The 2024 State of Cities Climate Finance report (SCCFR) provides the most comprehensive assessment of urban climate flows and needs globally. It aims to inform action on mobilizing finance for city-level climate action at scale by 2030.

Cities are indispensable actors in the climate transition. Currently, 56% of the world’s population live in cities and 70% of people are expected to live in urban areas by 2050 (World Bank 2023a). Many urban areas, particularly in emerging markets and developing economies (EMDEs), are already facing frequent and intense extreme weather events such as floods, drought, and heat.

The buildings sector offers a pathway for the financial sector to contribute to sustainability including climate and resource efficiency goals. The sector is both at risk and offers one of the largest opportunities for impact; evaluating the risks and rewards of investing in buildings that are energy-efficient and resilient to climate change is the financially responsible approach for commercial banks.

UNEP-FI's publication “Banking on Green Buildings”, written in partnership with the GlobalABC, explores how banks can play a key role in making our buildings more energy efficient and contribute to their climate and resource efficiency goals, including those made under the Principles for Responsible Banking. 

Download the full report below.

The CRREM initiative released a report on Green Governance and how to implement and develop feasible Net Zero Transition Plans in the real estate industry. The report was authored by the CRREM team and supported by EPRA and UNEP FI.

The report aims to support the industry in accomplishing full decarbonization until 2050 with a holistic and sector-specific framework. In addition to the white paper, CRREM has developed an Excel-based self-assessment guide to help boards identify initial areas for action to improve or develop net zero transition planning.

This report applies network analysis to examine the interdependencies between 75 policy and finance instruments, as well as 22 barriers, to support the transition to net zero carbon buildings. Such a network analysis approach allows us to move beyond case studies to explore potential high-impact pathways for cities to support a low-carbon transition for the building sector effectively.

Developing a systemic representation of the building sector allows us to answer the following questions:

• Which barriers should we prioritize to ensure systemic transformation of the building sector?
• Which instruments should we roll out, and in what sequence?
• What pathways can cities follow to transition to a fully decarbonized building sector?

This report offers initial findings on the general challenges and mechanisms behind the transition towards a net zero carbon buildings sector, helping shed light on concrete pathways cities can implement to decarbonize the building sector.

Download the report now

Climate Target Setting for Real Estate Sector Financing’ is the first in a series of publications developed by members of the Net-Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA) with the goal of assisting banks by outlining the choices they make when setting climate-related targets for financing in particular sectors of the real economy. This includes key considerations in relation to the scope, portfolio metrics, data, and scenarios, emerging practices, common challenges and policy, data, and other gaps.

For many banks, the commitment they choose to make when joining NZBA requires them to set sectoral decarbonisation targets for their residential and commercial real estate financing. This publication is aimed at these banks in particular. It does not prescribe any particular methodology for banks to use or impose any requirements on NZBA member banks over and above the ones they chose to commit to when becoming a signatory.

Read the full report here.

Construction value chains, encompassing the construction and operation of buildings as well as the production of construction materials like cement and steel, contribute to approximately 40 percent of global CO2 emissions. This figure is expected to rise as developing economies, responsible for about two-thirds of these emissions, intensify construction activities for urbanization and development.

IFC is launching this report to guide international efforts to decarbonize construction value chains. Building Green: Sustainable Construction in Emerging Markets was prepared through close collaboration between IFC economists, investment officers, and building and construction sector specialists. The report provides a comprehensive analysis of the challenges of reducing carbon emissions from construction value chains in developing countries, but also the considerable opportunities that will come from mobilizing the estimated $1.5 trillion of investment required for this transition.

Read the full report here.

A new paper, ‘Ahead of the Wave’, released by World Green Building Council (WorldGBC) on 2 March 2023, calls on the European financial and real estate sectors to take action as key players in the transformation wave to a sustainable built environment.

The finance sector is well-positioned to boost the transition to a sustainable built environment and take advantage of its leverage. Financial actors’ investment, lending, and insurance underwriting decisions shape tomorrow’s real economy. Investment decisions taken today will have repercussions for the built environment in years to come, so sustainability needs to be firmly at the top of the agenda.

Download the paper here.

A new report commissioned by IIGCC highlights how investors are considering buildings emissions using a ‘whole life carbon’ approach, drawing on research and case studies from experts and industry leaders.

In a world where embodied carbon is invisible, investors can make investment and sustainability decisions that may be unwittingly harming the environment. This is why leading members of IIGCC’s Real Estate Working Group are moving on the topic: “wait and see” is no longer an option. This report documents IIGCC’s series of roundtables hosted in 2022, providing “best practices” and examples from the series, where experts and leading investors explained how they are incorporating embodied carbon into their measurements and target setting.

Download the report here.

In this publication - State of Finance for Nature in Cities 2023: Time to Assess - Summary for Local Policymakers, developed as an addendum to the 2022 SFN report, UNEP and the Penn Institute for Urban Research seek to take stock of urban NbS investments, outline gaps and opportunities for NbS financing in cities, and map out best practices from cities around the world.

The SFN in Cities also illustrates actions that local governments, financial stakeholders, private sector, and knowledge partners can take to scale up investments for nature in cities.

Download it here