PUBLIC FINANCE
Governments are still spending billions subsidizing oil, gas and coal. We need to #StopFundingFossils and start investing in the future.
OVERVIEW OF WORK
Since the Paris Agreement, G20 governments have continued to finance more than USD 77 billion dollars annually in fossil fuels through multilateral development banks (MDBs), bilateral development finance institutions (DFIs), and export credit agencies (ECAs). This is three times the support they provide to clean energy. Beyond providing this direct monetary backing, these institutions reduce perceived risk and provide a government stamp of approval on fossil fuel projects that often serves to crowd in private finance. While recently the level of fossil fuel support has started to drop, institutional policies to exclude fossil fuel finance are needed to ensure this progress continues.
While a number of public finance institutions committed to ending coal finance in the early 2010s, it wasn’t until 2017, following years of campaign pressure by Oil Change and others, that the World Bank made a meaningful commitment to stop financing for upstream oil and gas. Following an intense campaign effort, in 2019 the European Investment Bank committed to ending nearly all oil, gas and coal finance. Recently, the UK announced it would end overseas oil and gas finance, and the EU and US, among others, have signalled that they intend to follow suit. Building off these successes, OCI is now working to secure further commitments from governments and public finance institutions on ending public finance for fossil fuels.
LATEST PROGRAM POSTS
Australia has joined a major international initiative to end international public finance for fossil fuels at an event held at the UK Government Pavilion today at COP28. Australia follows Norway, who also joined the initiative on Saturday.
Today 222 civil society groups from 55 countries sent an open letter calling on world leaders to transform international public finance to tackle climate change and deliver a just energy transition.
Minutes ago, Norway joined a major international initiative to end international public finance for fossil fuels today at COP28, called the Clean Energy Transition Partnership.
Over 250 organizations from 30 countries call on governments to support fellow OECD members' efforts to end oil and gas export finance at OECD meeting on 6 November 2023.
LATEST PROGRAM RESEARCH
A new report shows how multilateral development banks, including the World Bank, gave over $9 billion in funding for fossil fuel projects in 2016, nearly all of it following the Paris Agreement being reached and despite claims that they were acting on climate and adjusting their investment strategies.
Each year, G20 countries provide nearly four times more public finance to fossil fuels than to clean energy. In total, public fossil fuel financing from G20 countries averaged some $71.8 billion per year, for a total of $215.3 billion in sweetheart deals for oil, gas, and coal over the 2013-2015 timeframe covered by the report. Fifty percent of all G20 public finance for energy supported oil and gas production alone.
Risk guarantees and credit enhancement programs that subsidize coal-fired power plants could cost the Government of Indonesia and Indonesian ratepayers as much as tens of trillions of rupiah – many billions of U.S. dollars – over the coming decade.