Topic: COP-18 Doha

STATEMENT: Climate Talks Wrap Up with a Deal in Doha

James Anderson — Sat, 08 Dec 2012 09:30:41 -0500

The climate talks (COP18) wrapped up today in Doha, Qatar, with package of decisions, including an agreement to move forward an international climate agreement by 2015.

Following are key developments:

The parties resolved the Second Commitment Period of the Kyoto Protocol by adopting amendments;
They wrapped up and closed the long-term cooperative action (LCA) track, including rules around finance, accounting and review; and
They agreed to move forward with the core elements of the Durban Agreement, including a workplan for 2013 to begin negotiating the 2015 legally binding agreement.

Following is a statement by Jennifer Morgan, Director, Climate and Energy Program, World Resources Institute:

“It wasn’t pretty, but Doha delivered just enough to keep the process moving. By resolving the key issues, all countries are now on a single track to enter into a new international climate agreement by 2015.

“Yet, much more remains to be done. Over the coming year, negotiators need to step up their intensity and hammer out a plan that will lead to an agreement that is ambitious and fair for all. Moreover, they need to raise their level of ambition in the near term, even before a new agreement kicks in.

“Getting on the right track will take a greater commitment and sense of urgency than we saw in Doha. There were a couple of bright spots, including the EU countries that stepped up with important financial pledges. But the United Nations is primarily a reflection of the political will of its members– and right now we’re lacking leadership on climate from most world powers.

“Following President Obama’s re-election and the devastation of Hurricane Sandy, many people were watching to see if the United States would shift its strategy. The US made some gestures, but it didn’t significantly change course. All eyes will be on the administration to see what further action it takes to lower emissions at home. President Obama’s legacy– like all world leaders– will in part be measured by his response to the climate crisis.

“The stakes are high. Whether it’s events like Typhoon Bopha and Hurricane Sandy, or record-breaking droughts and rapidly rising seas, the dangers of a warming planet cannot be ignored.

“The door is now open. It’s up to all countries to step through and get on course to a strong and fair climate agreement.”

Greenhouse Gas Mitigation in the United States: An Overview of the Current Policy Landscape

Sarah Parsons — Thu, 29 Nov 2012 18:11:27 -0500

Executive Summary

In 2009, at the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties, President Barack Obama pledged to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions “in the range of a 17 percent emission reduction by 2020 compared with 2005 levels.” To date, this pledge is not enshrined in or supported by any domestic law. However, a variety of federal policies and programs are directly and indirectly reducing GHG emissions. In addition, U.S. state and local governments have authority to adopt GHG-reduction policies, and some are taking noteworthy actions.

In the context of the U.S. GHG reduction goal, this report examines key existing and emerging federal policies that are likely to reduce GHG emissions in the United States. Pages 10-12 also provide examples of policy actions being taken by U.S. states. For federal policies, our discussion focuses on those that are mandatory or provide a financial incentive, such as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), tax credits for renewable energy, and new standards for passenger cars and trucks. These programs, and others that are considered in the pages that follow, will drive significant reductions in U.S. GHG emissions.

Will this be enough to meet U.S. GHG reduction goals? Although this report does not provide an exhaustive assessment of U.S. policies, U.S. government GHG projections suggest that additional policy action is likely to be necessary for the United States to achieve the president’s GHG reduction target and continue significant emissions reductions after 2020. At this time, no promising initiatives are being considered in the U.S. Congress to drive further reductions in GHG pollution.

However, federal agencies already have the authority to do more, and have begun to take action. Additional policies such as standards for existing power plants, additional energy efficiency standards for appliances and equipment, and policies that reduce HFC consumption, can drive additional reductions in 2020 and beyond. WRI is conducting a separate analysis to quantify the possible reductions from these policies and to examine their impact on the United States’ 2020 reduction target. Moving forward it will be important to track action on these and other policies.

The Japanese Fast-Start Finance Contribution

Sarah Parsons — Wed, 28 Nov 2012 12:42:08 -0500

Executive Summary

Developed country governments have repeatedly committed to provide new and additional finance to help developing countries transition to low-carbon and climate-resilient growth. This assessment considers Japan’s efforts to provide “fast start finance” (FSF) between January 2010 and February 2012 in the context of the pledge by developed countries to mobilize USD 30 billion from 2010 to 2012 under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). It is part of a series scrutinizing how developed countries are defining, delivering, and reporting FSF.

Given the size of its economy, Japan has a major role to play in delivering FSF.

Japan’s USD 15 billion FSF commitment is one of the largest amongst developed countries, but it is important to consider the contents of this commitment. Japan has played a significant role in global efforts to finance climate change activities in developing countries, and its FSF commitments accounts for almost half of the FSF that developed countries have pledged for 2010-2012. However, it is essential to better understand the broad range of instruments and activities that the government includes in its FSF, as different governments consider different types of finance to constitute FSF, so self-reported figures are not directly comparable between countries.

