"I've been arrested for standing up and protesting."
Brut spoke to America's climate czar John Kerry about his and the younger generation's fight against the climate crisis.
Brut spoke to America's climate czar John Kerry about his and the younger generation's fight against the climate crisis.
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00:00I have engaged in civil disobedience.
00:02I've been arrested for standing up
00:04and protesting something.
00:07So I think that there's every right in the world
00:10to engage in civil disobedience
00:12if you're prepared to accept the consequences
00:14and you understand that that's part
00:17of the nature of your protest.
00:23Well, this generation, as in history,
00:27younger generations have always made the difference.
00:30We need some degree of militancy right now
00:34because there's much too much business as usual.
00:38Too many corporations and countries
00:41are talking about doing but not doing what they talk about.
00:46And the truth is that we're in a critical
00:49seven-year period from now till 2030
00:52when we must do our best to try to meet the targets
00:55set by the IPCC that we reduce emissions
00:59by 45% in these next years.
01:03It's critical.
01:04I mean, the stakes could not be higher.
01:06And no one feels that more than the younger generation.
01:09So we need young people all around the world
01:12to demand that adults will behave like adults
01:16and make the decisions that they're in positions
01:19of responsibility to affect.
01:22Well, I don't support terrorism
01:25and I don't support physical violence at any time,
01:29but I understand civil disobedience.
01:32And there's a difference between the two.
01:35The best thing to do is not only to be willing
01:38to protest in some non-violent way,
01:42but also to engage in the political process.
01:52Yes, the fight against the impacts of the climate crisis
01:59are more difficult in a democracy
02:02because it takes longer to be able to make a decision,
02:07go through a process which tries to build consensus.
02:11We have an imperative to make these decisions
02:14within a short period of time,
02:16not 10 years and five years,
02:18because we don't have that kind of time.
02:20And if we're going to meet our responsibility
02:22of physical safety to citizens all around the world,
02:27we need to move much more effectively
02:30and much more efficiently.
02:31♪♪
02:39China is complex in the sense that
02:43it is one of the two largest countries in the world,
02:471.4 billion people.
02:49And China has developed at an amazing rapid pace.
02:53And there are costs to that kind of
02:55rapid pace of development.
02:57But my counterpart that I talk to in China,
03:00Xie Zhenhua, is a serious environmental advocate.
03:04Now right now, China has developed at a rate
03:08where it is the largest producer
03:11of renewable energy in the world.
03:13It is also the largest deployer,
03:16the largest user of renewable energy in the world.
03:19And they are moving at a pace in China
03:22where they may not need some of the coal plants
03:25that have been built,
03:26where they may be able to move faster
03:28to be able to peak their emissions and then reduce them.
03:32And they may be able to move at a rate where
03:35it can really help the rest of the world be able to move.
03:38♪♪
03:42Well, I think two things initially.
03:44One was my mother, who took me on early morning
03:50nature walks years ago when I was obviously a little kid.
03:55And it had an impression on me,
03:56her respect for her surroundings, her knowledge about them.
04:00Subsequently, in 1962, when I was a freshman in college,
04:04I read Rachel Carson of The Silent Spring.
04:07And that had a profound impact on many of us.
04:09♪♪
04:13I have changed some of the things I'm doing,
04:16but I haven't changed them for the worse.
04:17I've changed them for the better.
04:19And I love, I mean, I drive an electric car now.
04:22And I love it.
04:23I have a solar panel field at our house.
04:27And it's great to have your own solar plant
04:32feeding your house.
04:33And when it doesn't feed your house
04:34for the necessities of the house, it feeds the grid.
04:37I think a certain kind of foods,
04:39you can make choices about not wasting food.
04:42I mean, we waste an extraordinary,
04:44frightening amount of food on this planet.
04:47And yet people are hungry.
04:48So there are a lot of things we can do
04:50that actually improve life.
04:53And they may be small changes,
04:54but we don't have to give up the quality of our life.
04:57We actually will have more quality.
04:59Cleaner air, where 15 million people a year
05:02are not dying as they are today
05:04because of the lack of air quality.
05:06But where 10 million people are dying from extreme heat.
05:11Those things we can control.
05:12We can do better.
05:14And we can make the planet cleaner and safer.
05:16Health is a huge security issue.
05:23I'm very proud that I was part of the Obama administration
05:28and I was the leader,
05:30privileged to be the leader of the negotiating team
05:33here in Paris, that achieved the Paris Agreement.
05:37And the Paris Agreement is one of the great success stories
05:40of the many years of the meeting of the UN entities.
05:44But I think since the Paris Agreement,
05:47people have moved too slowly.
05:49We could, in theory, still achieve the 1.5 degree limit.
05:53But we're very close to not being able to.
05:56And the only way we're going to do it
05:58is to hugely accelerate the reduction of emissions,
06:01the capture of emissions, the utilization,
06:03whatever it's going to be.
06:04All efforts that we know we have with current technology
06:09must be deployed faster than they are being deployed today.