EIB at the UN Climate Change Conference – COP 24
As the world's largest multilateral financier of climate-related investment, the European Investment Bank took part in the 24th session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change – COP24.
© Philippe Bourseiller
[EIB at the UN Climate Change Conference – COP 24]
[EIB at COP 24 - find out more about our activity at the COP 24 event in 2018]
EIB at the UN Climate Change Conference – COP 24
As the world's largest multilateral financier of climate-related investment, the European Investment Bank took part in the 24th session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change – COP24.
[EIB at the UN Climate Change Conference – COP 24]
[EIB at COP 24 - find out more about our activity at the COP 24 event in 2018]
As the world's largest multilateral financier of climate-related investment, the European Investment Bank took part in the 24th session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change – COP24.
Thanks to all who joined us at the EIB/ Benelux pavilion and heard how the EIB is helping to meet the challenges of paying for international climate action, keeping global warming to below 2˚C and helping the transition towards a low-carbon future.
This COP took place at the International Congress Centre in Katowice (3-14 December 2018), where governments came together to adopt the implementation guidelines of the Paris Climate Change Agreement.
In a guest contribution for Handelsblatt, EIB President Werner Hoyer argues that climate protection and a sustainable economy create many new jobs, contrary to certain claims heard at the COP24 in Katowice that they destroy jobs and slow economic growth.
During COP24 taking place in Katowice, Poland, Luxembourg-EIB Climate Finance Platform (LCFP) officially signed an investment of EUR 5 million to the Green for Growth Fund (GGF) to support the fund’s lending for energy efficiency, resource efficiency and renewable energy measures in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. Serving as a risk cushion,
On 8 December, on the margins of the “Business for Africa Forum 2018” in Sharm El-Sheikh, the European Investment Bank (EIB) signed a new financing agreement of EUR 214m for the depollution of the Kitchener drain in the Nile Delta region. It contributes to the environmental objectives highlighted in the EU Egypt Partnership priorities and represents the first project supported by the EU Bank under the Clean Oceans Initiative.
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and have your say during the eventsDo you want to know how our climate finance expertise helps fighting climate change? During COP24, the EU Bank plans to focus its attention on the following key topics:
Once considered the bedrock of economic growth, regions with strong coal industries have become synonyms of air pollution, land degradation and socio-economic decline. As the world gradually moves away from fossil fuels due to their impact on health and the environment, the challenge for these coal mining regions is to diversify their industries and find alternative sources of jobs and growth.
The EIB has been following the development of the Platform for Coal Regions in Transition initiative through the European Investment Advisory Hub (EIAH), which is the advisory pillar of the Juncker Plan, co-founded by the European Commission and the EIB.
The inauguration of the new headquarters of the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra (NOSPR) took place on 1 October 2014 in Katowice – a city located approximately 80 km northwest of Krakow.
Following the launch of the savings account which has already served to collect over EUR 8.5 million from the general public, the Nord-Pas de Calais Regional Council and CCI Nord de France have undertaken to create a dedicated investment fund.
Cities are responsible for about 75% of the world’s CO2 emissions and account for 55% of the world’s population, a proportion expected to increase to 68% by 2050. These figures show the importance of cities, both in terms of global climate change and economic development.
The EIB is helping to close the financing gap for sustainable investments in low-carbon and climate-resilient urban infrastructure, working directly with cities and in close partnership with others including the Global Covenant of Mayors, 100 Resilient Cities and the German Society for International Cooperation, GIZ.
In 2017 alone, the EIB invested EUR 22.7bn in urban projects, out of which EUR 8.2bn was dedicated to climate action.
In concrete terms, this constitutes 121 projects benefiting more than 2 million people.
“Smart Cities, Climate Action & Circular Economy II” has been launched with an additional EUR 400m to support ever smarter, more sustainable and circular projects helping to combat global warming.