Other official flows (OOF) such as export and investment insurance, non-concessional loans, and guarantees make up around 40% of Japan’s total FSF contribution so far, and there is some ambiguity around the role of leveraged private finance. OOF amounts to as much as USD 5.1 billion of the USD 13.2 billion mobilized by 29 February 2012 sincethe announcement of the Hatoyama Initiative in September 2009. This includes USD 3.1 billion of leveraged private finance. While the role of leveraged private finance in the Japanese pledge is ambiguous, as discussed in the section on Methodology, we have included it in the analysis presented in this paper.

Japanese FSF is heavily weighted toward mitigation. About 70 percent of Japanese FSF addresses mitigation objectives. Most mitigation finance, in turn, is financed through loans (both ODA and non-ODA), which constitute about 75 percent of the contribution for infrastructure development projects, such as urban transport projects. There is a more even balance between adaptation and mitigation objectives within the grant portion of the FSF contribution (adaptation: 30 percent, mitigation and REDD+: 27 percent, multiple objectives: 43 percent). A significant share of Japanese FSF addresses one or more non-climate objectives in addition to mitigation or adaptation urban transport projects. Asia receives the most FSF among all regions, irrespective of financial instrument type. It is worth noting that the Japanese FSF includes a number of “clean” fossil fuel power plant construction projects, such as a natural gas combined cycle (NGCC) power plant project in Central Asia. There is a need for greater clarity amongst members of the international community about how support for lower carbon fossil fuel facilities should be treated in the context of climate finance.

On balance, it is not clear that the entirety of the Japanese FSF is “new and additional.” While the FSF contribution reflects some new effort to address climate change, it is unclear that the contribution as a whole can be considered “new and additional.” Since the start of the FSF period, Japan has substantially increased international finance that explicitly targets climate change. Some Japanese agencies have also begun integrating climate change into aspects of development assistance and development finance. Applying five different criteria proposed by experts and practitioners, however, the results indicate that at least a portion of the Japanese FSF spend is not new and additional. A significant share of Japanese FSF reflects pre-existing pledges to development assistance initiatives to scale up climate change related finance such as those articulated in the Japan Cool Earth Partnership of 2008. Furthermore, Japan’s FSF cannot be seen as additional to its existing commitments to scale up development finance to 0.7 percent of its GNI.

FSF reporting follows Japan’s standard processes for reporting on conventional development assistance, whose transparency can be strengthened to meet new needs associated with FSF. There is room for improvement in terms of the transparency, accountability and credibility of Japanese FSF. Some of the identified issues may be attributable to the fact that Japanese FSF contains a large number of projects supported by a variety of channeling institutions. This has made it difficult for the government to present a clear overview of Japanese FSF.

The largest issue is that the information on FSF is disaggregated, although project-level information provided by the implementing agencies is detailed. Most of the climate finance projects could not be easily identified without extensive key word research on the websites of implementing agencies. This study identified about 250 likely FSF projects, amounting to USD 11.7 billion or nearly 90 percent of the amount committed by 29 February 2012. At the same time, about 500 FSF projects – most of which are of relatively low monetary value – could not be independently identified.

The Japanese government has already taken steps to strengthen the transparency of Japanese FSF, such as adding information about channeling institutions to the list of FSF projects included in its second submission to the UNFCCC. However, additional information would facilitate an informed discussion of the adequacy of FSF efforts. The following practices would further strengthen the transparency of Japanese climate finance reporting:

Provide a complete list of the projects that have been supported through the Japan FSF spend. Specify the climate finance projects that constitute aggregated numbers in the official documentation;
Include hyperlinks to the relevant webpages that describe the projects that have been supported through FSF in this proposed project list, as this would substantially enhance stakeholder access to information on the FSF contribution and understanding of its objectives;
Compile all information on its climate finance contributions in one easily accessible format, and support access to supporting information on the individual projects that constitute the FSF spend;
Explain the eligibility criteria for the ODA and OOF flows that have been counted towards the FSF contribution;
Work in cooperation with other contributor countries and multilateral institutions to strengthen and harmonize bilateral and multilateral reporting on climate finance.

STATEMENT: UN Emissions Gap Report Finds Global Action On Climate Change Inadequate

James Anderson — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 09:46:48 -0500

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The latest Emissions Gap Report, by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the European Climate Foundation, is being released today. The report finds that emissions are now around 14 percent above where they need to be. The gap is on course to be 8 gigatonnes of CO2 equivalent by 2020, which is 2 Gt higher than last year’s assessment.

Following is a statement by Jennifer Morgan, Director, Climate and Energy Program, World Resources Institute:

“This report is another harsh reminder that the world is simply not moving aggressively enough to tackle the climate challenge. The gap is growing and carbon dioxide levels continue to rise, and yet the current pledges and commitments by countries remain sorely inadequate. We are already seeing how climate change—with more extreme weather events, rising seas and more droughts—is taking its toll on people, property and our economy. Without a rapid change in direction, the world is headed more and more firmly down a path to even more severe changes that will be felt around the globe.”

“As we look to the Doha climate talks, it’s essential that negotiators come prepared with a renewed sense of urgency. As the Emissions Gap Report points out, it remains possible to achieve the carbon reductions needed to limit warming to below 2 degrees Celsius. The policy and technological solutions are within our reach. What we need is the political will and ambition to move forward with these solutions. We need to close the gap before it’s too late.”

-END-

STATEMENT: World Bank "Raises Alarm" of a 4 Degree Hotter World

Michael Oko — Sun, 18 Nov 2012 19:51:06 -0500

The World Bank Group just released a groundbreaking new report on climate change, called Turn Down the Heat, which offers a vivid assessment of what 4 degrees Celsius of global temperature rise would mean for the world.

Following is a statement by Andrew Steer, President, World Resources Institute:

“This report should awaken world leaders out of their slumber on climate change. A 4 degree temperature rise would bring unimaginable costs to people and society. We must take the necessary actions now to stay within 2 degrees or lower of warming.

“The differences between 2 degrees and 4 degrees temperature rise are stark. It took little more than four degrees of cooling to create the Ice Age, so imagine the havoc 4 degrees of warming would create. While the impacts would be uneven around the globe, vulnerable countries and poor people would be hardest hit. Communities already facing economic hardship would face longer droughts and more intense monsoons that disrupt food supply, more diseases associated with warmer temperatures and more pests, and greater water scarcity.

“The World Bank is to be congratulated for raising the alarm on this issue. By doing so they are aligning themselves with the majority of scientific opinion on climate change. It’s worth noting that the World Bank is a financial institution and not prone toward exaggeration. This report, therefore, must not be shrugged off. The World Bank itself can do more to raise ambition through its own financing, including by directing the great bulk of its energy investments toward scaling up renewable energy and energy efficiency. Further, the World Bank can channel more resources toward more projects that will enhance innovation and sustainability, as well as climate resilience.

“As negotiators head to Doha for the climate talks, they must bring a greater sense of urgency and purpose to these negotiations. A 4 degree warmer world can be prevented, but this will require greater leadership and imagination than has been shown to date. All negotiators should re-commit to keep the world within 2 degrees of warming. But we need more than UN negotiators to respond.

“Climate change is one of the great challenges of our generation, and we need to bring the full capacity of governments, businesses, multi-lateral institutions, and civil society to confront these challenges. Around the world, there are numerous examples of how the problem could be solved at low-cost and with high returns. We have no more excuses for inaction.

“The alarm bell on global warming is ringing. Let’s hope world leaders are listening.”

–

Dr. Steer previously worked as the World Bank Group’s Special Envoy for Climate Change.

ADVISORY: Press Teleconference on Doha Climate Talks

Michael Oko — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 17:32:07 -0500

Full audio recording of WRI’s press call below:

With the U.S. elections just completed and the Doha climate talks fast approaching, this is an important moment to consider where progress can be made on international action to address climate change. The recent Hurricane Sandy, along with other extreme weather and climate events, has delivered a powerful wake-up call about the urgency of shifting to a low-carbon trajectory.

Listen to the audio recording of WRI’s press call here:

On Tuesday, November 13, leading experts from the World Resources Institute will participate in a press teleconference to discuss the state of play and key topics in Doha, including how to move forward with an ambitious climate agreement, the role of the U.S. and other countries in the international negotiations, how to accelerate climate finance, and more.

WHAT
Press teleconference on the UNFCCC climate negotiations in Doha, Qatar (COP18)

WHO
Dr. Andrew Steer, President, WRI

Jennifer Morgan, Director, Climate and Energy Program, WRI

Clifford Polycarp, Senior Associate, Institutions & Governance Program, WRI

WHEN
Tuesday, November 13, 2012 at 9:00 a.m. EST (DC)//14:00 GMT (London)

Media: Call-in 10 minutes prior to the start time

DIAL-IN
+(888) 566-6569 (Toll Free, U.S. only); or

+(517) 308-9326 (U.S. and International)

Access code: WRI

STATEMENT: President Obama Elected to a Second Term

Michael Oko — Tue, 06 Nov 2012 23:04:46 -0500

Following is a statement by Andrew Steer, President, World Resources Institute:

“With his re-election, President Obama has the opportunity to fulfill the promise of his campaign and tackle the greatest challenges of our generation. At the top of the list should be climate change—which is already taking a serious toll on people, property, resources and the economy.

