UN Green Climate Fund to meet November deadline for investments

The United Nations fund to help finance climate change adaptation and mitigation projects in developing nations has set a November deadline to receive its first round of cash pledges.

The new deadline is seen as a significant step towards achieving a global climate pact by the widely targeted date of 2015.

The Green Climate Fund (GCF) was set up to help channel at least US$100 billion a year by 2020 from governments and the private sector, and the 24-strong board set a loose deadline during talks in Songdo, South Korea this month.

The GCF has particualt focus on supporting solar power plants and flood management systems and is seen as crucial to getting over 130 developing nations to sign a UN climate pact in 2015.

Developed nations including those in the European Union, Japan and the U.S have so far been reluctant to donate without clear structures and policies in place to ensure the funds would be spent wisely.

According to reports, this week’s meeting put the fund on track to receive money ahead of December’s annual UN Climate Change Conference in Lima, Peru and to start investing in projects early next year.

The board agreed basic principles on how the fund will operate, as well as who could donate and apply for the cash.

It avoided a selection of controversial issues including whether wealthier nations such as China could apply, if money could be spent on fossil fuel power plants and the role of multilateral financial institutions such as the World Bank.

The board also failed to set an overall target for the amount to be pledged by November.

Christiana Figueres, the UN’s climate chief, said that the initial wave of funding should reach US$10 billion and has also called on governments to list a suite of jointly operated, international projects that the fund could finance.