The Climate Group

China will need to raise up to USD243 billion of additional funds per year by 2020 in order to adequately finance action to curb the impacts of climate change and invest in low carbon development, according to a new report commissioned by the Chinese government’s powerful National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC). The report, authored by The Climate Group and the Research Centre for Climate and Energy Finance at the Central University of Finance and Economics, China, is to be presented to the NRDC, the Ministry of Finance and other top Chinese government entities later this month. It calls for a two stage plan to reform China’s climate finance mechanisms by 2020.

The Climate Group is joining forces with the China Advanced Construction Materials Group (China ACM), one of China’s biggest concrete producers, to tackle one of the biggest side-effects of China’s rapid growth and urbanization: urban construction waste.

The Climate Group said in a report issued on Monday that China should set up an effective institutional governance mechanism for its climate financing sector. China should upgrade climate financing and improve related policies, said the report, titled "China's Climate Financing Management Mechanism."

The Chinese Government has released a regulation on domestic voluntary carbon trading and market development, which puts the nation on track towards achieving a compulsory carbon market. According to NGO The Climate Group, China's influential National Development and Reform Commission (NRDC) has this month released a new document entitled The Interim Regulation of Voluntary Greenhouse Gases Emission Trading in China.

In the run-up to the UN’s Rio+20 Conference on Sustainable Development next week two groups of researchers have come out with the perspective that, in their different ways, point to the lack of sufficient belief rather than a lack of means as the principle barrier to a more sustainable future. In its soon to be published book, Energy Technology Perspectives 2012 (ETP 2012), the International Energy Agency (IEA) points to a host of new technologies that are ready to transform the energy system, offering the potential to drastically reduce carbon emissions, enhance energy security and generate a huge investment return – if only the right policies are put in place.