Public money 'needed to meet climate change finance targets'


Both public and private investment will be needed to finance the “new industrial revolution” required to combat climate change.

British economist Nicholas Stern told a meeting of a United Nations (UN) advisory group in Bonn that no single source will be able to provide the $100 billion (£63 billion) a year needed to control climate change, which was agreed under the Copenhagen Accord.

The potential sources of revenue identified by Mr Stern included carbon taxes, levies on air travel and charges on international finance transactions.

“Private sector investment will drive a new industrial revolution but there will be a very important part of the story which will require public money to support it,” Reuters reports Mr Stern as stating.

Recommendations from the advisory group, which consists of government officials and economists, will be presented to a UN meeting in Cancun, Mexico in November.

Signatories to the Copenhagen Accord agree that world temperatures must not be allowed to increase by more than two degrees in order to control the effects of climate change.

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