Al Gore Changes His Tune on the Environment

The 1997 Kyoto climate treaty he helped negotiate didn't end up controlling climate change, but Al Gore says this month's conference in Paris will be different. "We're going to win this," he tells the AP. "We need to win it faster because a lot of damage is being done day by day. We continue to put 110 million tons of global warming pollution into the atmosphere every 24 hours as if it's an open sewer." Though he says "every night on the television news is like a nature hike through the Book of Revelation," he adds "increasingly people are connecting those dots" and "more and more people are feeling that this is going to have to be addressed." It's a real change of tune for a man the AP notes has been framed as a "preacher of doom and gloom" by some.

Indeed, in their 35 minutes together, Gore "uses versions of the words 'optimistic' or 'hopeful' or 'positive' at least 16 times," writes the AP. Their talk comes in advance of a 24-hour-telethon he'll host Friday at the foot of the Eiffel Tower to raise awareness about global warming. Though initially scheduled as a global Live Earth event to be broadcast to 2 billion people across 193 television networks, Gore now says 24 Hours of Reality and Live Earth will be streamed online and is "about mobilizing people around the world ... and making our voices heard in national capitals and at the negotiating table in Paris," per the Guardian. (The UN Conference on Climate Change kicks off Nov. 30.) French President Francois Hollande, Pharrell Williams, Elton John, Duran Duran, Bon Jovi, Neil Young, Fall Out Boy, Hozier, Ryan Reynolds, and Jared Leto will also take the stage, per People. (More climate change stories.)