By SETH BORENSTEIN and FRANK JORDANS

GLASGOW, Scotland (AP) — United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 F) is “on life support” as U.N. climate talks enter their final days, but he added that “until the last moment, hope should be maintained.”

In an exclusive interview Thursday with The Associated Press, Guterres said the negotiations set to end Friday in Glasgow, Scotland, will “very probably” not yield the carbon-cutting pledges he has said are needed to keep the planet from warming beyond the 1.5-degree threshold.

So far, the talks have not come close to achieving any of the U.N.’s three announced priorities for the annual conference, called COP26. One is cutting carbon emissions by about half by 2030 to reach the goal Guterres alluded to.

The other two are getting rich countries to fulfill a 12-year-old pledge of providing $100 billion a year in financial climate aid to poor nations and ensuring that half of that amount goes to helping developing nations adapt to the worst effects of climate change.

Guterres said the Glasgow talks “are in a crucial moment” and need to accomplish more than securing a weak deal that participating nations agree to support.

“The worst thing would be to reach an agreement at all costs by a minimum common denominator that would not respond to the huge challenges we face,” Guterres said.

That’s because the overarching goal of limiting warming since pre-industrial times to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 F) by the end of the century “is still in reach but on life support,” Guterres said. The world has already warmed 1.1 degrees Celsius (2 degrees Fahrenheit), leaving far less than a degree before the threshold is hit.

Less than 36 hours from the scheduled close of the negotiations, Guterres said that if negotiators can’t reach ambitious carbon-cutting goals — “and very probably it will not happen” — then national leaders would need to come up with new pledges next year and in 2023 during high-level meetings.

He said it is “very important” that nations update their goals and send top leaders to the climate talks every year, at this point. However, Guterres would not say at what point he thinks the 1.5-degree goal would have to be abandoned.

“When you are on the verge of the abyss, it’s not important to discuss what will be your fourth or fifth step,” Guterres said. “What’s important to discuss is what will be your first step. Because if your first step is the wrong step, you will not have the chance to do a search to make a second or third one.”

Guterres said he agreed with youth climate activists — who have been a daily presence protesting in large numbers outside the climate talks, and at times inside — who called for the U.N. to term global warming a “climate emergency” of a high level and treat it as such.

“For me, it is clear it is a climate emergency,” Guterres said. “I have asked all member states to declare it, and I will be making sure that we mobilize the whole of the U.N. system based on the concept of a climate emergency.”

As terrible and tragic as the COVID-19 pandemic is, there’s a way climate change is more of an emergency, Guterres said.

“The pandemic is reversible. We have the tools and the instruments to stop it,” he said. “Climate change is a global threat to the planet and to humankind. And for the moment, we have not yet all the tools and the instruments that we need to defeat it.”

And much of that comes down to money.

The lack of movement on financial aid to poorer countries troubles Guterres. He said if he were the leader of a vulnerable small island or other endangered country he would be upset with what’s not happening in Glasgow.

“When I see trillions being spent by the developed world and at the same time, the suffering, the impacts of climate change more than in the global north, in hurricanes, in droughts that undermine the development of my country and the well-being of my citizens,” Guterres said, putting himself in the shoes of an island leader. “I mean, it would be impossible in this situation not to feel an enormous frustration if the developed countries do not correspond to a number of basic commitments” on financial help.

And that rich-poor split kept cropping up Thursday.

Pushing back against the “narrative” of trying to limit warming to 1.5C put forward by rich countries, a group of developing nations said that rich countries were trying to shift the burden of combating climate change onto poorer nations.

Talks are now at the point where two pathways were possible: one that was good for people and the planet, and the other that led to “carbon colonialism,” said Bolivia’s chief negotiator, Diego Pacheco Balanz. “We need to fight the developed countries against the carbon colonialism.”

Balanz was speaking on behalf of the negotiating block of developing nations that include countries from Africa, Latin America and Asia — with China and India among the latter.

Guterres praised a Wednesday evening agreement between the United States and China to cut emissions this decade as a reason why he still hopes for some semblance of success in Glasgow. He said China indicating that it would seek to have its emissions going down before 2030 represented a key change in the top emitter’s outlook.

“I believe it will be very important that this agreement paves the way for other agreements,” Guterres said in a 25-minute AP interview.

The U.N. chief said he hoped that two sticky issues that defied resolution for six years can be solved in Glasgow: creating workable markets for trading carbon credits and transparency that shows that promised pollution-reducing actions are real.

Fresh drafts of the documents on regulating international cooperation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including the carbon markets section, were released overnight, as were new proposals containing various options for assessing and tracking financial aid for developing countries.

The chair of this year’s U.N. climate meeting called on negotiators from almost 200 countries to engage in “another gear shift” as they try to reach agreement on outstanding issues a day before the talks are scheduled to end.

