New York’s frenetic pace ratcheted up last week with one of the United States’ biggest ever security operations, as it hosted world leaders for the United Nations General Assembly annual meeting. Global tensions, particularly in the Middle East, explain the tightened security measures in place to protect thousands of attendees, among them Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and our own Keir Starmer. 

Noise levels peaked as NYPD sirens signalled the passing of world leaders’ motorcades, while drivers in grid-locked traffic honked horns and overhead helicopters thudded across the Hudson River delivering yet more diplomats to the UN’s headquarters.

Into this heightened atmosphere delegates were also arriving for Climate Week NYC on the opposite side of Manhattan’s Midtown area. Some 2,000 political figures, business leaders, climate advisers and senior decision-makers had the pick of more than 900 events taking place in person and online, all focused on top-level strategic thinking to accelerate climate action around the world.

The Climate Week conference, which opened at The Glasshouse on 12th Avenue with a speech from former New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Adern, was themed around the urgency of the climate crisis. The Climate Group, the event organiser, works in partnership with the UN General Assembly – hence the reason for holding it last week – and it chose to highlight three key messages: “It is time to course correct. It is time to speed up. It is time to finish the race”.

Positivity was evident from the outset, as Adern explicitly called on delegates to resist those who view optimism as naive or dangerous: “I believe not only that things can be better but that they must be. That politicians, policymakers, the private sector, financial institutions will respond to the challenge in front of us, through the sheer magnitude of what will happen if they don’t.”

Nevertheless, a common theme of many of the subsequent discussions was the sheer scale of the challenges and demands posed by the necessary green transition of economies across the globe. An underlying frustration was evident among many speakers as they warned of examples in business and in government that showed the alarming distance between intentions to tackle the climate crisis and tangible results.

If the point about taking climate change seriously needed underlining, then delegates only had to turn on the news to hear about the impending damage to be wreaked by hurricane Helene as it hit the Florida coast. If anything the devastation has been worse than expected, affecting five states in the south-east, killing more than 60 people and causing billions of dollars of damage.

Topics at Climate Week covered everything from corporate transparency and the role of leaders to climate finance and the impact of AI, with all sectors represented including the built environment.

Building hosted its own roundtable debate with a full range of construction professionals, held in association with the Climate Group and supported by Gleeds, on the dual pressures to decarbonise the built environment that are coming from investor demand and regulatory change. A full account of their views on overcoming the barriers to greener buildings and infrastructure will be published soon.

In the meantime, here is a quick guide to some of the topics and themes that caught our eye during Climate Week NYC: