One balmy summer’s day in 2007, a trade union veteran with a Hells Angel beard and a penchant for disruption turned up at a town-hall meeting in Collie, Western Australia (WA), with the unwelcome news that the local coal industry was living on borrowed time.
“Absolutely got my head kicked in,” recalled Steve McCartney, state secretary of the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union (AMWU), whose no-nonsense, invective-prone manner belies a deep-seated altruism and care for those on the frontline of the energy transition. “They weren’t interested in anything I had to say. They kept reminding me there was 150 years of coal left in that hill outside town.”
Collie came into being in the 1880s after coal was discovered in the area. It soon became the heart of coal mining and coal-fired energy production in the state, and its two coal mines and three coal-fired power plants have powered the South West Interconnected System, WA’s main electricity grid, since 1931.
Today, 130 years on, coal still runs as deep through its culture as the rich seam of fossilised carbon beneath the ground, with around 1,800 of the town’s 9,000-strong population working in coal-related jobs.
But as the planet heats up and the need to move away from the main culprit – fossil fuels – becomes more urgent, this small town is a microcosm of the transformation underway in the global coal industry. As the world’s coal-producing regions grapple with how to decarbonise their economies by mid-century without devastating local communities, Collie offers a promising blueprint for a “just transition” away from coal.
Ending Australia’s coal dependence
The energy transition is set to cost nearly 1 million coal-mining jobs worldwide by 2050, and Australia is particularly exposed. The country is the world’s second-largest coal exporter, and nearly three-quarters of its electricity generation is coal-dependent – contributing over a third of its carbon emissions.
But as the country aims to shut 90% of its coal-fired power plants by 2035, Collie has successfully garnered close to A$700 million (US$445 million) in investment to help it attract new green industries, including battery energy storage, green steel, graphite processing and magnesium refining. The money will also go to retrain and repurpose the coal workforce and revitalise the town’s high street and tourist economy.
This plan, however, was not imposed from above by officials or corporate executives. Rather it is the result of a community-led, cross-sector collaboration, forged by almost two decades of painstaking struggle.
Having powered the region for over a century, Collie’s public coal-fired power plants, the Muja and Collie power stations, will gradually be switched off by 2029. That clearly threatens the future of the town’s coal mining firms, Griffin Coal and Premier Coal, and its sole private coal power station Bluewaters.
In response, the government, unions, businesses, and – most importantly – local people have jointly developed a transition plan that will support jobs, community stability and economic diversification.
“The world has no choice but to move on from coal – but coal communities like Collie need to have a renewed future that guarantees workers the support, income and opportunities they need to transition to new sustainable industries,” said Sharan Burrow, special advisor to the International Energy Agency’s Global Commission on People-Centred Clean Energy Transitions and former head of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC).
“Collie is a remarkable example that has all the right ingredients… It’s not a done deal yet, but it’s certainly on the right track.”
After Baku setback, activists call for ‘just transition’ to be front and centre at COP30
Anger, acceptance, action
After a decade of efforts by the likes of McCartney, Collie’s transition began in earnest in 2017 when the WA Government first announced plans to close Synergy’s Muja A and B sites. Initially, much of the community was in denial, recounted Ian Miffling, current President of the Shire (Mayor) of Collie. “People thought, ‘It won’t happen’. But gradually, it dawned on people that it was inevitable.”
Over the subsequent years, initial conversations evolved into hard plans. By the time the state government arrived to announce the staged retirement of Muja C in 2019, the town was ready for them, armed with a solid vision and principles to guide the transition.
“We wanted the town to decide its future, not the government,” McCartney explained. Residents emphasised the need for sustainable “jobs that create other jobs”, utilising the town’s long-established industrial skills – ones that wouldn’t leave future generations in the same plight. They also wanted to evolve from being a “one-job town,” recognising the vulnerabilities of relying solely on coal.
Jodie Hanns, member of WA’s Legislative Assembly for Collie-Preston, remembered the emotionally fraught task of announcing the coal-plant closure timelines alongside WA Premier Mark McGowan. “I had to stand in front of my husband, friends and neighbours and tell them their jobs at Muja power plant would have to end. It was one of the hardest days of my life.”
The establishment of the Just Transition Working Group (JTWG) in 2019 – and its state-run secretariat the Collie Delivery Unit (CDU) – was a pivotal moment. The JTWG brought together all the partners in the transition – the community, employers, government and unions. “We had everyone at the table,” said trade unionist McCartney. “Decisions could then be made without going back and forth to Perth.”
