Challenging Climate

43. Janos Pasztor on global climate policy and geoengineering

February 06, 2024 Jesse Reynolds and Pete Irvine
Challenging Climate
43. Janos Pasztor on global climate policy and geoengineering
Show Notes Chapter Markers

This episode’s guest is Janos Pasztor. He has four decades of work experience in the areas of energy, environment, climate change, and sustainable development, including roles as Executive Director of the Carnegie Climate Governance Initiative (C2G) and UN Assistant Secretary-General for Climate Change. 

In this episode, we explore the political lens of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and solar radiation management (SRM), discussing the progress of CDR and SRM discourse, as well as its challenges and controversies.

CORRECTION: Jesse suggested that the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) had a dozen or so members, but Janos pointed out that in fact it has universal membership, i.e., every UN member state is a member.

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Intro and background
Working as UN Assistant Secretary-General for Climate Change with Ban Ki-moon
Have all these international discussions actually made a difference?
Kyoto Protocol vs Paris Protocol: what’s the right approach?
Carnegie Climate Governance Initiative (C2G)
Is geoengineering just a distraction from more pertinent climate discourse?
Aims of C2G
Dropping the term ‘geoengineering’
Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) in models
Reactions to SRM
Do incumbent policy experts and scientists fear disruption of ideas?
UNEA 4 2019 – what went wrong?
Have perspectives on SRM changed since?
No substantial progress on SRM since – why and who is it blame?
The role and struggles of scientists in climate policy
Arriving at a global consensus on SRM – a pipe dream?
Retirement plans