British official Alok Sharma said Thursday that the drafts released overnight on a number of crunch topics “represent a significant step further toward the comprehensive, ambitious and balanced set of outcomes, which I hope parties will adopt by consensus at the end of tomorrow.”

Sharma said he was “under no illusion” that the texts being considered would wholly satisfy all countries at this stage but thanked negotiators for the “spirit of cooperation and civility” they had shown so far.

“We are not there yet,” he said, adding that he aimed to get a fresh draft of the overarching decision released early Friday.

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Associated Press writer Aniruddha Ghosal contributed from Glasgow.

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Follow AP’s climate coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/climate

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Follow Seth Borenstein on Twitter at @borenbears and Frank Jordans at @wirereporter

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

By BRITTANY PETERSON and SAM METZ

DENVER (AP) — Around the U.S., cities are increasingly warming to an idea that once induced gags: Sterilize wastewater from toilets, sinks and factories, and eventually pipe it back into homes and businesses as tap water.

In the Los Angeles area, plans to recycle wastewater for drinking are moving along with little fanfare just two decades after similar efforts in the city sparked such a backlash they had to be abandoned. The practice, which must meet federal drinking water standards, has been adopted in several places around the country, including nearby Orange County.

“We’ve had a sea change in terms of public attitudes toward wastewater recycling,” said David Nahai, the former general manager of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.

The shifting attitudes around a concept once dismissively dubbed “toilet to tap” come as dry regions scramble for ways to increase water supplies as their populations boom and climate change intensifies droughts. Other strategies gaining traction include collecting runoff from streams and roads after storms, and stripping seawater of salt and other minerals, a process that’s still relatively rare and expensive.

Though there are still only about two dozen communities in the U.S. using some form of recycled water for drinking, that number is projected to more than double in the next 15 years, according to WateReuse, a group that helps cities adopt such conservation practices.

In most places that do it, the sterilized water is usually mixed back into a lake, river or other natural source before being reused — a step that helps make the idea of drinking treated sewage go down easier for some.

Funding for more wastewater recycling projects is on the way. The bipartisan infrastructure bill passed by Congress has $1 billion for water reuse projects in the West, including the $3.4 billion project in Southern California.

And tucked into the federal budget reconciliation package being debated is $125 million in grants for alternative water sources nationwide that could include reuse technologies.

The Southern California project would be the nation’s largest wastewater recycling program, producing enough water to supply 500,000 homes, according to the Metropolitan Water District, which serves 19 million people in Los Angeles and surrounding counties.

In Colorado, over two dozen facilities already recycle water for non-drinking purposes, which is more affordable than cleaning it for drinking. But growing populations mean cities could need to pull additional supply from the Colorado River, which is already strained from overuse.

At that point, it might make sense to start recycling for drinking purposes as well, said Greg Fisher, head of demand planning for Denver Water.

To warm residents to the idea, Colorado Springs Utilities is hosting a mobile exhibit that shows how wastewater recycling works. On a cold, rainy afternoon, dozens of visitors showed up to learn about the carbon-based purification process and sample the results, which several noted tasted no different than their usual supply.

The recycling process typically entails disinfecting wastewater with ozone gas or ultraviolet light to remove viruses and bacteria, then filtering it through membranes with microscopic pores to remove solids and trace contaminants.

Not all water can be recycled locally. Often, Western communities are required to send treated wastewater back to its source, so that it can eventually be used by other places that depend on that same body of water.

“You have to put the water back into the river because it’s not yours,” said Patricia Sinicropi, executive director of WateReuse.

As a result, much of the country already consumes water that’s been recycled to some degree, simply by living downstream from others. It’s why drinking water undergoes stringent sterilization even when it’s pulled from a river or lake that looks clean.

Encouraged by efforts in other cities, even places with stable water supplies are considering recycling their own wastewater. After a poll showed broad support for the idea in Boise, Idaho, city officials began studying plans to recharge local groundwater with treated wastewater.

“We need to be managing for the potential impacts of climate change,” said Haley Falconer, a senior manager in the city’s environmental division.

The Southern California project, which still needs to undergo environmental review and finalize its funding plan, would also lessen the region’s need to pipe in water from afar. In exchange for financing from water agencies in Nevada and Arizona, the area is ceding some of its share of the Colorado River.

“We’re taking advantage of a water supply that’s right here in our backyard,” said Deven Upadhyay, chief operating officer for the Metropolitan Water District.

Officials emphasize the project uses technology that’s been used safely elsewhere, including in Israel and Singapore. The reassurances have become critical after a separate Los Angeles wastewater treatment plant, which uses a different process to purify water for irrigation and industrial purposes, flooded and spilled sewage into the ocean in July.

“The last thing that any of us want is one of these projects that have a water quality hiccup that sets back public perception,” Upadhyay said.

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Metz, who reported from Carson City, Nevada, is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/environment.