“After a long and bruising battle, it’s time for elected officials to get off the stump and get back to the job of governing. It’s time for America’s leaders to come together and find common ground on vital issues for people and the planet.

“In its first term, the Obama administration made real progress to reduce harmful emissions and shift the country toward cleaner energy. The administration implemented historic clean vehicle rules, proposed standards for greenhouse gas emissions for new power plants, and directed unprecedented investments in clean energy, among other achievements.

“But, these actions aren’t enough. The reality is that the Obama Administration has not yet put the country on a pathway to truly confront the climate crisis. First off, the United States needs a strong national climate and energy strategy. The president should begin by re-engaging a dialogue on climate change and identifying the actions needed to address the crisis. The president should work with Congress on national-level policies, including putting a price on carbon, to get the country on a low-carbon trajectory. In addition, the EPA, in particular, has the ability to implement new standards to reduce dangerous greenhouse gases from existing power plants. The president should reject proposals that would over-exploit America’s resources, decimate its lands, or increase its dependence on high-carbon fuels.

“Many leading businesses are looking for greater clarity to stay competitive in the global economy and take advantage of the emerging $2.3 trillion clean energy market. They need to set long-term goals, which are currently being undercut by America’s piecemeal approach on climate and energy.

“In the international arena, the Administration should take a more constructive role around the climate negotiations. President Obama has shown the power of bold leadership on big international issues—and he has the opportunity to make an ambitious international climate agreement part of his legacy.

“Since he took office, President Obama has been a champion of transparency and good governance. In particular, he spurred the creation of the Open Government Partnership, consisting of over 40 countries, to promote transparency and citizen engagement around the world. In his second term, he can help ensure that access to information and citizen engagement in government will continue unabated.

“Just last week, Hurricane Sandy delivered a crippling blow, reminding us what climate change looks like. Climate change is here and its impacts are being felt today. In its aftermath, we have seen how people can come together in times of need, set aside their differences, and focus on the big picture. We need to learn from these lessons and turn them into action.

“President Obama’s legacy will be shaped by his ability to take on big challenges, including climate change, clean energy, environmental protection, and sustainability. The next four years will determine if we will truly be able to say that this presidency moved the country ‘Forward!’”

Climate Finance

Christine Potochny — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 13:55:16 -0500

Facts and Figures: The Scale of Needed Investment

Developing countries will require new investments of up to $300 billion annually by 2020—growing up to $500 billion annually by 2030—to adequately limit their growing greenhouse gas emissions.
These countries will also require several hundred billion additional dollars to protect themselves from the worsening physical and economic impacts of greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere.
About $900 billion per year between now and 2050 will be needed to address investments in global energy supply and demand technologies (in addition to the roughly $2.6 trillion in annual investments to occur in a “business as usual” scenario.
While developed countries have committed to channeling US$100 billion (from public and private sources) annually by 2020 to developing countries for climate mitigation and adaptation activities, this level of investment is far from what is required.

Global Investment for a Resilient Low-Carbon Economy

Stabilizing the global climate is one of the most urgent challenges in coming decades. Our warming world affects all people and ecosystems, particularly the poor who already suffer disproportionately from climate-change impacts. Major financial investments – from both public and private sources and guided by smart and equitable policies - are required to transition the world’s economy to a low-carbon path, reduce greenhouse gas concentrations to safe levels, and build the resilience of vulnerable countries to climate change.

WRI is addressing how these massive investments toward a low-carbon and resilient economy – which we refer to as climate finance –can be realized.

In developing countries, climate change investment needs are significant. Direct government funding is scarce. And the billions of dollars committed to be marshaled by industrialized countries remain inadequate to the magnitude of the challenge of stabilizing a steep trajectory of greenhouse gases. Additional financial investment should be accompanied by rules, regulations, fiscal incentives and effective markets at international, national, and sub-national levels to shift current and projected “business-as-usual” investments, and mobilize resources at the scale required.

WRI’s Vision of Success

Public and private actors—development financing institutions, governments, and private sector investors, including financiers and project developers—significantly shift and scale-up their investments in sustainable, low-carbon and climate-resilient development. These investments will create new markets, address long-term opportunities and risks arising from climate change, promote wider socio-economic benefits, and minimize social and environmental harm.

WRI Strategy

WRI focuses on climate finance broadly defined, not just international public climate finance but both public and private flows including domestic (within developing countries) and international (to developing countries) finance that support climate-related goals.

