This presentation was shown by Bill Becker, Executive Director of Presidential Climate Action Plan (PCAP), to support his speech at the event 'The Future we want' organized by Tomorrow's Company.It focuses on the state of play in Washington looking forward to Copenhagen - and explores the power of creating a positive vision of a post-carbon future.The panel that joined this event was formed by: Richard Gillies, Director of Plan A and Sustainable Business, Marks & Spencer Richard John, Head of Sustainability at AECOM Europe; and Dr Jan Ole Kiso, Office of Climate Change, Department of Energy and Climate Change.You can listen to his presentation and the rest of the panel's contributions here.

(Washington, February 9, 2009) – Over 50 of the world’s leading scientists, China experts, political and business leaders recommend immediate action to create a new, groundbreaking collaboration with China to address the urgent issue of climate change.  In a report released today by Asia Society’s Center on U.S.-China Relations and the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, these leading figures provide the Obama administration a new policy roadmap for immediate action with China.

The researchers from the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and the Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy conclude that about US$400 billion should be spent worldwide on ‘green’ policies and investments which also help economic recovery and lay the foundations of sustainable low-carbon growth. The report, ‘An outline of the case for a ‘green’ stimulus’, points out that this sum represents about 20 per cent of the US$2 trillion, or 4 per cent of global gross domestic product, that governments might spend in the next 18 months on fiscal stimulus packages to lessen the economic downturn.

This booklet is for UK businesses of all sizes. It presents the case for action to make cost savings, grasp new market opportunities and address strategic risks in an economy where resources such as energy, raw materials and water need to be used more effectively. It also highlights the benefits of engaging staff, costumers and suppliers in the pocess of change.

Bonds are a set of financial products ideally suited to both the financing of long-payback period energy projects and to providing institutional investors with security of returns over the longer term. Climate Bonds are intended to unlock ‘patient capital’: taking savings which require secure returns over long periods of time, such as those held by pension funds, and investing them in low-carbon projects that have high up-front costs but good payback rates over the long term. Climate Bonds need not differ greatly from existing government and corporate bonds, save for their central purpose: the funds they attract are underpinned by real and verifiable energy efficiency and renewable energy projects that in some certifiable manner contribute to the mitigation of climate change. At a minimum this has marketing benefits, allowing investors to report to their members on how their secure investments are also making a contribution to addressing climate change. At a maximum, investors...