Karenna Gore Speaks at TED Countdown Event: “Beyond COP30: Leadership for a New Era”
On Wednesday, September 24, CEE Executive Director Karenna Gore appeared as a featured speaker at Beyond COP30: Leadership for a New Era, hosted by TED Countdown and Futerra during Climate Week NYC. She joined Lindsay Levin, co-founder of TED Countdown, and Tulio Andrade, chief strategy officer of the COP30 Presidency, for a dialogue on the leadership and imagination required to meet this pivotal moment.
As TED Countdown framed the event:
“The climate crisis has never been just a scientific or political challenge—it’s a test of our imagination, courage and conscience. In an era when conversations have grown too insular and institutions are faltering, COP30 comes at a time of profound disruption, but also possibility.”
The conversation ranged from the importance of the Global Ethical Stocktake and its guiding principle of a “Global Mutirão,” to larger questions of how to speak about an uncertain future in ways that invite connection, belonging and shared purpose.
Gore brought an ethical lens to the conversation, echoing Minister Marina Silva’s call to investigate the moral dimension of climate action. “Ethics is most powerful when a widely held, deep sense of right and wrong is out of step with both laws and social norms. We have to confront the fact that most of what is destroying our climate and our environment is perfectly legal—and even socially encouraged,” she said.
Andrade spoke to the need for both human and institutional evolution, reminding the audience that, no matter how daunting the climate crisis may seem, “we still have agency.” He emphasized the importance of moving beyond bureaucratic language toward human-centered narratives. By telling stories that bring lived experience and emotion to the fore, “we cultivate in ourselves a deep sense of purpose, belonging, and meaning,” he said.
Representatives of Strawtown, an organization that connects young people with the natural world through art and science discovery, attended the event. They reflected on the key takeaways from “these visionary leaders”:
"We have been focusing on the effect of climate change, and not enough on the cause. A common ground for all of us is the need to be prepared for the unpredictable, which can open the discourse for change making. And ultimately the earth is in charge."
TED Countdown will continue exploring these themes at the Countdown House, a space at COP30 in Belém, Brazil that will convene “innovators, business leaders, scientists, activists and Indigenous knowledge keepers to ground the climate conversation in lived experience, practical solutions and honest reckoning.”