Sub-committees tackled specifics, from job creation to retraining, ensuring every worker had a personalised plan. “We wanted paid training to happen while people were still working, so they didn’t fall behind,” he added. “We saw what happened when Australia’s car industry transitioned: if you wait until after the closures to retrain the workers, it’s already too late.”
In 2020, the JWTG and the State Government published a Just Transition Plan for Collie built on four pillars: maximising opportunities for affected workers, diversifying the local economy, celebrating Collie’s history and promoting its future, and committing to a just transition as defined in the 2015 Paris climate agreement.
Financing the transformation
Collie’s approach has already yielded results. The WA Government has so far committed A$662 million to the cause, earmarked for retraining programmes, industrial diversification and infrastructure projects. The town will also benefit from the state’s wider A$3.8-billion renewable energy development programme, including a A$1-billion battery energy storage system (BESS) currently being constructed in Collie.
The funding support for the transition started in 2019, with the State Government committing $115 million to Collie support initiatives. As part of this, $38 million was allocated for new tourism attractions including public murals, adventure trails, redeveloping recreation sites and renovating the high street, which has since seen a surge of visitors.
In 2022, the WA Government announced that, alongside A$300 million for decommissioning Collie’s state-owned coal assets, $200m would be allocated to the Collie Industrial Transition Fund to support new large-scale industrial projects in priority sectors such as green manufacturing, minerals processing and clean energy.
Magnium’s new green magnesium pilot plant has been one of the beneficiaries. The facility produces low-carbon magnesium metal, a critical material for electric vehicles and other green technologies. It opened in January 2025, aiming for full-scale production by 2030. “We’re targeting 5% of global magnesium demand,” explained CEO Shilow Shaffier. “The full-scale facility will span 40 hectares, create over 1,000 construction jobs, and provide 400 permanent positions.”
Similarly, the Collie Battery Energy Storage System, run by state utility Synergy, will be one of the world’s largest battery systems. It will provide 500 megawatts of power with 2,000 megawatt hours of storage to the South West Interconnected System, which can power 785,000 average homes for four hours. Liz Baggetta, Synergy’s head of transition, said it offers a “great opportunity” to the company’s employees, with some already working on the project as part of their individual transition plans.
The town is pinning even greater hopes on Green Steel WA, another cornerstone of Collie’s economic diversification strategy. The company plans to build a 450,000-metric-tonne electric arc furnace, powered by renewable energy. The facility will recycle scrap steel into low-emission products, with the potential to cut 800,000 tonnes of CO2 annually compared to traditional steelmaking. The company is hoping to generate around 220 direct jobs in Collie, and hundreds more in supporting roles.
Tailored plans for workers
The final piece in Collie’s transition puzzle is its retraining programme. In 2022, the government announced a training support package that would expand the existing Collie Jobs and Skills Centre (JSC) to deliver a facility situated – very deliberately – in the middle of the high street to provide tailored career and training assistance to residents.
“We can’t train everyone at once – new industries are still evolving,” explained JSC manager Nat Cook. “So we adapt to meet changing needs, offering everything from resume writing to on-site consultations.”
Separately, Synergy has set up a Workforce Transition Program to provide individualised pathways for workers affected by the closure of the Muja and Collie power stations, offering retraining, redeployment, voluntary redundancy or retirement. “When the closure announcements were made, we spent six months listening to workers to understand their concerns and goals,” explained Baggetta, who heads up the programme. Based on these conversations, Synergy developed tailored plans to help employees navigate their futures.
And while Collie’s transition is still in its infancy, these efforts are starting to bear fruit. Maintenance workers at Griffin Coal have received a 43% pay rise, paid-time training, a 25% uplift to their redundancies, a A$30,000 retention package and the establishment of ‘work councils’. Similarly, Synergy workers have agreed wage increases of inflation plus 1.5% guaranteed until 2029, paid-time training and a three-month uplift to their redundancies.
“Just transition should change people’s lives right now, not sometime in the future; that is how you start to make the connection in a worker’s mind between climate action and their life changing for the better,” said Darcy Gunning, AMWU’s campaigns organiser.
