When the dust settled after the near failure of the UNFCCC climate talks in Copenhagen, the issue of climate finance seemed strangely to have been one of the few areas, where despite all procedural and political misgivings, real progress was made. The “Copenhagen Accord” gives some clear promises and numbers for both short- and long-term climate financing. However, as the Accord is a nonbinding political agreement, many questions about if and how those commitments can be fulfilled are yet to be answered. A new analysis by Liane Schalatek, HBF, and Neil Bird and Jessica Brown, ODI, analyses some of these questions in further detail.
The United States must make long-term investments in clean energy development or risk being shut out of a $2.3 trillion industry, this new report has found. The study describes Germany, Spain and China as early winners in the next great technological and industrial revolution because each imposed policies to encourage low-carbon energy development.
In cooperation with the Center for American Progress
If the Copenhagen Accord on climate change can be called a small step forward or a grand failure depends on the regional perspective. Two months after the Copenhagen climate summit, this paper sheds some light on the different regional and national evaluations of the conference and analyzes how perceptions on the outcome of the conference vary between key countries and regions.
Der Kopenhagener Klimagipfel hat in Europa für Enttäuschung gesorgt. Nicht so in der USA. Klimaschützer kämpfen hier weiter um das Klimagesetz. Doch eine Mehrheit ist alles andere als sicher. IN GERMAN ONLY.
According to an estimate of the U.S. Congressional Research Service, the global financial crisis destroyed 40% of the world’s GDP. Since then, stock indices show a significant recovery of the lost wealth; however, analyses are likely to show that, on the whole, the response to the crisis (government stimulus packages and especially bank bail-outs of worldwide estimated $14 trillion) redistributed wealth upward. In the U.S., unemployment has exceeded the 10% mark and one out of every nine people receives food stamps.
The green industrial revolution will, on a grand scale, create new products, services, and jobs. Although much remains to be done, the great transformation is on its way. In this collection of short articles, the authors debate the pros and cons of carbon capture and storage, the American turn to "green," and the questions of how economic growth and climate protection can be reconciled.
