Countries Pledge $10 Billion for Clean Energy Fund

World leaders attending the Paris climate negotiations took major steps this weekend toward speeding up the development of clean energy to reduce global reliance on fossil fuels.

Twenty countries, including the U.S. and France, have committed to double their investments in clean energy research and development to $10 billion over the next five years.  That commitment, called Mission Innovation, is being supported by the Bill Gates’ Breakthrough Energy Coalition, a global group of private investors who will help fund clean energy companies that will be formed from the research done under Mission Innovation.

Advancing wind, solar and other clean energy technologies is critical to decarbonizing global economies as world leaders seek to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to levels that will keep global warming to 2°C (3.6°F).

“While significant progress has been made in cost reduction and deployment of clean energy technologies, the pace of innovation and the scale of transformation is falling far short of what is required,” the White House said in a statement Sunday.  “Mission Innovation and the Breakthrough Energy Coalition constitute a powerful public-private effort to accelerate the research and development of affordable clean energy technologies and support a new generation of scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs.”

Speaking in Paris, Obama said that such incentives will unleash the creative power of the world’s best scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs to deploy new clean energy technology and create new clean energy-related jobs globally.

“There are hundreds of billions of dollars ready to deploy to countries around the world if they get the signal that we mean business this time,” Obama said.  “Let’s send that signal.”

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