Franziska Mager is senior researcher and advocacy lead for climate and inequalities at the Tax Justice Network.
As the climate crisis accelerates, global fault lines widen. Wealthy nations gut aid budgets while pouring fortunes into their militaries. Their climate finance commitments ring hollow, hidden behind claims that public funds have run dry.
But the money is there – and a bold tax justice agenda can unlock it. Reclaiming tax sovereignty – the power to decide how wealth is taxed and where it goes – can shift resources from billionaires and corporate giants to real climate solutions.
Tax Justice Network analysis shows governments could raise an extra US$2.6 trillion a year by applying a modest wealth tax on the richest 0.5% and ending corporate tax abuse. This would more than cover global climate finance needs and still leave most countries with billions to invest in care, education and green jobs at home.
Coalition set sights on taxing luxury air travel to fund climate action
The climate crisis is accelerating. Floods, heatwaves and crop failures are pushing more people into precarity. Climate adaptation, mitigation, and loss and damage could cost US$9 trillion a year by 2030. Yet the global community is still scrambling to honour a US$100 billion pledge made over 15 years ago.
As attention turns from the Bonn climate talks to the fourth Financing for Development conference in Seville, climate finance remains a structural void that policy declarations alone cannot fill.
On the road to COP30 in Belém, governments face a critical choice: keep chasing inadequate voluntary climate finance handouts, or finally confront the rigged tax systems that let the super-rich and big polluters amass obscene wealth while the planet burns.
Plugging leaky tax systems
As our research shows, fair taxes on extreme wealth and curbing multinational tax abuse could raise more than double the UN’s US$1.3 trillion annual climate finance goal for 2035. The real issue isn’t where new money comes from, but why governments let public resources leak through a broken tax system.
Applying a modest annual wealth tax of 1.7-3.5% and reclaiming tax from multinationals that underpay could unlock revenue equal to 2.4% of global GDP. This money could be raised today if governments closed loopholes and took action.
Our modelling based on countries’ historic emissions responsibility shows striking results: with a US$300 billion global climate finance fund, 89% of countries could cover their share and still have billions left for public services. Even with a US$1.5 trillion fund, 58% would contribute their fair share and have money to spare.
Take the United States. It could raise enough additional revenue to contribute US$365 billion a year towards climate finance and still be left with US$412 billion to spend at home. China, India, the United Kingdom and Brazil follow the same pattern.
This is the core message of our climate finance slider tool. Taxing extreme wealth and curbing tax abuse does not pit climate justice against development. It enables both. The interactive tool shows how much countries could raise and how much they could contribute if tax rules were rebalanced in favour of people and planet.
Governments lose tax control
So why are countries still acting like climate finance is unaffordable?
The answer lies in decades of eroded tax sovereignty. Governments have signed away their taxing rights through unfair treaties, handed out corporate tax breaks under economic coercion, and let wealth pour into secrecy jurisdictions. In doing so, they’ve stripped themselves of the power – and the will – to tax the richest and biggest polluters driving the climate crisis.
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Today, 61% of countries have an “endangered” level of tax sovereignty or worse — meaning they are failing to collect tax revenue worth at least 5% of what they already raise, largely from their richest households and from multinational corporations that underpay tax.
Nearly a fifth of countries fall into the “negated” category, missing out on the equivalent of 15% or more of their annual tax revenue. These are not natural constraints. They are political outcomes shaped by an unequal global financial system.
Across the Global South, the consequences are especially severe. Governments face impossible tradeoffs between education and adaptation, debt service and disaster response. Climate finance cannot be separated from this wider fiscal injustice.
When forced to borrow for every disaster or rely on aid pledges, governments lose both agency and time. The race to build resilience becomes a race against the clock – one they cannot win without revenue.
Wealth taxes popular with voters
It’s time to reframe the debate. Climate finance can’t rely on broken promises or voluntary pledges. It must come from fair, redistributive tax systems that reflect both capacity to pay and responsibility for emissions.
The upcoming UN Tax Convention is a once in a generation opportunity to rebalance global tax rules. Done right, it could help countries tax their richest residents and corporations fairly, ending tax havens, profit-shifting and billionaire impunity.
