Library

This activity report is about the Environment on the Edge series of lectures. These are given by leading international figures, examine our current relationship with the natural world and discuss possible future scenarios. This publication includes reports and summaries from six conferences.

This analytical report looks at how the key causes of the current food crisis are the combined effects of speculation in food stocks, extreme weather events, low cereal stocks, growth in biofuels competing for cropland and high oil prices.

The Kenya Atlas of Our Changing Environment, produced at the request of the Kenya Government, provides visual and compelling evidence of the rapid changes taking place in the country’s critical ecosystems due to pressures from human activities. The side-by-side display of historical and current remote-sensing images highlights forest degradation, wetland drainage, and shrinking lakes to the impacts of refugees on fragile ecosystems and signs of coastal degradation. The Atlas provides a good evidence base for strategic intervention by the government and communities.

The analytical report consists of an inventory of lenders and investors who provide finance to the renewable energy and energy efficiency sectors. This first version of the Financing Sustainable Energy Directory is designed to help these investors, project developers and entrepreneurs seeking capital, as well as investors looking for financing vehicles in the renewable energy sector.

This policy document analyzes the most recent studies on the economics, the costs of climate change, and the investment required for mitigation and adaptation. It highlights the crucial role played by the finance sector due to its influence in directing investment.

The purpose of this policy document is to evaluate the impact of climate change related risks on bank borrowers, utilizing as much data and analysis as possible. The first section of this report reviews the current climate change policies in place in Canada, Europe, and the US, in order to provide a framework for policy implementation in the future. The report then utilizes aggregated loan and lease data from Bank of America, CIBC, Citigroup, Scotiabank, and TD Bank Financial Group, to analyze the impact of climate change related risks on bank loans and leases.

This policy document looks at how carbon markets have so far been a successful economic tool in the fight against climate change. However, it highlights that carbon markets have largely failed to tackle emissions from the forestry sector.

This analytical report follows up on some of the key recommendations outlining the current political developments concerning emissions trading, explaining the manner in which companies are affected, discussing the risks and opportunities emissions trading presents, and delving into the role of financial services providers in diminishing the respective risks and creating new opportunities.

This technical document is the fourth study in a series of reports by the Climate Change Working Group (CCWG) of the UNEP Finance Initiative. The paper focuses on the Clean Development Mechanism and pinpoints barriers to implementation and financing of CDM projects as seen from the financial sector perspective. Recommendations on how these barriers can be overcome are provided.

This policy document presents the “Declaration on Climate Change by the Financial Services Sector”. It has been launched by UNEP FI on World Environment Day, 5 June 2007 and represents the first global statement on climate change by the finance sector. The essence of the declaration is a recognition by financial institutions from around the globe that anthropogenic climate change is real, the cost of inaction will be extremely high, financial institutions must take greater action and integrate climate change into their everyday decision-making, and governments need to do more, namely set ambitious, long-term targets for emissions reduction.

This analytical report considers adaptation from the viewpoint of the finance sector. Climatic changes will accelerate if emissions continue on a “business-as-usual” trajectory. Among the effects could be more frequent, extreme weather events and droughts, rapid sea level rise from icecap melting, breakdown of the marine food chain and worst of all, feedback effects like large releases of methane from thawing permafrost, or large scale dieback of forests. These risks are real and the economic costs would be huge. The document describes some of the current products and services and other innovative approaches used by the finance sector to tackle climate change, such as weather derivatives and natural catastrophe bonds.

This guide provides a step-by-step method for the calculation of GHG emissions in order to give a single GHG Indicator for an organisation.

This manual includes a guide for governments, small and large organizations, businesses and individuals who want to embark on the path to climate neutrality. This concept – climate neutrality – is the subject of this book. True, there is a huge gulf between where we are now and the climate-neutral future that we need if we are to achieve sustainable development. But the message of this book is that the gulf is not uncrossable and that there is also a lot to gain. It will take patience, persistence and determination, but it can be done.

This analytical report uses current and historical satellite images to analyze the status of the environment in Africa. This Atlas provides scientific evidence of the impact that natural and human activities have had on the African continent’s environment over the past several decades. More importantly, this book contributes to the knowledge and understanding that are essential for adaptation and remediation.

This analytical report presents the financial perspective, or ‘dollar view’, of the current state of play in sustainable energy development. The analysis in this report consists of actual data on the different types of capital flows and their movement over time, combined with analysis of regional and sectoral trends. This information is intended to be a strategic tool for understanding the status of the clean energy sector’s development and for weighing future public and private commitments to the sector.

Using the Global Environment Outlook (GEO) methodology, this analytical report provides a complete and integrated assessment of the globally significant ecosystem of the Amazon Basin. The GEO Amazonia aims to provide a sound basis for policy makers at the national, subnational and local levels of the Amazonian countries in their efforts to ensure the long term sustainability of development initiatives.

This policy document presents UNEP’s past, present and future activities in the area of climate change and shows how the Programme is building partnerships with governments, civil society organizations, the private sector and other United Nations entities to foster a Green Economy.

The analytical report presents work in progress on the scientific understanding of global environmental change, as well as foresight about possible issues on the horizon. The aim is to raise awareness of the interlinkages among environmental issues that can accelerate the rates of change and threaten human well-being.

This analytical report summarises the outcomes of the 2001 Working Groups Three when it assessed the peer-reviewed expert literature on mitigation. The guide is not an official document. Instead, it represents an effort to make the hundreds of pages of detailed and technical text that constitute the volume on “Mitigation” more accessible to a broader
audience.

This training manual looks at climate change and its consequences on employment and trade union action. In addition, it addresses a clear gap and lack of knowledge of the environmental issues at stake regionally and globally in the trade union movement.