The transition’s early successes are also filtering through to the town’s wider economy. Since 2019, Collie’s labour force has grown by 5.4%, its population by 4%, and building approvals have risen fivefold. Median house prices have surged 21% in the past year, while annual visitor numbers have also climbed.
A global blueprint?
The global push toward net-zero emissions is accelerating the decline of coal, but the polluting fuel still provides 36% of the world’s electricity and supports the livelihoods of 8.4 million workers worldwide, with many regions almost entirely dependent on it to fuel their economies. For instance, the half a million coal workers of India’s Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh states, 90,000 of South Africa’s Mpumalanga province, and 80,000 in Poland’s Silesian coal basin are all staring down the barrel of their countries’ energy transitions.
Without proper transition strategies, these communities face high unemployment, social dislocation and growing inequality – the impacts of which will reverberate throughout their societies for decades to come.
Coal-reliant South African provinces falling behind on just transition
Globally, effective transition strategies are still thin on the ground, explaining why policy-makers and researchers in Australia and beyond are taking notice of Collie’s nascent success. Australia’s new Net Zero Economic Authority (NZEA) has recognised its potential as a model for other transitioning coal towns in the country. And according to mayor Miffling, the town has received enquiries about its plans from the United Arab Emirates, the US Eastern Seaboard and the Canadian province of Saskatchewan.
Collie has benefited from a set of unique conditions: a highly unionised workforce, historic ties to the Labor Party and state ownership of key assets like the Muja and Collie power stations. Such conditions, which enable collaboration across different economic actors, can also be found in Germany and Scandinavia, but remain rare elsewhere. “In places like in Appalachia [in the US], the absence of organised labour and political commitment often leads to disaffection and even the rise of far-right politics,” said Bradon Ellem, labour historian and co-author of a recent paper on coal transitions in WA.
Additionally, Collie’s compact size and proximity to emerging industries like green steel and renewables are a distinct advantage. Because of these specific factors, Caleb Goods, senior lecturer of management and employment relations at the University of Western Australia (UWA) Business School, and a leading expert on labour and energy transitions, believes the model’s replicability will be limited.
Large and more dispersed coal regions like Appalachia and Poland’s coal basin will find it much tougher to create enough new jobs and infrastructure, he said. “Even in Collie, bridge transition opportunities are only beginning to emerge,” he noted. “Reaching the finish line, where a community has secure, green job opportunities, is an incredibly hard task – and one that will look different for every region.”
Nonetheless, Goods praised Collie’s approach as a leading example of a “progressive and dynamic” consultation process that prioritises the voices of workers. “Not all are enthusiastic about the transition; some are sceptical or see coal as part of the town’s future. But they recognise the transition’s value for their children and the community,” he explained.
Union veteran McCartney knows how hard it is to get them onside, but is convinced there is no other route to success.
“If we don’t empower local people when we’re trying to create wholesale change inside their communities, then we’re in the wrong game,” he said.
This is an abridged version of original reporting by Oliver Gordon for JUST Stories – a global project from the Institute for Human Rights and Business dedicated to finding and telling stories of people working together to advance just transitions.
The post This Australian coal community is co-designing its own green future appeared first on Climate Home News.
This Australian coal community is co-designing its own green future
Climate Change
DeBriefed 3 July 2026: US faces scorching Independence Day | Record ocean temperatures | Vietnam’s EV surge
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Heating up
NOT FREE FROM HEAT: “Dangerous, record-breaking” heat altered plans for 4 July celebrations across the US this weekend, reported the Associated Press. New York and Boston hit 100F (37.8C) on Thursday, said the newswire. CNBC reported that temperatures of up to 105F (40.5C) are forecast in central and eastern parts of the country, with “daily, monthly and all-time records possible”.
TEMPERATURES SOAR: Heat that hit western Europe last week spread east to “scorch” Germany, Hungary, Romania, Poland and others, said Bloomberg. Red warnings for extreme heat were issued in a number of nations, noted the outlet, adding that the heat “underscores how climate change is transforming summers in the world’s fastest-warming continent”. The Independent said last month was confirmed to be England’s hottest June on record.
HEAT DEATHS: June’s extreme temperatures caused more than 2,000 excess deaths in Spain and France, reported the Guardian. The countries are bracing for further heat that “could bring temperatures of 44C (111F) over the coming days”, said the newspaper. Deaths in France rose almost 30% at the heatwave “peak” on the week of 22 June, according to Le Monde. Last week’s conditions also led to around 480 excess deaths in the Netherlands, reported Reuters.
