Session I – Out with the old, in with the bold: there's an opportunity in the climate crisis

The urgency of the climate crisis is impossible to brush off. Even if we wanted to ignore the extreme weather events that have plagued the planet recently, Greta Thunberg, along with hundreds of thousands of students from across Europe, have been making sure that we don’t. While the momentum for action is increasing across the board, civil society is clearly leading the charge, showing more enthusiasm than governments and industries combined. To effectively fulfil the goals of the Paris Agreement and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, everyone must however be on board and give it their all. Nevertheless, too few EU countries are considering revising their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) to comply with science-based targets. When will the leaders of our world stop acting ‘like children’ and take the radical decisions needed to avoid environmental collapse? How can we further mobilise political and economic actors to comply with the Paris Agreement and 2030 SDGs? Will the private sector pay heed to voices from civil society asking for more transparency and actions to avert the climate crisis? SPEAKERS Mark Fulton, Chair of the Research Council at Carbon Tracker Michal Kurtyka, Secretary of State at the Polish Ministry of the Environment, and President of COP24 Mauro Petriccione, European Commission Director-General for Climate Action Linda Steg, Professor of Environmental Psychology in the Faculty of Behavioural Sciences at the University of Groningen Valentino Rossi, Head of Public Affairs, Regulation and Antitrust for Europe and Euro-Mediterranean Affairs at Enel MODERATOR Dharmendra Kanani, Director of Insights at Friends of Europe