WRI focuses its expertise on the technical and institutional aspects of three major questions:

How to SHIFT finance from high carbon to low carbon and climate resilient investments (mainstreaming);
How to LEVERAGE private flows using public climate finance (domestic and international) and
How to ASSESS the impact or effectiveness of climate finance, whether positive or negative.

WRI is pursuing national, international and private sector strategies.

National Strategy: Strengthen institutions for effective climate finance mobilization, management and monitoring

SHIFT

Facilitate building national public institutions and capacity to access, manage, program, deploy and monitor climate finance in an effective and transparent manner.
Empower non-governmental institutions and actors to engage and participate in climate finance processes in order to ensure more effective outcomes.
Related projects: Open Climate Network, Electricity Governance Iniative, Measurement & Performance Tracking in Developing Countries.

LEVERAGE

Ensure development financing institutions and finance ministries catalyze a shift in public and private investments toward climate-friendly development through the strategic use of international climate finance.

ASSESS

Help create efficient and accountable financial systems. WRI aims to help national governments and their domestic stakeholders develop systems through which they can wisely generate, access, disperse, and track finances for adaptation.
Related work: Vulnerability & Adaptation
Maximize the impact and effectiveness of climate finance by aligning national mechanisms for receiving, allocating and disbursing international climate finance with the country’s planning, budgeting, programming and monitoring procedures and systems.
Related project: Open Climate Network
Related publication: Summary of Developed Country ‘Fast-Start’ Climate Finance Pledges

International Strategy: Build a robust, effective and equitable climate finance architecture

SHIFT

Promote more effective and legitimate governance of international climate finance by bringing to bear developing country expertise and experience to inform discussions on governance and operation of international climate finance.
Related project: International Financial Flows & the Environment (IFFE).
Related blog posts: the Green Climate Fund.
Ensure mainstreaming climate change in international development finance by encouraging public international financial institutions to adopt and implement ambitious, internationally recognized standards. Such a significant investment shift will support low‐carbon and climate‐resilient development, while ensuring high environmental and social standards.
Related project: International Financial Flows & the Environment (IFFE)
Related publications:

ASSESS

Create an enabling environment for investment by ensuring that international climate finance includes long-term support for conducive policy environments and addresses non-financial barriers to investment. WRI has developed a framework to guide governments and their international partners in selecting pre-investment activities to support and inform the providers of public international climate finance.

Private Sector Strategy: Leverage private sector flows from public climate finance

Related project: Climate Finance & the Private Sector

SHIFT

Provide robust research and analysis to determine what tools and approaches are the most effective at leveraging private climate investment, including detailed mapping of financing instruments used by public and private institutions to finance climate-relevant projects.
Related publications:
Moving the Fulcrum: A Primer on Public Climate Financing Instruments Used to Leverage Private Capital
Public Financing Instruments to Leverage Private Capital for Climate-Relevant Investment: Focus on Multilateral Agencies

LEVERAGE

Help leaders in the public sector seize the opportunity to leverage private investment in a low-carbon future. The public sector can expand its role in effectively unlocking private investment by reducing risk, directing investment and maximizing public and private benefit through the appropriate mix of policies and finance.
Related resources:
Moving the Fulcrum: A Primer on Public Climate Financing Instruments Used to Leverage Private Capital
Climate Finance and the Private Sector brochure

ASSESS

Mobilize WRI’s strong external ties with private sector financial institutions to bring a private sector perspective to climate finance, and help translate the complex languages of private sector investors and public sector policy makers.

Monitoring the Receipt of International Climate Finance by Developing Countries

Sarah Parsons — Fri, 07 Sep 2012 10:19:30 -0400

Executive Summary

The 2010 Cancun Agreements and 2011 Durban Outcome call for developing countries to register, monitor, and report on support received, and for developed countries to improve their reporting by using more complete climate finance reporting guidelines. Doing so will enable information on climate change finance from developed countries to be matched with information from developing countries. The lack of detailed guidance makes it difficult for developing countries to decide how to respond to calls to report climate finance received.