BOILING: Global ocean temperatures reached record levels for this time of year, reported NBC News, “fuelling fears of more dangerous heatwaves this summer and fanning concerns over the escalating global climate crisis”. Scientists told the Financial Times that this could lead the world towards “uncharted territory”. The newspaper said global average sea surface temperatures reached 20.96C on 21 June, exceeding June records for 2023 and 2024.
Around the world
- GOAL DROPPED: The World Bank will “abandon” its goal to devote 45% of annual lending resources to climate-related projects, reported Reuters. Carbon Brief explored what it could mean for global climate action.
- FIVE-YEAR PLAN: China plans to invest more than 20tn yuan ($2.9tn) in “key energy projects and new business models” over the next five years, according to International Energy Net.
- DRILLING: The Guardian said UK Labour politicians “urged” the likely next prime minister Andy Burnham to ignore “deluded” calls to develop the Rosebank oil field located in the Atlantic north of Scotland.
- PLASTIC TALKS: Countries and activists feared key issues could be sidelined at “critical” talks on a global treaty to curb plastic pollution in Kenya, said Climate Home News. A treaty could have “important implications” for climate change, reported Carbon Brief in 2024.
- CANADA PIPELINE: Canadian prime minister Mark Carney announced plans to build an oil pipeline to supply Asia with up to 1m barrels per day, reported the Financial Times. Earlier this week, Carney called the previous government’s climate plans “expensive” and “divisive”, said CBC News.
63
The number of UK newspaper editorials calling for more oil and gas extraction in the North Sea so far in 2026, according to Carbon Brief analysis.
Latest climate research
- Including emissions from permafrost thaw raises the likelihood of the Arctic becoming a net-carbon source by more than 50% at 2C of warming | Earth System Dynamics
- Net-zero scenarios relying less on carbon dioxide removals lead to fewer residual emissions, which offers greater health improvements for “non-white and low-income groups” in particular | Nature Climate Change
- Agricultural plots of land in sub-Saharan Africa owned by women face heat impacts 2-2.5 times higher than those owned by men | Nature Sustainability
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
Wind and solar were the world’s largest source of new energy in 2025, according to Carbon Brief analysis of the latest Energy Institute statistical review of world energy. Wind and solar also saw the fastest growth, up by 18% in 2025. Nevertheless, every source of energy – including coal, oil, gas, nuclear and hydro – also reached global all-time highs last year.
Spotlight
Vietnam’s EV surge
Carbon Brief explores the reasons behind soaring electric-vehicle sales in Vietnam.
Motorbikes are a constant fixture on streets across Vietnam. They pollute the air in cities and make crossing the road a feat of endurance.
But, increasingly, people are moving away from petrol-powered vehicles to save money and reduce air pollution.
Sales of electric motorbikes, scooters and mopeds more than doubled in Vietnam last year, according to a recent report from the International Energy Agency (IEA).
This identified that Vietnam has the largest electric vehicle (EV) market in south-east Asia.
Nearly one-in-five of the two-wheeled vehicles sold last year were electric, it noted, in a nation with 102 million people and 77m motorbikes.
This is “particularly impactful” given they are the main mode of transport in Vietnam, said Lam Pham, Asia energy analyst at thinktank Ember. He told Carbon Brief:
“Electrifying road transport is essential for Vietnam to achieve its net-zero target by 2050. Road transport accounted for around 86% of transport-sector emissions in 2022.”
The nation has just 6.8m cars, but this number is also climbing, partly due to EVs, with nearly 40% of new car sales being electric.
This is “above levels seen in most European countries”, noted the IEA. (The UK’s figure is around 30%.)
EV incentives
Fuel costs surged in south-east Asian countries earlier this year after the energy crisis caused by the US-Israel war on Iran.
This “accelerated” discussions from “why use EVs” to “why keep paying more for fuel”, said Dr Tham Nguyen, a lecturer at the Ho Chi Minh City campus of Australia’s Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) University, who has researched Vietnamese public attitudes to EVs.
But the surge is “not driven by fuel prices alone”, noted Pham.
Increased EV sales can also be attributed to a “convergence of affordability, convenience and sustainability”, Nguyen said:
“Vietnamese consumers buy EVs because they see real value with immediate personal benefits, such as cost savings and energy security, alongside long-term environmental gains.”
