Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, who wrote a book in 2021 titled, “How to Avoid a Climate Disaster,” now says leaders need to shift their approach to climate change.
In a letter published Tuesday ahead of next week’s COP30 U.N. climate summit, Gates argued that too many resources are focused on emissions and the environment, and that more money should go toward “improving lives” and curbing disease and poverty.
“… Climate is super important but has to be considered in terms of overall human welfare,” Gates told CNBC’s Andrew Ross Sorkin in an exclusive interview. “I didn’t pick that position because everybody agrees with it – it’s I think intellectually the right answer.”
In the letter, Gates called out the “doomsday view” of climate change and said leaders need to make a “strategic pivot” to focus on issues that have the “greatest impact on human welfare.”
“It’s the best way to ensure that everyone gets a chance to live a healthy and productive life no matter where they’re born, and no matter what kind of climate they’re born into,” he wrote.
Breakthrough Energy, Gates’ climate-focused investment fund, reportedly cut dozens of staffers earlier this year. The New York Times reported in March that the “change shows how Mr. Gates is retooling his empire for the Trump era.”
This year’s climate summit in Brazil comes nearly a decade after world leaders adopted the Paris Climate Agreement aimed at limiting temperature warming to 1.5 degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
Gates called that original goal unrealistic.
Over the last decade, the U.S. government has stepped in and out of the commitment depending on who’s in the White House.
The U.S. initially entered the agreement under President Barack Obama, before President Donald Trump pulled out of the pact when he took office for a first time in 2017. After President Joe Biden rejoined, Trump issued an executive order to again withdraw during his second term.
Gates said in 2017 that he was “deeply concerned” but “hopeful” that the U.S. would continue supporting innovation after Trump left the agreement.
Gates told Sorkin that pulling back on climate initiatives is a “huge disappointment,” but credited companies like Microsoft for investing in alternative energy technologies. Continued support of these innovations will bring down costs, he said.
Over the last decade, several major technology companies, including Meta, Alphabet and Microsoft have set 2030 targets to reach net-zero emissions or go carbon negative.
In February, Microsoft sustainability chief Melanie Nakagawa admitted that the “moon has gotten further away” from previous goals as the company doubles down on artificial intelligence.
“However, the force creating this distance from our goals in the short term is the same one that will help us build a bigger, faster, and more powerful rocket to reach them in the long term: artificial intelligence (AI),” she wrote.
The massive energy demand needed to meet growing data center power requirements has sparked concerns among many climate activists.
In terms of AI and concerns that a bubble has formed, Gates said many investments will be “dead ends.”
Still, he added, “If you want to be a tech company you don’t get to say no let’s check out of this race.”