A Step in the Right Direction

4 December 2018

On Monday, the World Bank released news of its post-2020 climate action, to cover 2021-2025.

The announced USD$200 billion is good news. Quite a lot of zero-carbon resilient-infrastructure building good news, in fact, and the Bank has doubled its existing climate finance commitment. The World Bank (minus the IFC) has also committed to 50% for adaptation. Did other MDBs hear that?

Who could complain about the newly-pledged efforts to support 36GW of renewables and 1.5GW of energy efficiency savings? Or helping 100 cities decarbonize?

It’s just that the Bank has failed to actually state a climate target, or even how much carbon savings all that money will aim to achieve. It has not promised to end funding fossil fuel infrastructure completely, either directly or through intermediaries, although its prior announcement to stop funding upstream gas and oil remains a very positive step. This remains a gaping hole in the Bank’s stated climate ambition.

Perhaps the simplest way to set a climate-ambitious target would be to pledge, as civil society called on them to do at their October annual meeting, that the World Bank will make ALL of its portfolio lending compatible with 1.5C.

And please remember in the midst of all the joy surrounding the new announcement, that most of the money from the banks are loans that must be paid back — by the world’s poorest countries.