Government policies have also incentivised sales through registration fee exemptions and tax cuts for EVs.
Another factor is affordable EVs sold by Chinese companies and Vinfast, a Vietnamese manufacturer. The IEA report noted that Vietnam is the only country in south-east Asia with “sizeable” domestic production of accessible EVs.
Vinfast reported a 219% year-on-year increase in orders for electric motorbikes and e-bikes in the first quarter of 2026, but the company has yet to turn a profit.
Pham noted that “growing public awareness of air pollution” has also “dramatically strengthened” public support for EVs.
Future plans
Vietnam’s major cities also have plans to get drivers to go electric or turn to public transport.
The capital city Hanoi announced that it would ban fossil-fuel-powered motorbikes from a central zone this month, but this has been postponed until 2028.
Ho Chi Minh City, the nation’s largest city with more than 9.5 million people, intends to introduce low-emission zones and swap 400,000 petrol-powered motorbikes to electric by 2028.
The city’s green transport plans focus on metro lines, electric buses and e-bikes, explained RMIT associate professor Catherine Earl. She noted that walking and cycling are currently “not popular, accessible or safe for many residents in Ho Chi Minh City’s hot and humid climate”.
Looking ahead, Pham said Vietnam could focus on “purchase subsidies, financing schemes and adequate charging or battery-swapping infrastructure, to ensure lower-income riders, including delivery and ride-hailing drivers, are not negatively affected”.
Watch, read, listen
‘JUST 1%’ OF EMISSIONS: The Guardian debunked arguments that climate actions from smaller countries are “insignificant”.
DRILLING RISKS: Mongabay reported on the possible impacts oil drilling in the Amazon could have on a “little-known reef”.
HEATING UP: The BBC Climate Question podcast discussed the weather pattern El Niño and its links to climate change.
Coming up
- 7-10 July: AI for good global summit, Geneva, Switzerland
- 7-15 July: UN high-level political forum on sustainable development, New York
- 8-10 July: Ninth meeting of the board of the fund for responding to loss and damage, Manila, Philippines
Pick of the jobs
- Green Alliance, senior partnerships officer | Salary: £42,748-£47,346. Location: London
- World Vision, environment and climate action senior adviser | Salary: Unknown. Location: Kenya
- Nature Energy, interim associate or senior editor | Salary: Unknown. Location: London or Milan
- Climate Analytics, senior communications manager – climate policy (maternity cover) | Salary €60,605-€66,880. Location: Berlin
- Carbon Exchange, researcher | Salary: Unknown. Location: Hong Kong
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.
The post DeBriefed 3 July 2026: US faces scorching Independence Day | Record ocean temperatures | Vietnam’s EV surge appeared first on Carbon Brief.
The World Bank has abandoned a target for 45% of the funding it gives developing countries to be “climate finance”, following months of pressure from the Trump administration in the US.
However, a concerted effort by developed- and developing-country shareholders has seen the bank hold onto its “action plan” for tackling climate change.
The multilateral development bank (MDB) – which is headquartered in Washington DC – is the single largest provider of climate finance globally, distributing $39.2bn in 2025 alone, primarily as loans.
Amid widespread aid cuts by developed countries, the World Bank and other MDBs have previously pledged to significantly scale up their climate finance over the next decade.
Despite scrapping its central target, the bank says it will continue to support the demands of its “clients”, many of which have explicitly stated their need for climate-related investment.
Here, Carbon Brief looks at the likely impact of the World Bank’s policy shift and whether it is – as one expert puts it – “mostly a symbolic victory” for the US.
- How does the World Bank support climate action?
- Why has the World Bank abandoned its climate-finance target?
- Why is the World Bank important for international climate finance?
- How will these changes affect global climate action?
How does the World Bank support climate action?
The World Bank is the oldest and largest MDB. It is tasked by its 189 member governments – the bank’s shareholders – with supporting development projects around the world.
The US is the bank’s largest shareholder, followed, in order, by Japan, China, Germany, France and the UK.
Every year, the bank provides billions of dollars – predominantly as loans – to developing countries.
(One part of the World Bank, the International Development Association – IDA – specifically distributes grants to lower-income nations, as well as lower-interest loans.)
Through its financing, the World Bank also has an important role in “mobilising” private investments in developing countries.
In recent years, the bank has increasingly focused on helping developing countries to cut emissions and adapt their economies for climate change.
