Bloomberg launches New Economy Climate Technology Coalition in Singapore

Wednesday, November 16, 2022 (Singapore) — Against the backdrop of world leaders meeting at the UN Climate Conference in Egypt this week, the Bloomberg New Economy Climate Technology Coalition (the Coalition) has been launched today at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum taking place in Singapore. Reducing emissions through the expansion of new climate technology innovation is a critical step the international community must take to reach net-zero climate goals. A recent McKinsey analysis found that for the European Union more than 85 percent of emissions reduction could be achieved through technologies that are at least at the demonstration stage, while 60 percent could be met through mature technologies or those that are beginning to be early adopters. But to scale, these new technologies require capital and structures in place to share learnings with others, in order to drive further innovation. 

The mission of the Coalition is to identify and rapidly scale the next generation of climate-critical green technologies that will be instrumental in achieving the world’s climate goals, accelerating the transition to the low-carbon economy. For example, identifying innovative ways to bridge the financing gap from early-stage ventures to full-scale commercialization.  

Over the next 3 years the Coalition aims to:

1. Conduct a landscape analysis of the climate-critical technologies that need to be scaled to transition to a low carbon-economy 
2. Identify solutions and design innovative pathways to accelerate the commercialization of these technologies by understanding the current barriers to scale 
3. Catalyze action by mobilizing key global stakeholders across sectors and industries around these solutions and pathways, rapidly scaling these technologies 

The Coalition Steering Committee has a global breadth of expertise bringing together leaders from India, China, North America, Africa, Europe, Australia, and the Middle East including: Michael R Bloomberg, 108th mayor of New York City and founder of Bloomberg Philanthropies, Natarajan Chandrasekaran, Chairman, Tata Sons, Bruce Flatt, CEO, Brookfield Asset Management, Andrew Forrest, Chairman and Founder of Fortescue, Sara Menker, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Gro Intelligence, H.E. Khaldoon Khalifa Al Mubarak, Managing Director and Group CEO, Mubadala Investment Company, Neil Shen, Steward of Sequoia Capital, and Founding & Managing Partner of Sequoia Capital China, Lord Adair Turner, Chairman, Energy Transitions Commission, and Lei Zhang, Founder and CEO, Envision Group.

Over the coming months the Coalition will invite the world’s leading technologists, researchers, entrepreneurs, industrialists, investors and public sector leaders to become members.

“Solving the climate crisis will take innovation on every front – including the push to drive more investment, faster, to the most promising solutions,” said Michael R. Bloomberg, founder of Bloomberg LP and Bloomberg New Economy. “We can’t afford to wait decades to bring more green technologies to scale, and this new initiative can help us accelerate progress worldwide.” 

The Coalition has an initial three-year mandate and will work to identify and progress critical technologies that over the next decade will need to overcome hurdles to scale, in order to accelerate the low-carbon transition. 

“We are already in a green industrial revolution. The only way forward now is to build and scale industrial engines that will simultaneously create opportunities and new industries while tackling the climate crisis we are in” said Lei Zhang.

“The global climate crisis is a fundamental issue for all mankind to tackle in our era. Elevating planetary technology from level 0 to 1 could essentially pave the way forward in our universal pursuit of a net zero future, which demands investment of green technologies to triple by 2025 from over $750 billion in 2021 and then double again to 2030. In this Coalition, we look forward to working alongside many key stakeholders to conduct practical analysis and inspiring new solutions, to scale out green technologies by incubating and bolstering innovative forces around the world,” said Neil Shen. 

To start, the Coalition will focus on tackling roadblocks to scale in the clean hydrogen sector.  Despite being established as a cost-effective and scalable technology set to decarbonize many sectors of the global economy, the clean hydrogen ecosystem still faces many challenges as it rapidly builds out a new value chain that needs to be accepted by the market. The Coalition will concurrently explore similar climate-critical technologies that are facing barriers to scale.

“Responsible Chairmans of Remuneration Committees and Boards of Directors will be incentivising their CEO’s and leadership teams to step their companies beyond fossil fuels,” said Andrew Forrest. “To imagine, then implement a future where their corporations run profitably on renewable energy. The only fuel that the more you use it, the cheaper it becomes. Green energy will become cheaper than fossil fuel in any event, then it will be asinine or simply laziness for Chief Executives to cling to their fossil fuel past. Companies are abdicating their responsibility if they do not provide their customers a choice between dirty polluting fossil fuels which the more you use them, the more expensive they become, or renewable energy, a fuel that becomes cheaper the more you use it. Right now, supplying energy from fossil fuels instead of renewables or consumer goods in single-use plastic, is forcing consumers to collectively destroy the planet.”

Re-disseminated by The Wealth and Society