnerable countries and communities. And national climate action plans must show how each country will contribute to the global goals agreed at COP28 to triple the world's renewables capacity, and end deforestation by 2030. They must also cut global consumption and production of fossil fuels by 30 percent in the same timeframe."

Xinhua News Agency correspondents reporting from UN Headquarters.
(XHTV)