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Interview: UN Climate Chief Says
Talks are Steadily Making Progress

Few jobs on the international stage are more daunting than that held by Christiana Figueres, the woman

UNFCCC

Christiana Figueres

in charge of United Nations talks aimed at lowering carbon emissions. Figueres is executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which has been widely criticized for failing to secure a treaty imposing binding limits on carbon emissions. With new climate talks beginning next week in Doha, Qatar, Figueres says in an interview with Yale Environment 360 that contrary to public perception, negotiations have actually been moving forward in a “slow but steady” manner. In the interview, she discusses the need for the U.S to finally sign on to a global climate treaty, the inevitability of world economies making the transition to a low-carbon future, and the need for politicians to feel the same urgency as scientists about the threats posed by global warming. “There’s a huge gap between the two,” says Figueres, “and it is our very challenging task to encourage the closing of that gap.”
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