World Bank Zeros In On Climate Change With $16B Annual Budget

The World Bank, the biggest provider of loans to developing countries, announced it will dedicate 28 percent of its financial investments to confronting climate change. This amounts to approximately $16 billion a year for energy efficiency, renewable energy, and climate resiliency projects. In addition to its own financing, the World Bank said it would work to mobilize $25 billion in commercial funding for clean energy over the next five years. “If we don’t act, climate change threatens to drive 100 million more people into poverty in the next 15 years,” John Roome, senior director for climate change at the World Bank Group, said in a statement. The new spending plan “will allow us to help developing countries more quickly, and in the areas where support is most needed, such as disaster preparedness, social protection, and coastal protection.”