Lord Browne and the future of climate finance
Lord Browne and the future of climate finance
Plus: How California’s climate suit against Exxon might finally lead to the Supreme Court
In today’s edition:
— From Climate Week NYC: Creative, radical thinking is the answer
— UN leaders achieve an early win on the pace of climate reform after Russia debate
— California’s Exxon lawsuit isn’t the first of its kind, but could it reach the Supreme Court?
— New York youth protest fossil fuels and greenwashing ahead of Climate Week
— IBM, NASA team up to create open-source AI foundation model for weather & climate
NEW YORK (Callaway Climate Insights) — A week focused on the future of fighting climate change kicked off with a look at the past Monday night as Lord John Browne, former chairman of BP BP 0.00%↑ and an early advocate for renewable energy, reminisced about his journey from oil executive to climate investor, and forecast an unexpected future.
Speaking at a dinner for climate investors sponsored by Jonathan Maxwell and his Sustainable Development Capital Ltd. (SDCL), Browne recalled how the American Petroleum Institute accused him of having “left the church” when he talked about the prospects for clean energy in 1997.
Now a managing director of equity firm General Atlantic, — which just made a big investment in SDCL — and head of its partner Beyond Net Zero, Browne said that type of thinking was considered too radical a quarter century ago.
One of main themes Beyond Net Zero focuses on is energy efficiency, the process of controlling energy waste in large buildings and other structures, which Browne said is “good for all seasons and doesn’t rely on policy very much.”
Another theme is decarbonizing supply chains, which is getting lots of attention this year in New York.
Browne said the answers to solving global warming still lie ahead of us and might be even more creative and more radical than we currently imagine even now.
“Activities we’ve been doing to reduce emissions will be regarded in many years’ time as primitive … they don’t do very much and they are not investable.”
He cited someone who suggested sending all energy and plastic waste into space as an example of the new type of thinking.
Sounds bizarre, even for a maverick like Lord Browne, but so did clean tech in 1997.
Don’t forget to contact me directly if you have suggestions or ideas dcallaway@callawayclimateinsights.com.
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UN achieves modest upgrade in transition deal as climate week begins
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