Comment: A global wealth tax is needed to help fund a just green transition
But we do not need to wait for negotiations to conclude. Countries can act now by introducing wealth taxes, renegotiating exploitative tax treaties, increasing transparency and aligning fiscal policies with climate goals.
These reforms are not only possible. They are popular. Polling consistently shows widespread support for taxing extreme wealth to fund public goods.
Extreme wealth fuels climate inaction, rising debt and inequality. In a world on fire, refusing to tax those who profit most is no longer neutral – it’s a global risk.
The post There is no climate finance gap – only a tax sovereignty gap appeared first on Climate Home News.
There is no climate finance gap – only a tax sovereignty gap
Climate Change
‘This is a fossil fuel crisis’, Greenpeace tells Senate gas tax Inquiry, citing homegrown renewables as path to energy security
CANBERRA, Tuesday 21 April 2026 — Greenpeace Australia Pacific has slammed gas corporation war profiteering and environmental damage in a scathing Senate hearing today as part of the Select Committee on the Taxation of Gas Resources, urging fair taxation of gas corporations and the transition to secure, homegrown renewable energy to protect Australian households and the economy from future energy shocks.
Speaking at the hearing, Greenpeace said the US and Israel’s illegal war on Iran has laid bare the fundamental flaws of an energy system built on fossil fuel extraction, geopolitical power plays and corporate greed, and will be a defining moment for how the world thinks about energy security.
Greenpeace’s submission and full opening remarks can be found here.
Joe Rafalowicz, Head of Climate and Energy at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said:
“This is not an energy crisis, it’s a fossil fuel crisis. The crisis we’re all facing lays bare the dangers of fossil fuel dependence, for our energy security, our communities, and for global peace and stability.
“Gas corporations like Woodside, Santos, Shell and Chevron — the same companies whose CEOs refused to front this Inquiry — are making obscene war profits, using the illegal war on Iran to price gouge, profiteer and push for more gas we don’t need — while people and our environment pay the price.
“Australians are getting smashed by soaring bills and the impacts of climate disasters — gas corporations should be paying their fair share to help this country, instead of sending billions offshore, tax-free.
“But we’re at a turning point — while gas corporations cynically push to open up more of our oceans and land to drilling for fossil fuels, our allies like the UK are doubling down on renewables in response to the fossil fuel crisis. Our trading partners in Asia are making the same reassessment of fossil fuels.
“Which is why the hearing today is crucial: an effective and well-designed tax on the gas industry’s obscene war time profits is a chance to channel funds to people and communities, fast-track the rollout of clean, secure homegrown wind and solar energy, while holding polluters accountable.
“Our dependence on fossil fuels leave us overexposed to the whims of tyrants like Trump — it’s in Australia’s national interest to end the fossil fuel chokehold for good and usher in the era of clean energy security.”
-ENDS-
Media contact
Kate O’Callaghan on 0406 231 892 or kate.ocallaghan@greenpeace.org
HOW WOODSIDE’S BROWSE GAS PROPOSAL THREATENS SCOTT REEF’S GREEN TURTLES AND PYGMY BLUE WHALES
Woodside’s Browse to NWS gas project is under assessment by the WA and Federal Governments right now. This is a project that involved drilling up to 50 gas wells around Scott Reef off the coast of WA. Gas would be extracted directly underneath Scott Reef and Sandy Islet and pumped through a 900-kilometre subsea pipeline to the NWS gas processing facility.
Woodside’s Browse gas project’s impact on Scott Reef’s marine habitats?
Scott Reef is one of Australia’s most ecologically significant marine environments, where green turtles breed, pygmy blue whales feed, and an array of at-risk species, including sharks, dolphins, whale sharks, rays, sawfish and sea snakes thrive. It is home to many threatened species, including some found nowhere else on Earth or in genetically isolated groups, magnifying its importance from a conservation perspective.
This delicate reef’s ecosystem faces multiple threats if Woodside’s Proposed Project goes ahead, including seismic blasting, gas flaring, noise pollution, artificial lighting, pipe laying and fast-moving vessels. The reef also faces the risk of a gas well blowout, which could have catastrophic and irreversible consequences for the region’s reefs and marine parks.