The World Bank provided $164bn in what it calls financing with climate “co-benefits” between 2020 and 2025.
The largest share of this funding – roughly one-fifth – went to clean energy and electricity access projects. Smaller shares went to areas such as public transport, water supply and sustainable farming.
As the map below shows, the largest recipients of the bank’s climate funds since 2020 have been emerging economies, such as Turkey ($10.3bn), India ($9bn) and Nigeria ($6.3bn).
Among the largest World Bank projects in recent years are two extensive programmes in India, totalling nearly $3bn, supporting renewables and green hydrogen.
Others include $1.7bn for a Pakistan hydropower project, $926m for Iraq’s railways and $803m to boost “green development” in Colombia.
Despite the bank’s major role in providing climate finance to developing countries, it has faced heavy scrutiny from climate advocates.
In particular, they have noted the dominance of loans that push developing countries further into debt. The World Bank has also been criticised for a lack of transparency around how it classifies projects as “climate-related”, as well as “over-reporting” of climate finance.
Why has the World Bank abandoned its climate-finance target?
When World Bank president Ajay Banga – nominated by former US president Joe Biden – took over the institution in 2023, there were widespread calls for MDB reform.
Many of the bank’s shareholders wanted to see billions more dollars being channelled to support climate action. Later that year, Banga announced that the bank would ensure that 45% of the bank’s funding was climate finance by 2025.
This replaced an existing target of 35% for climate finance between 2021 and 2025, which had been set out in the bank’s second climate change action plan (CCAP).
The CCAP is intended to “mainstream” climate action in the bank’s work. With it in place, the World Bank’s climate finance more than doubled from $17.2bn in 2020 to $39.2bn in 2025.
As the chart below shows, this meant the World Bank exceeded its 2025 goal, with climate-related projects making up a 48% share of total funding that year.
When Biden was replaced by Donald Trump as president in 2025, the US administration turned against international cooperation, including climate finance.
However, the US did not walk away from the World Bank, where it exerts considerable power as the largest shareholder.
With the CCAP due to expire in July 2026, the US has spent months pressuring the bank and its shareholders to weaken or abandon the plan altogether.
US Treasury secretary Scott Bessent issued a statement during the 2026 World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) spring meetings in April 2026, in which he called for “jettisoning” the 45% climate-finance target. More broadly, he said:
“We welcome the coming expiration of the CCAP and…expect the bank to immediately shift its myopic focus on climate and financing volumes to one that emphasises high-quality, durable projects.”
This vision involves a push for the World Bank to finance more fossil-fuel projects, including drilling for new gas. (The bank has committed since 2019 to stop funding upstream oil and gas projects.)
The decision on whether to continue with the CCAP was negotiated behind closed doors by the board of directors – representing national shareholders. There were reports of “deep divides”.
A joint statement from 19 of the 25 directors last year affirmed the need for both a plan and a target. The US, Russia, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia all declined to sign up, while Japan and India abstained, according to Reuters.
There were reports of European nations championing a climate plan, bolstered by support from the developing countries that would stand to receive climate finance. The US call to drop the 45% target entirely was reportedly backed by Saudi Arabia and Russia.
Ultimately, the day before the CCAP was due to lapse, the World Bank announced what appeared to be a middle ground. It would drop both the 45% target and the 35% goal it had replaced, while also “extend[ing]” the CCAP.
UK development minister Jenny Chapman told a committee hearing in the House of Commons the next day that this marked a “compromise”. She said:
“It wasn’t clear we were going to get a CCAP at all and a bank without an action plan on climate is a problem for us – so that’s a good outcome.”
Supportive shareholders had been pushing for a one-year extension of the plan. While the World Bank did not initially define the length, Chapman confirmed on LinkedIn that the plan had, in fact, been extended “indefinitely”.
The bank said it would also engage an “independent evaluation group” to assess the CCAP, in line with a board request.
Gaia Larsen, director of climate finance at the World Resources Institute (WRI), tells Carbon Brief that this evaluation will likely be “relatively free from political ideology” and could be “focused on how to make the CCAP more effective”.
Why is the World Bank important for international climate finance?
Under the Paris Agreement, developed countries – including major World Bank shareholders in Europe and elsewhere – are obliged to provide climate finance for developing countries.
This includes a target of $300bn a year by 2035, which is expected to largely come from developed countries. One significant way these nations can contribute to this goal is via their support for MDBs, particularly the World Bank.
