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International Climate Finance

Why the new IPCC report is also a ‘code red’ for finance

By Stacy Swann, Alan Miller, and Darius Nassiry Earlier this week, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its report "Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis."  The report was based on over 14,000 studies by hundreds of scientists from 66 countries and represents a significant update to the last major report eight years ago. Recent extreme weather events, including wildfires in California, Greece, Turkey, and Russia, and flooding in China and northern Europe, underscored the risks of extreme weather amplified by climate change. The reaction in the press was dire: ­ "Code red for humanity" and "the [...]

2021-08-13T11:42:32-04:00August 13th, 2021|Climate Risk, International Climate Finance, Of Note|
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The Role of Securities Regulators and the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) in Promoting Climate Risk Mainstreaming

In the shadow of our collective COVID19 experience, it is clearer that financial policy frameworks will need to be enhanced to reinforce our resilience to exogenous shocks, including those brought about by climate change. Financial policies and frameworks that promote transparent information necessary for financing for low-carbon, climate-resilient investment will be essential. Yet, the diversity of investors and types of investing means that there is a multitude of ways that climate considerations can be mainstreamed into financial policy and frameworks to accelerate climate-aligned investment. As such frameworks need to be tailored to the investors they cover.  Financial system governance bodies, [...]

2020-05-05T14:07:01-04:00May 4th, 2020|Greening Finance, International Climate Finance|
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Adjust, Align, Accelerate: What the Financial Sector Must Do to Deliver Resilience to Climate Change

Across the globe, physical climate impacts have become more pronounced and damaging in recent years, with grave implications for many vulnerable people and societies. The four-year period between 2015 and 2018 has been confirmed as the hottest on record and was replete with extreme weather triggered or exacerbated by climate change that negatively affected, and sometimes devastated, many countries and millions of people and their livelihoods, rippling out to entire ecosystems and economies. Both acute and chronic impacts from a changing climate are already manifesting in financial and economic losses around the globe, not only in emerging economies of the [...]

2020-02-20T13:15:51-05:00July 18th, 2019|Climate Risk, Greening Finance, International Climate Finance|
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Filling Gaps in the Financial Ecosystem for Energy Access Requires Financing the Last Mile

Sub-Saharan Africa, a land of abundant energy resources and roughly 750 million people, is the least electrified region in the world. Two out of every three people there are in desperate need of reliable and affordable energy supply to power their homes and workplaces. Across the region, 60% of the population lives in rural areas and 22% of them have energy access; the region has an average household electrification rate of only 42%. Achieving universal energy access is thus a critical step in unleashing Africa’s human development and economic growth potential. It will increase productivity through improved living and working [...]

2018-12-13T10:03:32-05:00December 13th, 2018|Greening Finance, International Climate Finance|
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Infrastructure Is Local – Financing Resilience Must Be, Too

By Andrea Colnes and Stacy Swann When the costs are tallied, Hurricane Matthew will become the thirteenth extreme weather event of 2016 in the United States to cost more than $1 billion in damages, including four flooding events and nine severe storm events.  The damages here and abroad from Matthew will affect entire communities – their housing, businesses, and major infrastructure, including power plants, roads, water and bridges.  In August, an extreme flooding event brought more than 25 inches of rain in two days to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, damaging more than 100,000 homes and costing the economy more than $10 [...]

2016-11-18T17:52:28-05:00October 11th, 2016|Climate Risk, International Climate Finance|
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Time to Pick Up the Pace: Climate Change, Risk, Resilience

The world is warming. About that there is no doubt. 2015 was a hot year – the hottest on record. The first two months of 2016 continued to shatter temperature records. In February, we crossed the 1.5°C threshold, meaning average global temperatures that month passed what many governments say should be the limit, that of a world 1.5 degrees warmer than pre-industrial times. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) also just reported the largest 12-month jump in carbon dioxide concentrations ever, with global concentrations rising by 3.76 parts per million (ppm) to 404 ppm. “Carbon dioxide concentrations haven’t been [...]

2016-11-18T17:52:29-05:00March 14th, 2016|Climate Risk, Greening Finance, International Climate Finance|
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Green Banks, Greening Banks and the Sustainable Financial System

By Andrea Colnes and Stacy Swann - Coalition for Green Capital & Climate Finance Advisors   We are in the second week of the UN Climate Summit in Paris, and while we wait for the negotiators to finish their hard work, private sector and finance continue to show they are ready and prepared to increase their efforts and do their part to address climate change. Just this weekend, major businesses stepped up their pledges to do more to address climate change, including Unilever, L’Oreal, Virgin Atlantic and Harley Davidson, among others. All very good news. Yesterday, two new climate finance [...]

2016-11-18T17:52:29-05:00December 8th, 2015|Climate Risk, Greening Finance, International Climate Finance|
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Building Climate Resilience into Investment Choices: Time for a “Koh”?

The Paris Climate Conference is underway, and the announcements, pledges and statements of leadership are starting to roll in, and some of them are fairly impressive. In the opening day alone, Bill Gates and a powerful list of fellow billionaires announced the creation of the Breakthrough Energy Coalition, aimed at accelerating the pace and scale of affordable, clean energy solutions. This is significant in part because it is a commitment by private investors to finance projects just past the R&D stage and bring them to commercial viability, helping them avoid the “valley of death” that exists between basic research and [...]

2016-11-18T17:52:29-05:00December 3rd, 2015|Climate Risk, International Climate Finance|
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