The Expert View Simon Black, IMF Climate Economist
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Simon Black is an economist at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) where he advises governments on policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Before joining the IMF, he was a climate economist at the World Bank, a climate economist at the UK’s foreign ministry, and served as a UK negotiator at the UN’s climate body where he helped negotiate the Paris Agreement. He has also worked in economic diplomacy and financial sector advisory.
n 2022, Simon was the IMF Staff Association’s Outstanding Young Leader for his work on climate change. He holds a master’s degree in international political economy from the London School of Economics and a master’s degree in international development (MPA/ID) from Harvard University, where he received a full scholarship as a Frank Knox Fellow.
burning thousands of years’ worth of this stored energy all at once in cars, power plants, homes, and factories, and releasing billions of tonnes of heat-trapping “greenhouse” gases into our atmosphere. This warms our world, nudging our climate away from a delicate equilibrium.
WE’RE SEEING THE HOTTEST TEMPERATURES ON RECORD ACROSS PARTS OF THE WORLD, AND JULY IS LIKELY TO BE THE HOTTEST MONTH IN HUMAN HISTORY. WHAT DO WE NEED TO DO TO STOP GLOBAL WARMING?
To slow warming, we need to rapidly remake the global energy system. This means decarbonizing electricity production and then using that clean electricity for most of our energy needs. For example, we need to drastically increase the amount of energy we get from capturing ‘today’s sunlight’ through solar panels. At the same time, we need to rapidly adopt technologies that can use this electricity such as electric vehicles and heat pumps for residential heating and cooling.
We need to shift humanity’s relationship with energy. Thought of one way, fossil fuels are ancient sunlight, captured and deposited by plants millions of years ago. By extracting fuels like coal, gas, and oil from the earth’s crust, we’re
If we can ‘green’ the production and consumption of energy, then we’ll be about two-thirds of the way there. But we also need to end deforestation, restore ecosystems, and make food production and consumption far
more sustainable. It’s a big challenge, and one where governments must step up with policies to accelerate the transition to climate-safe activities, while simultaneously addressing the world’s other problems like poverty and inequity.
HOW HAVE COUNTRIES AGREED TO MITIGATE CLIMATE CHANGE AND HOW IS IT GOING? I think many of your readers will be familiar with the Paris Agreement, the landmark treaty signed in 2015 by almost 200 countries to limit global warming to 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels. Under this agreement, countries have committed to cut emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases, with developed countries pledging to move farther and faster while transferring finance and technology to developing countries. The problem is that countries have voluntarily committed to cut emissions, but those cuts don’t
