In remarks to the Pacific Energy Summit in Auckland, UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres spoke on the transition to renewable forms of energy and the need for country-specific solutions to climate related challenges in Small Island Developing States (SIDS). From the speech:

My call to you today, dear friends, is to use the voice the voice of the SIDS as a clarion call. Traditionally, in the climate negotiations, the SIDS have used their voice to flesh out all of the urgent, critical, indispensable details of adaptation and loss and damage. Do not let up on that. You have to continue that. But my urge today is that in addition to using your voice on adaptation, you use your voice to bring in the transformation toward renewable energy. I urge you to use your voice to address the root of the problem –the root of the problem is not adaptation, that is what we have to do in view of the inevitable effects of climate change, but the root of the problem is the slow pace with which we are pursuing the transformation toward renewable energy. 

I urge the SIDS to use your voice to bring about that commitment at the global scale that you already have here at the domestic level. You can use your commitment to domestic transformation to inspire, to motivate, to accelerate the global transformation toward renewable energy, toward energy efficiency, toward access to clean energy. You can help to create the new norm, the new norm of low-carbon development and growth.

Read the full speech here (pdf).

Read other speeches by Christiana Figueres.