This paper explores the challenges faced by three Asian countries, that is, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam in monitoring finance for climate change. Challenges faced in the three focus countries can be grouped into five categories, and are summarized as follows:

Definitions and Criteria: Countries and donor institutions use a variety of definitions and criteria in identifying climate finance and distinguishing it from other development finance. For the three focus countries, no formal climate finance marker system or definitive guidance exists to help address this definitional issue.
Classifications and Indicators: Sector and activity type classifications also vary widely among donor and recipient institutions, and often do not lend themselves well to climate finance. For example, in the Philippines, there is no energy-specific classification in its current official development assistance (ODA) monitoring system.
Financial Instruments: The type of financial instrument monitored can carry both political implications as well as technical challenges. From a political standpoint, many developing countries and NGOs hold that climate finance—especially adaptation finance—should be delivered primarily in the form of grants. From a technical standpoint, all three countries expressed challenges in monitoring grants, while their loan monitoring systems are fairly developed.
Source: Private finance could potentially play a very important role in international climate finance and its monitoring may be something developing countries could explore for domestic purposes. However, domestic private finance monitoring efforts in the focus countries are often not coordinated with ODA monitoring efforts, nor do they include climate-specific information.
Institutional Arrangements: In the three focus countries, institutional responsibility for the coordination of national climate finance and development of monitoring systems is generally fragmented. Institutional platforms and databases for gathering data on climate finance in particular do not exist. Countries have two options, that is to either modify existing systems or to develop standalone/complementary standardized climate data systems for climate finance.

Despite significant challenges in building their capacity to monitor the receipt of climate change finance, government officials consulted in all three countries expressed an interest in doing so. Such efforts would require several steps, including, for example:

Developing the institutional arrangements and technical platforms necessary to monitor climate finance received. This may include the formation of an interministerial working group on climate finance with an agenda item dedicated to monitoring climate finance, and a complementary (stand-alone) management information system.
Agreeing on and adopting climate finance-specific definitions, criteria, and classifications.
Agreeing on the scope of information to be tracked (type of financial instrument, private versus public, etc.).

Such efforts should be complemented and furthered by support at the international level, both in the form of consistent yet flexible guidance that takes into account the domestic challenges outlined in this paper, as well as financial and capacity building support from developed countries.

Case Study: Applying Information for Adapting the Agriculture Sector in Bundelkhand, India

Sarah Parsons — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 16:25:44 -0400

This case study examines two projects implemented by Development Alternatives to highlight the multiplicity of data sources involved in adaptation decision making, provide an analysis of how information was used, and explore the challenges associated with information use for adaptation decision making in the agricultural sector.

This case study is part of a series under the World Resources Institute project, Information for Climate Adaptation in South Asia: Identifying User Needs. Each of the case studies in this set explores an aspect of information use in adaptation decision making. The goals of this series are two-fold:

Provide insights into how information (such as climate projections, stakeholder interviews, and environmental monitoring) can be used to support adaptation decisions; and
Guide investments by national governments and their development partners in information systems that can inform decision making around risks related to climate change.

This case study series was supported by the UK Department for International Development. Case study authors used the same framework of guiding questions for their research, which consisted of literature reviews and interviews.

Case Study: Information Use in Nepal's National Adaptation Programme of Action

Sarah Parsons — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 16:14:36 -0400

Nepal is passing through a turbulent period of transition, reorganizing its internal political boundaries, establishing a federal structure, and changing the very nature of the national government. Since 2008, Nepal’s priorities have been dominated by these political imperatives, a post-conflict peace process, and attempts to integrate Maoist ex-insurgents into the national mainstream. This dynamic presents numerous challenges for the government in seeking to meet the country’s development and environmental needs. Climate change adds extra stress to these needs in the form of heightened weather variability, extreme events, and other impacts on the country’s natural and social systems.

Provide insights into how information (such as climate projections, stakeholder interviews, and environmental monitoring) can be used to support adaptation decisions; and
Guide investments by national governments and their development partners in information systems that can inform decision making around risks related to climate change.

Case Study: Communicating Modeled Information for Adaptation Decision Making

Sarah Parsons — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 15:30:27 -0400

The HighNoon project, which began in 2009, set out to assess the impact Himalayan glacier retreat and expected changes in the Indian summer monsoon on the distribution of water resources in Northern India. The project’s aim was “to recommend appropriate and efficient response strategies to enable adaptation to hydrological extreme events.” The project used information from scenarios generated by regional climate and hydrological models and integrated it with stakeholder perspectives to identify and prioritize adaptation strategies. This case study examines the HighNoon project in order to explore how adaptation-relevant information can best be packaged and disseminated to different users and audiences at the state, district, and block levels.

This case study is part of a series that fall under the World Resources Institute project, Information for Climate Adaptation in South Asia: Identifying User Needs. Each of the case studies in this set explores an aspect of information use in adaptation decision making. The goals of this series are two-fold:

Provide insights into how information (such as climate projections, stakeholder interviews, and environmental monitoring) can be used to support adaptation decisions; and
Guide investments by national governments and their development partners in information systems that can inform decision making around risks related to climate change.

