Q&A with Gonzalo Muñoz on the global challenge of eliminating plastic pollution
Ambition Loop’s Founder was interviewed by EL PAÍS about the United Nations Environment Program (UNEA) and the importance of negotiating action with non-state actors.
Read an english translation of the conversation with the ANTONIETA DE LA FUENTE originally published in November by EL PAÍS.
Question. Is there water in the pool [conditions] to sign a treaty of this nature?
Answer. When the UNEA, through a resolution, declares that a treaty must be made of this, a treaty will have to be reached. The question now is what the level of ambition is going to be.
Q. What are the goals per country?
A. In this case, the UNEA declaration is that a treaty must be reached that is legally binding and that aims to solve the problem of plastic pollution in the environment in a short period. We hope that by 2040 the world will have been reorganized in such a way that there are no plastics being discarded in the environment.
Q. How is that achieved?
A. Through, of course, considerably increasing the capacities of collection and recycling mechanisms. In many countries there are no garbage systems. Therefore, the system must be updated rapidly everywhere. But we also have to rationalize how much plastic we are putting into the system, because today it is not just beverage or food packaging. Clothing, electronics, agricultural issues, the world of medicine, plastic is used everywhere.
Q. Will the plastics industry be willing?
A. That leads to a first tension in which we speak to the petrochemical companies and tell them that we are going to set a reduction goal. That's where all the sparks are going to fly. The second is: let's talk about which are the problematic plastics, that is, those that are made in such a way that they are very difficult to process or recycle, because they either have toxic components, or because when they fragment, they generate microplastics. And a conversation begins to be generated going down to the micro level that is extremely complex. Of course, it is a process that generates positions where there are countries that are much more inclined to advance, versus, fundamentally, those with strong petrochemical industries that resist a little more.
Q. What are those?
A. They are the same as always: the United States, Russia, China, the Arab countries. Then, a room that is also polarized by conflicts such as Ukraine and the Middle East begins to polarize . My role is to design the model to accelerate changes among non-state actors. Imagine the role that municipalities have in addressing an issue that they deal with every day. But all actors have a lot to contribute to a good treaty, but they cannot do it in a random and disorganized way. It is no use for each actor who wants to contribute to do so on their own. The important thing is that this information be articulated in a serious, credible, formal way, so that this group, if well structured, can then, once the treaty is signed, help with its implementation.
Q. When is this treaty going to be signed?
A. At the beginning of 2025, that is the goal.
Q. We are going to COP28 which starts now. What is the expectation if last year's COP27 ended with the feeling of failure in the negotiations?
A. The agreement is already there, it is the Paris agreement, therefore what we have to do now is implement it. And the commitments to fulfill that agreement are part of what we have to deal with at this COP. The Global Stocktake (the global stocktake carried out every five years) recently arrived , which is the central element of this COP and which takes an inventory of how we are doing with respect to the Paris agreement. And we're late. We are not achieving what is needed to fulfill the agreement. That is an important fraction of the news. But another fact is that there are certain sectors that are accelerating and some even beyond what we imagined.
Q. What are those sectors?
R. Renewable energies, electromobility, batteries. There is also something associated with agricultural systems. There is everyone from the shipping industry, steel, cement. The hydrogen agenda, heat pumps. There are technologies and there are sectors that today, if you analyze them in more detail, are already breaking the curve and becoming exponential. And there are countries whose curve performance is better than what we as humanity would need on average. Chile is one of the countries that, if you analyze its curve, for example, with respect to the adoption of renewable energy, is better than the curve that the world needs.
Q. What are the areas where we are most behind as humanity?
A. One of the very lagging areas is putting funds directly into people's adaptation, because this is a multidimensional problem. It doesn't help to say that on average the electrical arrays are doing super well, if it turns out that the most vulnerable people in the world are suffering the impacts. If you try to cover that with a finger, in the end the equation turns upside down, because if this agenda is not useful to begin by protecting the most vulnerable, then what is it for? There is a challenge that is how to provide the resources, the technologies, the models that protect the people who today are being directly impacted by the climate crisis. That is a pending task where we are very, very late. We are also late with everything that has to do with protecting nature to increase its capture capacity. We have to regenerate nature. If we don't, we are losing the battle.
Q. Do you think more ambitious commitments will be achieved at this COP?
A. The level of commitment that the Arab Emirates put into the energy transition will be very indicative . What I would hope is that we come out of COP28 with very clarity regarding that, because the photo is very bad. And that implies what the Emirates are going to commit to in terms of exiting fossil fuels and increasing renewable energy, which hopefully can also be a good example to be replicated by other countries that have developed their economy based on fossil fuels.
