The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) is an international financial institution, established in 1944 and headquartered in Washington, D.C., United States, that is the lending arm of World Bank Group. The IBRD offers loans to middle-income developing countries. The IBRD is the first of five member institutions that compose the World Bank Group. The initial mission of the IBRD in 1944, was to finance the reconstruction of European nations devastated by World War II. The IBRD and its concessional lending arm, the International Development Association (IDA), are collectively known as the World Bank as they share the same leadership and staff.
The International Finance Corporation (IFC) is an international financial institution that offers investment, advisory, and asset-management services to encourage private-sector development in less developed countries. The IFC is a member of the World Bank Group and is headquartered in Washington, D.C. in the United States.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is an international financial institution founded in 1991. As a multilateral developmental investment bank, the EBRD uses investment as a tool to build market economies. Initially focused on the countries of the former Eastern Bloc it expanded to support development in more than 30 countries from Central Europe to Central Asia. Similar to other multilateral development banks, the EBRD has members from all over the world, with the biggest shareholder being the United States, but only lends regionally in its countries of operations. Headquartered in London, the EBRD is owned by 69 countries and two EU institutions, the 69th being India since July 2018. Despite its public sector shareholders, it invests in private enterprises, together with commercial partners.
The European Investment Bank (EIB) is a publicly owned international financial institution whose shareholders are the EU member states. It was established in 1958 under the Treaty of Rome as a "policy-driven bank" using financing operations to further EU policy goals such as European integration and social cohesion. It should not be confused with the European Central Bank, which is based in Frankfurt (Germany) or with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) which is based in London.
The Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) was the United States government's development finance institution until it merged with the Development Credit Authority (DCA) of the United States Agency for International Development to form the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC). OPIC mobilized private capital to help solve critical development challenges and, in doing so, advanced the foreign policy of the United States and national security objectives.
The Climate Group is a non-profit organization that works with business and government leaders around the world to address climate change. The group has programs focusing on renewable energy and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Launched in 2004, the organization operates globally with offices in the UK (headquarters), the United States and India.
The CDP is an organisation based in the United Kingdom which supports companies and cities to disclose the environmental impact of major corporations. It aims to make environmental reporting and risk management a business norm, and drive disclosure, insight and action towards a sustainable economy. Since 2002 over 8,400 companies have publicly disclosed environmental information through CDP.
Conservation Finance is the practice of raising and managing capital to support land, water, and resource conservation. Conservation financing options vary by source from public, private, and nonprofit funders; by type from loans, to grants, to tax incentives, to market mechanisms; and by scale ranging from federal to state, national to local.
Global climate change was first addressed in United States policy beginning in the early 1950s. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) defines climate change as "any significant change in the measures of climate lasting for an extended period of time." Essentially, climate change includes major changes in temperature, precipitation, or wind patterns, as well as other effects, that occur over several decades or longer. Climate change policy in the U.S. has transformed rapidly over the past twenty years and is being developed at both the state and federal level.
Climate bonds are fixed-income financial instruments (bonds) that have positive environmental and/or climate benefits. They follow the Green Bond Principles stated by the International Capital Market Association (ICMA), and the proceeds from the issuance of which are to be used for the pre-specified types of projects.
Terrance Arthur Tamminen is an author, lecturer, and strategist on energy and the environment. In 2003, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appointed him as Secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency. In December 2004, he was appointed Cabinet Secretary, the Chief Policy Advisor to the Governor. He continues to advise the former governor, and other regional, national, and international leaders, on energy and environmental policy.
Green Investment Group Limited (GIG) is a specialist in green infrastructure principal investment, project delivery and the management of portfolio assets, and related services.
Pedro Moura Costa is an entrepreneur involved in environmental finance with a focus on the international efforts for greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reductions. Of particular relevance, he was the founder and President of EcoSecurities Group Plc., one of the leading project developers for the international carbon markets, and has written widely about the policy and science of climate change mitigation, including contributions to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports.
Climate Change Capital was a private asset management and advisory group founded in 2003 by Lionel Fretz and James Cameron to support efforts to develop solutions to climate change and resource depletion. Fretz left Climate Change Capital at the end of 2004 to found rival carbon trading company, called Carbon Capital Markets, backed by the AIM listed fund Trading Emissions PLC. Shortly, after Mark Woodall became the first CEO of Climate Change Capital.
Climate finance is “finance that aims at reducing emissions, and enhancing sinks of greenhouse gases and aims at reducing vulnerability of, and maintaining and increasing the resilience of, human and ecological systems to negative climate change impacts”, as defined by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Standing Committee on Finance. The term has been used in a narrow sense to refer to transfers of public resources from developed to developing countries, in light of their UN Climate Convention obligations to provide "new and additional financial resources", and in a wider sense to refer to all financial flows relating to climate change mitigation and adaptation.
The Climate and Clean Air Coalition to Reduce Short-Lived Climate Pollutants (CCAC) was launched by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and six countries — Bangladesh, Canada, Ghana, Mexico, Sweden, and the United States — on 16 February 2012. The CCAC aims to catalyze rapid reductions in short-lived climate pollutants to protect human health, agriculture and the environment. To date, more than $47 million has been pledged to the Climate and Clean Air Coalition from Canada, Denmark, the European Commission, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and the United States. The program is managed out of the United Nations Environmental Programme through a Secretariat in Paris, France.
A green bank is a financial institution, typically public or quasi-public, that uses innovative financing techniques and market development tools in partnership with the private sector to accelerate deployment of clean energy technologies. Green banks use public funds to leverage private investment in clean energy technologies that, despite being commercially viable, have struggled to establish a widespread presence in consumer markets. Green banks seek to reduce energy costs for ratepayers, stimulate private sector investment and economic activity, and expedite the transition to a low-carbon economy.
The Cities Climate Finance Leadership Alliance (CCFLA) is a coalition of more than forty organizations actively working to accelerate investment into sustainable infrastructure. The Alliance brings together a wide range of public and private institutions. For example, the Swiss Global Infrastructure Basel Foundation (GIB) is a member of the CCFLA Steering Committee, and occupies the “Research/NGO/Foundations” seat. The Alliance was launched at the United Nations Secretary-General’s Climate Summit in September 2014. In 2016, R20 Regions of Climate Action was elected to lead the Secretariat of CCFLA, partnering with three other organizations: FMDV, UNDP, and UNEP.
Jeffrey Walter Eckel is an American investor and business executive. He is the Chairman and CEO of Hannon Armstrong, an American sustainable investment company providing capital primarily to energy efficiency and renewable energy projects and companies and publicly-traded as a real estate investment trust (REIT).
Hannon Armstrong Sustainable Infrastructure Capital LLC is an American sustainable investment company. In 2013, the company became the first investment company to go public as a clean energy real estate investment trust (REIT). As part of its environmentally sustainable investment approach, Hannon Armstrong provides capital to companies in energy efficiency, renewable energy, and other sustainable infrastructure markets.
