Glasgow Breakthrough Agenda
An International clean technologies plan signed in COP26 and supported by over 40 countries, including the UK, US, India, China, and Turkey, Glasgow Breakthrough Agenda aims to make clean technologies more affordable and accessible globally by 2030.
Agriculture Innovation Mission for Climate (Aim for Climate)
A $4 billion joint initiative launched by the US and the United Arab Emirates and supported by Singapore. This new initiative uniquely focuses on rapid innovations in agriculture and aims to address the climate crisis through supporting research and innovation.
United Kingdom financial commitments
During his speech, Chancellor, Rishi Sunak shared that the UK would invest £100 million to developing countries to ease and accelerate their progress against climate change. In addition, not only did Sunak announce that over the next five years the G20 would give $500 billion to “countries that need it most”, but also, “Today, I can announce that the United Kingdom will commit £100m to the task force on access to climate finance, making it quicker and easier for developing countries to access the finance they need.”
The Glasgow Financial Alliance
During COP26 the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero launched 24 new initiatives. The initiatives are aiming to strengthen the information, tools, and markets required for the global financial system to support the transformation to net zero. It has now brought together financial organizations with assets worth over $130 trillion of capital to be deployed.
Leaders urge the private sector to drive the clean economic transition “The gap between what governments have and what the world needs is large and the private sector needs to play a bigger role,” US Treasury secretary Janet Yellen shared.
The UK and US pledged their commitment to support a new “Climate Investment Funds’ Capital Markets Mechanism” — which is designed to stimulate investment in clean energy such as solar and wind power in developing countries.
US and UK ministers continue to urge the private sector to do more to accelerate the transition towards cleaner economies.
Asian Development Bank partners with investors to buy and shutter coal power plants
The Asian Development Bank is launching a new fund that will buy coal power plants with the purpose of shutting them down in pursuance of accelerating the energy transition. In addition, ADB has launched the Energy Transition Mechanism with funding of $2.5 billion to $3.5 billion, which will focus on continuing to buy plants and close down 50% of coal-generated power plants. “The idea of the [initiative] is to take the range of investors, and blend different financing, to create a very low average cost of capital,” said David Elzinga, senior energy specialist at ADB.