The World Bank has described itself as “by far the largest provider of climate finance to developing countries”. Each year, it oversees half of all climate finance from MDBs and far more than any single donor country.
Many developed countries have, therefore, enthusiastically backed the World Bank’s climate efforts, as well as a “bigger” role for MDBs in development more broadly. The bank can lend sums that far exceed the amount of new public finance that individual nations are willing to commit.
This is particularly significant, given many of these nations, including the UK, Germany and France, have announced large cuts to their aid budgets in recent years.
Carbon Brief analysis suggests that roughly a fifth of the international climate finance provided and “mobilised” by developed countries in recent years can be attributed to their World Bank contributions, as the chart below shows.
(This only accounts for the World Bank financing that can be linked to developed-country shares in the bank. Developing countries, such as China, also have significant shares, which are not included in the chart below.)
MDBs – including the World Bank – have committed to providing $120bn in climate finance to developing countries by 2030.
This was set to come from greater shareholder contributions, combined with a programme of reforms to free up capital.
If the World Bank continued to provide half of the MDB total, it would need to increase its climate finance by around 50%, from $39.2bn today to $60bn in 2030.
Therefore, experts see a “key” role for the World Bank in achieving not only the $300bn target, but also the more aspirational $1.3n target that countries agreed as part of the “new collective quantified goal” (NCQG) on climate finance at COP29 in 2024. This includes the private capital it could “unlock” through its lending.
Joe Thwaites, international climate finance director at Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), tells Carbon Brief that these “NCQG politics” are “quite important”. He says:
“The maths of the $300bn does not work if the MDBs pull back and so I think that’s why you’re seeing developed countries taking a stand.”
How will these changes affect global climate action?
To date, the World Bank has only released minimal details about its new climate plans. As such, experts say the impact on future climate finance remains uncertain.
Jon Sward, environment project manager at the Bretton Woods Project, tells Carbon Brief:
“They have said they are going to retain all the same processes about climate-finance reporting. So, of course, there is a world in which, actually, climate finance continues to increase like it has been.”
Some of the World Bank’s internal organisations will, in fact, keep their climate-finance goals for the time being. For example, the IDA’s largely grant-based funding retains a 45% target for its current round, which will last until 2028 – the year of the next US presidential election.
However, WRI’s Larsen tells Carbon Brief that the changes, from a bank that was previously a “champion for climate action”, remain significant:
“This reality, reinforced by the elimination of the 45% goal, means that it would not be surprising to see a reduction in climate investments.”
In a statement, the World Bank said its “work on climate is and will remain firmly client driven”, noting that it supports nations undertaking their Paris Agreement climate plans.
Therefore, its climate focus may come down to whether there is demand for climate action from “client” countries receiving finance.
At an April event in discussion with the climate sceptic Bjørn Lomborg, Bessent said that global financial institutions should focus on growth, characterising climate action as an “elite belief”.
The implication from the US Treasury secretary was that recipient countries are not interested in climate action. However, as reported by Devex, a group of World Bank shareholders representing nearly 100 developing countries, wrote a letter that appeared to push back against this framing.
This “G11+” group, led by Brazil and China, said the bank “must remain firmly client-driven”, noting that countries are “following nationally determined pathways toward climate action”. NRDC’s Thwaites tells Carbon Brief:
“It’s one thing for the Europeans to talk about climate…This was the client countries [100 developing countries] saying: ‘No, we want this.’”
Recent research by the ODI thinktank found that 79% of developing-country officials polled wanted to see MDB investment in solar projects, 54% wanted hydropower and 47% wanted wind power. Only 13% wanted investment in gas-power plants.
Rishikesh Ram Bhandary, a senior development researcher at Boston University, has stressed the need for an “enhanced CCAP”, which could be supported by the bank’s new independent evaluation. Among other things, he tells Carbon Brief:
“The bank needs to make a more convincing case about how climate change is being integrated into development priorities rather than competing with them.”
Thwaites says he is hopeful that the outcome is “mostly a symbolic victory for the US”.
However, he says major shareholders from Europe and elsewhere should make it clear to the bank that it is not “the only game in town” when it comes to climate finance. He says:
“If [the World Bank] are going to cave into one shareholder, when the vast majority of the other shareholders are supportive of continuing climate action, they can take their money elsewhere.”
