The Paris Agreement has helped open the door for close to $23 trillion in “climate-smart” investments in emerging markets worldwide through 2030, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) said in a report this week.
The climate change agreement was adopted nearly a year ago and entered into force on Friday. The report noted that 189 nations have delivered intended nationally determined contributions — steps they would take to counter global temperature rise, including increased renewable energy, low-carbon urban areas, and energy efficiency. More than 100 of those governments have formally joined the accord, and delegates are meeting this week in Marrakesh, Morocco, to move ahead with implementing the agreement.
The IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, said in a press release that its study determined areas in each geographic region with the highest investment potential, based on the national plans and policies of 21 emerging-market economies.
The report found well over half of the investment potential in East Asia and the Pacific, “where China, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam show a climate-smart investment potential of $16 trillion,” with a focus on green buildings, the release says. The No. 2 opportunity was seen in Latin America, “where the potential for investment in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico is about $2.6 trillion,” with a focus on sustainable transportation. That was followed by $2.5 trillion in opportunities in India and Bangladesh in South Asia, largely in climate-resilient infrastructure; $783 billion in sub-Saharan Africa, specifically clean energy in Cote d’Ivoire, Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa; $665 billion in Russia, Serbia, Turkey, and Ukraine in Eastern Europe, focused on energy efficiency and new green buildings; and $265 billion in Egypt, Jordan, and Morocco in the Middle East and North Africa, for renewable-energy generation, climate-smart buildings, transportation, and waste solutions.