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The "How-To" of Low Carbon Growth
Developing countries seeking low-carbon growth often lack the knowledge and financial tools they need to achieve it.
To address these gaps, the Energy Sector Management Assistance Program (ESMAP) and the World Bank Group are working with partners to match the ‘how to’ to the ‘need to know’ for low-carbon growth. At Carbon Expo 2010 in Cologne, Germany, they hosted an event to review the experience of seven emerging economies with new tools for low carbon development. The countries involved—Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Poland and South Africa—are proactively seeking to identify opportunities and related financial, technical and policy requirements to move towards a low carbon development path. With World Bank and ESMAP support, the governments of these countries have initiated studies to assess their goals and development priorities, in conjunction with greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation opportunities, and to examine the additional costs and benefits of lower carbon growth.
“Each study responds to national priorities,” said Jane Ebinger of ESMAP. “They all span multiple sectors and issues: land use change and forestry, renewable energy, energy efficiency, transport, policy implementation, financing, macro-economic modeling and capacity building.”
ESMAP’s donors are also supporting knowledge exchange through the Carbon Finance Assist Program (CF-Assist) at the World Bank Institute, which supports their efforts to develop knowledge programs for low-carbon growth. The low-carbon pathways identified under the aegis of this program can be used to help other countries identify low cost opportunities to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Results from these studies can be found at the World Bank Group's Climate Change Data Portal.
A new climate finance website was also unveiled at the Carbon Expo event. This site provides useful information for policy-makers and project leaders in developing countries on various sources of climate finance, and guidance for informed decision-making on mitigation and adaptation investments. Developed in partnership by the bank Group and the UN Development Programme, it is also intended to to develop an interactive South-South community of practice.
”This web-based Climate Finance Knowledge Platform should become the “go to” website for developing countries trying to identify Climate Finance Options,” said Ari Huhtala, Senior Environmental Specialist in the World Bank’s Climate Change Team.
The website will provide:
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A harmonized description of the types of funds available from multilateral finance institutions, bilateral donors, carbon market, types of private sector sources, voluntary sources, nationally-dedicated funds addressing climate change, etc.
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Examples of successful cases of bundling different types of grant and concessional funds and on enabling environments to leverage commercial funds;
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Publications, tools and instruments available from UN and multilateral development bank partners to support investment decision making;
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Development of monitoring tools and building capacity of developing countries in tracking climate finance flows.
The Bank Group also shared two issue briefs on Monitoring Climate Finance and ODA and Making the Most of Public Finance for Climate Action at the Carbon Expo event. These are the first in a series that will draw on the Bank Group’s capacity and experience to analyze climate finance issues. The briefs can be found on the World Bank’s climate change website
Related Links
- Low Carbon Country Studies: Getting Started - Experience of Six Counties
- Low Carbon Growth Country Studies Program Brochure
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