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NY climate week marked with pledges, new initiatives

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NY climate week marked with pledges, new initiatives

A number of nations and corporations during the Sept. 23-27 climate week in New York City announced new emissions and renewable generation targets, banks joined a new sustainability initiative, and fossil fuel companies eyed new options for capturing and sequestering carbon.

The announcements were made at some of the dozens of conferences held in the Big Apple in hopes of creating more momentum around achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change. Scientists have said the world must act quickly to limit emissions and resulting global warming to 1.5 degrees C relative to preindustrial levels. To accomplish that objective, the world must achieve global net-zero emissions by 2050, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

The following are highlights of climate-related announcements and events from New York City climate week.

The United Nations held an all-day climate action summit on Sept. 23, during which heads of state and corporations announced ongoing, and some new, climate-related ambitions.

Among other declarations, U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced up to £1 billion in funding to develop new technologies such as battery storage that help tackle climate change in developing countries. And Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the U.N. event announced plans to more than double his country's renewable generation target, but later that week added that India will not change its plan to use existing coal reserves to help meet its development needs.

Officials acknowledged at the U.N. event and at other gatherings that much more needs to be done.

"Let us not be scared of being ambitious, of applying pressure and of constantly reminding ourselves of the truth of the situation," said U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres.

As for the entities that could help fund much of the green energy transition, the U.N. announced the Principles for Responsible Banking. As signatories to the new banking principles, the initial group of 130 companies agreed to take a number of specific steps toward helping the world achieve the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals and the carbon reduction goals of the Paris Agreement.

Specifically, the banks agreed to assess their impact on the environment, set at least two new sustainability-related targets, and report back on their progress within 18 months and annually thereafter. Participating banks include Citigroup Inc. and BNP Paribas SA.

New net-zero emissions targets

A number of companies and asset managers set new environmental targets or participated in events that featured ongoing efforts.

U.S. independent power producer NRG Energy Inc. announced a goal of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050 and indicated that it expects to reach the halfway mark by 2025. NRG joins a growing list of companies, including DTE Energy Co. Amazon.com Inc., and Duke Energy Corp., that have set net-zero targets

In addition, some of the world’s largest pension funds and insurers that collectively are responsible for directing more than $2.4 trillion in investments announced a new Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance that committed to carbon-neutral investment portfolios by 2050.

Nokia Corp. announced it would reconfigure its emissions targets to align with the more ambitious 1.5-degree C global warming target of the Paris Accord rather than the 2-degree C goal the company previously set. But Nokia did not specifically pledge to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.

Some climate-related events in New York were not centered around big announcements but instead aimed to help companies and investors plot their course to low-carbon emissions.

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Todd Bridges of State Street Global Advisors speaks at an S&P Global event in New York City.
Source: S&P Global Market Intelligence

At a Sept. 26 S&P Global climate risk conference, State Street Global Advisors Inc.'s head of environmental, social and governance research and development Todd Bridges suggested investors can transition their portfolios to align with the Paris Agreement with very little additional risk and a high potential for beating exchange-traded funds.

Also at the event, an official with pharmaceutical giant Novartis AG talked about how the world's rapid loss of biodiversity due largely to climate change presents a growing risk to the company's ability to discover, develop and deliver new drugs to customers.

In an earlier event that day focused on offshore wind development along New York's coastline, an official at the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority indicated that the state may want to consider including battery storage in future requests for offshore wind project bids in order to preserve grid reliability.

The Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs held a Sept. 24 panel discussion on how to raise the trillions necessary to fund the continued buildout of renewable capacity in the U.S. and globally.

"The trillions certainly will be available; I think the question is can we create the right environment for those trillions to find the kind of returns [they want]," said Sumant Sinha, chairman and managing director of India-based ReNew Power Ltd.

Industrial emissions get new spotlight

A number of events and announcements centered around emissions from the industrial sector, which is among the hardest nuts to crack on emissions because the processes for iron and steel require high temperatures that only fossil fuels can achieve, among other reasons.

Mining heavyweight Rio Tinto signed a memorandum of understanding with China's biggest steel producer, China Baowu Steel Group Corporation Ltd., and Tsinghua University to develop new ways to reduce carbon emissions produced as part of the steel value chain. And a bakers' dozen of fossil fuel companies participating in the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative announced plans for a series of CCS industrial emissions hubs in the U.S., UK, Norway, Netherlands and China.

S&P Global Inc. is the parent company of S&P Global Market Intelligence.