Europeans are heading for the cities. By the end of this century, 9 out of 10 of them will live in an urban area. But what kind of city will they call home? In this series of in-depth essays, leading academics and urban planners examine how a range of European metropolises have dealt with the challenges of recent decades, recovering from deindustrialisation, coping with migration, and setting a course for sustainability and smart development. Find out how Europe is changing and what the future holds for your city.
The Challenge is a joint pilot initiative of the EIB and the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy (GCoM) to help prepare and finance urban climate action projects (mitigation and adaptation) in Africa, Central Asia, Latin America and EU accession and neighbourhood countries. EU countries may also be considered, if their projects are relevant for the initiative. The aim is to make further public resources available and attract private investments to build greener, low carbon and more climate resilient cities for future generations.
Transformational investment totalling EUR 190 million in transport, waste, energy efficiency, culture and urban rehabilitation schemes across Athens will be backed by a new EUR 55 million European Investment Bank agreed earlier today. The citywide investment initiative will create jobs, unlock urban regeneration and ensure that climate risks can be better managed in the Greek capital in the years ahead.
Poland’s Katowice hosts “Upgrade your City” conference on how to create modern and inclusive urban environments
With EUR 205 million direct loans over 20 years, the EIB has sustained the city’s transition to a low-carbon economy
In Poland, the EIB has invested EUR 2.7 billion in urban projects over the past four years, benefiting 28 cities and 9.3m people, and new projects are expected to target environment, mobility, housing, health, education and energy efficiency
This sentence by American Marine Biologist, Sylvia Earle, captures one of the biggest challenges the world is facing today.
According to the WHO and UNICEF, 844 million people lack access to drinking water services, 2.3 billion live without even basic sanitation.
At the same time, human action is responsible for the rapid degradation of the earth’s largest ecosystem, the oceans. Global warming renders oceans more acid and decreases their oxygen levels. In addition, 8 million tonnes of plastic waste end up in the ocean every year – about the weight of 50.000 blue whales.
The EIB is the largest lender to the global water sector to date: since its early days, it financed over 1 500 projects that have increased access to water sources, provided flood protection and improved the water treatment as well as the disposal of residual waste.
In recent years, the EU bank has also been more and more engaged in the blue economy, i.e. the sustainable development of our oceans. Together with KfW and AFD, the EIB has declared war on plastic to save our oceans with the launch of the Clean Oceans Initiative.
The world’s first global framework to finance a sustainable ocean economy was launched at the Our Oceanconference today.
The Sustainable Blue Economy Finance Principles were developed by the European Commission, WWF, World Resources Institute (WRI), and the European Investment Bank (EIB). Started as a commitment by a dozen financial institutions and key stakeholders just a year ago, they are now set to become the gold standard to invest in the ocean economy—the “blue economy”—in a sustainable way.
The EIB is a cornerstone investor in this $100m fund, which is dedicated to making pioneering impact investments in marine and coastal projects. This in turn will help to build resilience in coastal ecosystems and underpin sustainable growth in the so-called blue economy, which is defined as all economic sectors that have a direct or indirect link to the ocean. The OECD has forecast that by 2030, the blue economy could outperform the growth of its global counterpart in terms of value added and job creation.
Transport is the main source of air pollution in cities and represents almost a quarter of Europe's greenhouse gas emissions. For this reason, the EIB supports green transport and smarter mobility. In fact, transport is the largest sector in which the Bank has been active since its foundation in 1958.
The mobility projects the EU Bank invests in throughout Europe and the world range from electric motorbikes and cars to hydrogen busses, and from ultra-fast charging stations for electric vehicles to cleaner maritime transport.
Ahead of the COP24, the EIB has launched a first-of-its-kind climate survey, in partnership with the global public opinion company YouGov, to assess citizens’ perception of climate change and their expectations in terms of political action to mitigate or adapt to it.
The EU Bank asked the same 24 questions to more than 25 000 citizens in the European Union, the United States and China.
The results are being released periodically in six phases starting 8 November 2018 up until the EU elections on 23-26 May 2019.
Discover here the first key findings of this worldwide climate survey.