Moving the Fulcrum: A Primer on Public Climate Financing Instruments Used to Leverage Private Capital

Christine Potochny — Wed, 25 Jul 2012 15:11:56 -0400

Executive Summary

The Problem: Projected climate change mitigation investment needs in developing countries–including for low-carbon sectors–are significant, growing, and may not be met. Experts estimate new investments of up to $300 billion annually by 2020, growing up to $500 billion annually by 2030, are required to mitigate developing countries’ greenhouse gas emissions to levels in line with global targets. While industrialized nations have committed to mobilizing new funds of $100 billion annually by 2020 to meet these needs, this level of funding is far from what is required.

One Solution: Redirect the private sector’s growing investment in developing countries to help fill the growing climate finance gap. McKinsey estimates that the financial stock—that is, the total value of outstanding stocks and bonds—of developing countries grew by $11 trillion in 2011. By intervening to improve the investment attractiveness of climate change-relevant markets, the public sector has a significant opportunity to harness and redirect these significant private sector capital flows away from fossil fuel-driven sectors and toward low-carbon development.

The Challenge: Mobilizing private sector investment will require better targeted public support that improves the risk-reward calculus of lowcarbon markets. The private sector seeks markets that exhibit (i) attractive returns relative to associated risks over an appropriate investment timeframe (“attractive risk-reward calculus”) as well as (ii) adequate size, liquidity, and transparency. These conditions are often absent in developing countries due to the nascent natures of both low-carbon and financial markets in these geographies.

Recommendation: To improve the risk-reward calculus of investments—arguably the most fundamental barrier to leveraging private capital—the public sector can complement support for low-carbon policies with direct finance that manages the following risks:

Political and macroeconomic risks. Political risk guarantees, interest-rate/currency exchange products, and local currency loans can help investors and project developers financially manage political (for example, political instability) and/or macroeconomic (for example, exchange rate volatility) risks. As these financing instruments are not easily accessible in poorer countries, by providing these instruments, the public sector can catalyze low-carbon investment in geographies where access to finance is most challenging.
Low-carbon market risks, including policy, technology, and operational risks. These risks, which range from unexpected policy changes to technology failures, can affect both new and mature low-carbon markets. In newer low-carbon markets, public financing instruments like first-loss equity and debt investments and concessional loans can be instrumental in encouraging early investment. Projects in more established low-carbon markets—like solar, wind, and energy efficiency—can benefit from flexible loans, partial risk and credit guarantees, and risk sharing facilities.

Given the varied investment conditions across developing countries and their respective low-carbon markets, each market will require a unique combination of finance and policy support to scale-up private sector investment. Future WRI publications, drawing on private sector perspectives, will delve deeper into how public climate finance providers—whether governments, development finance institutions, or export-credit/aid agencies—can tailor direct finance to scale-up private sector investment in different markets.

The U.S. Fast-Start Finance Contribution

Kevin Lustig — Thu, 17 May 2012 11:54:20 -0400

Executive Summary

OpenClimateNetwork.org

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Developed country governments have repeatedly committed to provide new and additional finance to help developing countries transition to low-carbon and climate-resilient growth. This assessment considers U.S. efforts to provide “fast start finance” (FSF) in fiscal years 2010 and 2011 in the context of the pledge by developed countries to mobilize $30 billion1 from 2010 to 2012 under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). It is part of a series scrutinizing how developed countries are defining, delivering, and reporting FSF.

Given the size of its economy and its historic responsibility as a top emitter of greenhouse gases, the United States has a major role to play in delivering FSF. Key characteristics of the U.S. FSF contribution are quantified in Figure 1.

The U.S. FSF contribution of $5.1B reflects a positive effort made in challenging political and economic circumstances, but there is more to be done. Congress and key agencies have increased funding for climate change objectives relative to the pre-FSF period, and have begun to integrate climate considerations into ongoing portfolios. The global economic recession and the resulting pressure to cut spending, however, combined with an active subset of policy-makers who oppose U.S. action on climate change, have impeded further increases to climate finance.

The US does not count private finance toward its FSF contribution, but it does count non-grant instruments as well as development assistance. Loans, loan guarantees, and insurance constitute one-third of the U.S. contribution; grants and related instruments (including contracts and grant contributions to multilateral climate funds) account for the rest. Only a minority of the funds examined – 40% for adaptation and 29% for mitigation – support projects that clearly target climate change as a principal objective, although the remainder can in most cases still be expected to deliver climate benefits. (A greater share may principally target climate change, but adequate information was not available to support this conclusion.)

While the FSF contribution reflects some new effort to address climate change, it is unclear that the contribution as a whole can be considered “new and additional.” Since the start of the FSF period, the United States has substantially increased international finance that explicitly targets climate change. Some U.S. government agencies have also begun integrating climate change into aspects of development assistance and development finance. The United States is also counting as FSF projects and programs that it was funding – and that were likely delivering climate benefits – prior to the FSF period. Furthermore, the United States has distanced itself from targets and timetables to increase development assistance, and climate finance appears to be increasing at a significantly faster rate than development assistance.