Woodside’s woeful marine impacts management plan
To secure their approvals, Woodside had to develop a plan for how they would manage the significant risks to threatened green turtles and endangered pygmy blue whales if the project proceeds. We’ve had two independent scientists provide a technical assessment of Woodsides management plan for whales and turtles and their findings are gobsmacking.
Their assessment found that Woodsides management plans for these species misrepresents or does not assess the risks the Browse project poses to Scott Reef’s pygmy blue whales and green turtles. They’ve also surmised that if the project goes ahead the impacts contradict the Australian government’s own recovery plan for turtles and Conservation Management Plan (CMP) for Blue Whales.
The State and Federal Governments now have the opportunity to define their legacies on nature protection and save Scott Reef from Woodside’s dirty gas.
Technical Assessment of Woodside’s Browse Pygmy Blue Whale Management Plan
Prepared for Greenpeace Australia Pacific by Dr Ben Fitzpatrick of Oceanwise Australia with Dr Olaf Meynecke of Griffith University.
The full technical assessment is available HERE
Scott Reef is a vital feeding, foraging and resting habitat for pygmy blue whales.
Pygmy blue whales feed, forage and rest in the Scott Reef region every year. Scott Reef is recognised as a Biologically Important Area for the pygmy blue whale and is an important stop-over on their annual migration.
Woodside’s Browse gas project could delay or prevent the population recovery of the endangered pygmy blue whales that rely on Scott Reef, heightening their extinction risk.
- Woodside’s management plan claims of “no credible threat of significant impacts” are not supported by scientific evidence.
- The management plan relies on outdated whale population information.
- Woodside has claimed it is unclear whether Scott Reef is a foraging habitat for pygmy blue whales, despite the presence of pygmy blue whales and significant concentrations of krill being documented in the area.
- The PBWMP ignores the impacts of industrial noise on whale-to-whale communication. This is especially concerning as mother-calf pairs migrate through the Scott Reef Biologically Important Area shortly after calves are born. Mother-calf pairs rely on continuous, uninterrupted communications to maintain their connection.
Woodside’s Browse gas project could delay or prevent the population recovery of the endangered pygmy blue whales that rely on Scott Reef, heightening their extinction risk.
Technical Assessment of Woodside’s Browse Turtle Management Plan
Prepared for Greenpeace Australia Pacific by Dr Ben Fitzpatrick of Oceanwise Australia.
The full technical assessment is available HERE
Scott Reef is a vital nesting ground for unique green turtles.
The green turtles that nest at Scott Reef’s low-lying Sandy Islet sand cay and nearby Browse Island are genetically unique and are classified as ‘Extremely Vulnerable’ in Australia’s Recovery Plan for Marine Turtles.
Woodside’s Browse gas project could make Scott Reef’s unique green turtles extinct.
- The Browse project would operate within 20 kilometres of nesting habitat that’s critical to the survival of Scott Reef’s genetically unique and vulnerable green turtle population.
- Woodside’s Browse Turtle Management Plan (TMP) misrepresents the risks the Browse project poses to Scott Reef’s green turtles.
- Claims in Woodside’s TMP about Scott Reef’s green turtle population size, nesting success and hatchling numbers are not backed by scientific evidence.
- The TMP proposes gathering updated data after the Browse project is approved.
- Woodside’s TMP proposes adding sand sourced elsewhere to Sandy Islet to counter subsidence and erosion, but fails to properly assess the associated risks.
To save Scott Reef and protect our oceans and animals, the State and Federal Governments must reject Browse.
Technical Assessment of Woodside’s Browse Pygmy Blue Whale Management Plan
To secure their approvals, Woodside had to develop a plan for how they would manage the significant risks to threatened green turtles if the project proceeds. We’ve had two independent scientists provide a technical assessment of Woodside’s management plan for whales and turtles and their findings are gobsmacking.
Woodside’s Browse gas project could make Scott Reef’s unique green turtles extinct.
Woodside’s Browse gas project could delay or prevent the population recovery of the endangered pygmy blue whales that rely on Scott Reef, heightening their extinction risk.
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