With a possible recession looming, Bill Gates is preparing to raise a new fund for Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV) to back innovative climate start-ups, on the heels of two billion-dollar funds that have together helped finance roughly 100 companies. “Even as the ebullience in investing in tech and climate companies is down a bit, I…
Global challenges amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic have made Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) issues even more pressing for policymakers, boards and executives. To promote alignment among existing ESG frameworks, the World Economic Forum, with Partners including Deloitte, EY, KPMG and PwC, has identified a set of universal metrics and disclosures – the Stakeholder Capitalism Metrics. During the Sustainable Development Impact Meetings…
South African petrochemical major Sasol SOLJ.J will announce partnerships over the next few weeks with local mining companies to supply green hydrogen for their mining operations, a senior company executive said on Wednesday. A major part of the South African government’s aim to cut climate-warming gas emissions is tied to the private sector’s use of green hydrogen…
A global coalition of 108 leading wind energy companies and associations, representing 81 percent of installed wind energy worldwide, has challenged governments to take dramatic action to scale up wind and renewable energy in this decade. In a 16-page statement issued world-wide titled Global Energy Manifesto for COP27, the Coalition called for annual global wind…
South Africa’s Presidential Climate Finance Task Team has their work cut out for them: in a few weeks the team will have to thrash out and publish details of the US$8.5 billion just energy transition partnership ahead of COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt in November 2022. According to the Presidential Climate Commission’s First Annual Review…
While global investment in renewable energy has increased, a new Bloomberg report shows that half of the countries that pledged to phase out coal at the COP26 talks saw an increase in coal generation in 2021. The continued use of coal-fired energy has resulted in a 7% increase in sector emissions beginning in 2021. More…
Business groups have urged the South African government to postpone the implementation of new carbon tax increases until after 2035. Business Unity South Africa (Busa), Business Leadership South Africa (BLSA), and others have called for the government to consider a higher carbon price only “after 2035,” a delay in annual carbon tax increases until “at…
The Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and Standard Bank Group, with the support of the Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa (BADEA), the Motor Industry Retirement Funds (MIRF) and Copartes Pension Fund and the African Union Commission (AUC), have announced the African Women Impact Fund (AWIF) Initiative’s achievement of its first commitment of USD$60 million. The announcement was made at…
Dubai Investment Fund (DIF), one of world’s largest global independent investment funds and asset manager, that effectively manages financial resources through diversification into new asset classes, today announced the creation of ESG Investment Department. “Investing in areas, that will bring not only profits, but also long-term benefits for the whole community is one of our…
Microsoft and McKinsey have joined forces to launch an integrated decarbonisation solution that uses data intelligence from Microsoft together with McKinsey’s Catalyst Zero execution engine. The tech collaboration will allow companies to use integrated data on their emissions-inducing activities and create a detailed decarbonisation plan. The solution will apply the Sustainability Manager to automate and scale companies’ sustainability data…