There is a need for additional transparency and harmonization in reporting. The United States has made significant efforts over the past several years to improve monitoring and reporting on climate finance, as well as on foreign assistance. However, there is room for improvement.

We recommend that the United States:

Publish the criteria it uses to program and identify FSF.
Publish a detailed list of the projects and programs that constitute FSF, including, for each project, the amount, the administering agency, the financial instrument, the recipient country (where relevant) and institution, whether it is supported by core or non-core climate finance, and, to the extent feasible,information on disbursement status.
Identify and explain any discrepancies between such a project list and the total reported FSF sum, and explain how non-grant instruments are counted.
Provide complete information on U.S. FSF in a single document, so that users can avoid the need to download and reconcile over 240 documents to access this information.
Harmonize reporting between the FSF reports and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Development Assistance Committee (DAC) by ensuring that relevant FSF projects are tagged with the appropriate DAC Rio Markers and using consistent project titles between the two reporting systems.
Work in cooperation with other contributor countries and multilateral institutions to strengthen and harmonize bilateral and multilateral reporting on climate finance.

The UK Fast-Start Finance Contribution

Kevin Lustig — Thu, 17 May 2012 11:21:25 -0400

Executive Summary

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Developed country governments have repeatedly committed to provide new and additional finance to help developing countries transition to low-carbon and climate-resilient growth. This assessment considers UK efforts to provide “fast start finance” (FSF) in 2010/11 and 2011/12 in the context of the pledge by developed countries to mobilise funds approaching USD 30 billion from 2010 to 2012 under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). It is part of a series of studies scrutinising how developed countries are defining, delivering, and reporting FSF.

The UK has a major role to play in delivering FSF. It is one of the richer economies in the developed world. Like other developed countries, it bears historic responsibility for contributing to the global accumulation of greenhouse gases. Key characteristics of the UK FSF contribution are quantified in Figure 1.

The UK has made a substantial effort to mobilise climate finance. Finance has been channelled through the Environmental Transformation Fund in 2010/11 and through the International Climate Fund (ICF) in 2011/12. GBP 1.06 billion had been spent and committed as of November 2011. It has also committed climate finance beyond the FSF period through the International Climate Fund (ICF), which will spend GBP 2.9 billion between April 2011 and March 2015.

The majority of UK finance is spent by multilateral institutions, in the form of capital contributions. UK contributions of GBP 715 million to the Climate Investment Funds (CIFs) administered by the World Bank in partnership with Regional Development Banks constitute the largest share of its FSF.

*The UK does not count private finance toward its FSF contribution, but it does count non-grant instruments as well as development assistance.** The majority of the projects supported do seem to have climate change as a principal objective.

While the FSF contribution reflects some new effort to address climate change, it is unclear that the contribution as a whole can be considered “new and additional.” Since the start of the FSF period, the UK has substantially increased international finance that explicitly targets climate change. The UK is also counting as FSF projects and programmes that it was funding – and that were likely delivering climate benefits – prior to the FSF period. Much of the funding counted was pledged prior to the FSF period, notably the contributions to the CIFs and Congo Basin Forest Fund. Climate finance appears to be increasing at a significantly faster rate than development assistance.

The UK is relatively transparent about its FSF spend, but more can be done. The UK discloses a list of projects and programmes to which FSF has been directed to interested stakeholders, and to the European Commission (EC) on an annual basis. The UK’s adoption of new transparency standards for its administrative processes is substantially strengthening its performance in this regard. Specifically, it participates in the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) for its official development assistance (ODA) spending. In this context, government departments are now required to disclose the business case for all projects that receive public support. A business case presents the key components and purpose of the programme, and how it contributes to the achievement of relevant government UK strategic objectives. This includes relatively comprehensive information on the institutions receiving funding and implementing projects.

There is a need to improve access to information in practice. The commitment to disclose business cases was made in January 2011 and has not been applied retroactively. In practice, few business cases have yet been made available. We do note some discrepancies between aggregate and project-level reporting, although we recognise that the project list is a snapshot at a given moment in time of the collection of FSF recipients. As new systems to improve reporting and disclosure on the status of programmes funded by the UK government are implemented, we should expect to see higher levels of transparency realised in practice.

We recommend that the UK:

Disclose underpinning project-level spending information alongside aggregate reporting
Ensure that project lists consistently specify the recipient institution for finance to reduce discrepancies and enhance transparency
Work in cooperation with other donors and multilateral institutions to strengthen and harmonise reporting on climate finance, particularly with regards to the status of disbursement
Ensure that business cases for approved projects are publicly disclosed in a timely manner by all ICF implementing departments