The post Q&A: How will the World Bank’s abandoned finance goal affect climate action? appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Q&A: How will the World Bank’s abandoned finance goal affect climate action?
Rich Wilson is CEO of the Iswe Foundation and co-founder of the Global Citizens’ Assembly.
The numbers are stark. According to the 2026 Global Report on Food Crises, 266 million people across 47 countries experienced high levels of acute food insecurity last year, nearly double the figure recorded a decade ago.
Meanwhile, disruptions to oil, gas and fertiliser flows through the Strait of Hormuz drove a 46% month-on-month spike in urea prices early this year, sending agricultural price indices up 8% and raising the spectre of a global affordability crisis.
This is not a blip. It is a new baseline. The EAT-Lancet Commission concluded that food systems now account for roughly 30% of total greenhouse gas emissions and are the largest single contributor to the climate crisis. The science has been clear for years.
Now some of the solutions to the problem are becoming socially acceptable too.
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Earlier this year, people from more than 60 countries and territories, selected not by vested interest, but by lottery, spent seven weeks examining the evidence on food and climate for the latest Global Citizens’ Assembly. They heard from scientists, farmers and industry. They worked through 42 hours of structured deliberation, engaging with some difficult trade-offs.
They were not asked to endorse a predetermined conclusion. They were asked an open question: what changes, if any, should we make to how we grow, share and eat food, so that everyone has enough to nourish themselves while tackling the causes and impacts of climate change?
Phase down industrial animal farming
Their answer was unambiguous. They voted to protect forests. They voted to phase down industrial animal food production. They voted for supply chain reform and corporate accountability, explicitly rejecting the idea that the burden of change should fall on individual consumers. All 22 of their Calls to Action passed with over 85% support, a super-majority of randomly selected people from every region of the world, in agreement.
Consider what the assembly was actually being asked to decide. Industrial animal food production is the primary driver of tropical deforestation. Protecting more land as forest and ecosystem means less land available for the expansion of industrial production. That is a real trade-off, with real consequences for real livelihoods. Politicians have spent years avoiding it.
These randomly selected people looked at the evidence, deliberated across time zones and cultures, and chose the forests, with 64% in strong support and a further 20% in favour. People from livestock farming communities voted for change. Not because they were told to. Because deliberation led them there.
We estimate there have now been more than 7,000 citizen participation initiatives worldwide in the last decade. They have been organised because, as our 2025 report: People in the Lead demonstrated, people are now consistently and significantly ahead of politicians on issues ranging from climate to AI governance.
The people know best
What the research consistently shows is that ordinary people, given proper evidence and time, produce recommendations that are more effective and more aligned with public values than what emerges from elected legislatures. The gap in global governance is no longer primarily between science and the public. It is between citizens and their political leaders.
That gap matters for more than procedural reasons. When policy treats people as passive recipients rather than active participants, it leaves out the very actors whose behaviour, trust and consent the transition depends on. Institutions that speak only to other institutions, and negotiate only with state actors and industry lobbies, are missing out on the trust and energy of the people they are supposed to serve.
Governments, left to their own devices, are not moving fast enough to prove that argument wrong. At COP30 in Belém last November, countries failed to agree on a fossil fuel phaseout roadmap, and even full implementation of every submitted national climate plan still leaves the world on course for 2.3 to 2.8C of warming.
Citizens’ track at COP
But the Brazilian presidency grasped something important. Among the conference’s more significant outcomes was the formal launch of a Citizens’ Track within the UNFCCC process, a mechanism for connecting the global participation field to intergovernmental climate negotiations. Türkiye and Australia, who together hold the COP31 presidency in Antalya this November, now have the opportunity to strengthen and institutionalise what Brazil began.
In Guatemala, Indigenous women build climate resilience with old and new farming methods
The question before us is no longer whether citizens can contribute to solving these problems. Across the world, in local food networks, in community assemblies and in participatory planning processes, they already are, quietly generating more ambitious and more legitimate solutions than those emerging from formal diplomatic channels.
What is required now is the political courage to connect people to power. Not to consult citizens and file the results. Not to invite them to observe while the real decisions are made elsewhere. But to recognise the public as partners in perhaps the most consequential governance challenge of our time.
The post As food shocks spread, citizens are showing more leadership than governments appeared first on Climate Home News.
As food shocks spread, citizens are showing more leadership than governments
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