Search Climate Insights Directory

This report, published in April 2024 by Global Energy Monitor and several partner organizations, tracks the global development of coal-fired power plants. It highlights a divergence in trends: while new construction is reaching record lows outside of China, China is seeing an eight-year high in new construction. The report specifically examines the risks of expanding coal capacity in Central Asia, where proposed projects contradict climate goals and add to an aging, worn-out energy infrastructure.

The report 'Auge y caída del carbón 2024' analyzes global coal-fired power generation trends in 2023, highlighting a contradiction where global operational capacity reached an all-time high despite a decline in new construction outside of China.

This report, published by Global Energy Monitor and a coalition of partners, tracks global coal-fired power plant capacity as of April 2024. It highlights a paradoxical trend where global coal capacity reached record highs in 2023, driven primarily by China, despite a general decline in new coal construction in the rest of the world and increasing phase-out commitments.

This briefing paper critiques the G20's "Better, Bolder and Bigger" framework for Multilateral Development Bank (MDB) reform, arguing that its private-sector-first approach prioritizes profit over people and planet. The authors highlight risks including the erosion of accountability, continued fossil fuel financing, and a lack of gender-sensitive strategies, urging a shift toward grants-based financing and systemic democratization.

This report, published by Trend Asia and several international partners, analyzes global coal power trends in 2023. It highlights a contradiction where global coal capacity reached a historic high in 2023 despite a general decline in new construction outside of China. The document provides detailed analysis of China's continued expansion and Indonesia's struggle with 'captive' coal plants supporting the nickel industry, which complicates its energy transition goals.

This training manual, developed by the Ministry of Planning and Development (MoPD) of Ethiopia with support from the Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN), provides a comprehensive guide for facilitators to integrate Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI) into the design and implementation of national development and climate change initiatives. It outlines a structured eight-session training module covering basic GESI concepts, gender analysis tools, gender-responsive budgeting, and organizational transformation, with a specific focus on the intersection of gender and climate change resilience.

This briefing note by the Global Resilience Partnership and Transitions Research examines the landscape of urban resilience solutions in informal contexts across the Global South. Based on a review of approximately 130 solutions, the report identifies a significant gap in urban climate investment—where only 1.2% of urban climate finance flows to adaptation and resilience—and highlights that most non-governmental solutions are still in early development stages. It provides recommendations for municipalities, funders, and policymakers to scale these innovations through better coordination, hybrid financing, and the integration of informal settlements into city planning.

The Global Resilience Partnership (GRP) 2024–2029 Strategy outlines a framework to advance climate resilience by focusing on three transformative opportunities: food systems, finance flows, and community-led action. The strategy aims to shift from fragmented, Global North-led approaches toward locally-led adaptation and systemic collaboration, targeting high-vulnerability regions in the Global South.

The INVESTING IN RESILIENCE Project Portfolio 2024 outlines the activities of the Global Resilience Partnership (GRP), which identifies and scales locally-led resilience innovations in the Global South through challenge fund competitions. The document highlights several active projects focusing on climate adaptation, food security, and sustainable finance across Africa, Asia, and South America, while detailing the funding requirements needed to scale these initiatives.

The 2024 Regional Resilience Hubs virtual summit emphasized the necessity of locally-led adaptation (LLA), flexible and decentralized climate finance, and the meaningful inclusion of marginalized groups. Key discussions focused on integrating nature-based solutions, addressing the gendered burden of unpaid care work, and ensuring that climate investments protect human rights and land tenure to prevent the displacement of vulnerable populations in regions including Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

This report by Ember analyzes the underreporting of coal mine methane (CMM) emissions, finding that global emissions may be up to twice as high as government figures reported to the UNFCCC. It highlights systemic failures in monitoring, noting that 97% of reported emissions rely on general emission factors rather than direct measurement, and recommends mandatory direct monitoring, satellite verification, and international support for low-income countries to mitigate this potent greenhouse gas.

This report by Zero Carbon Analytics examines the role of smallholder farmers in global food security, their productivity, and their adoption of sustainable agricultural practices. It highlights that small-scale farms, particularly those between two and five hectares, produce a significant portion of the world's food and often exhibit higher land productivity and biodiversity than larger farms. The document emphasizes the importance of integrating smallholders into modern agrifood supply chains and providing financial resources to scale climate-smart agricultural practices, especially in Africa.

This policy brief by the Stockholm Environment Institute argues for the establishment of a regional cooperation mechanism to address cascading climate risks in the Hindu Kush Himalaya (HKH) region, emphasizing that climate impacts propagate across national borders and require collaboration beyond local and national scales.

The World Resources Institute outlines four key demands from the ACT2025 consortium for COP28: advancing ambition to limit warming to 1.5°C through a 43% emissions cut by 2030; scaling up people-centered adaptation; operationalizing loss and damage institutions; and mobilizing trillions in climate finance to replace the insufficient billion-dollar commitments.

This report by Zero Carbon Analytics examines Bangladesh's increasing reliance on imported liquefied natural gas (LNG) and the resulting financial, energy, and climate risks. It argues that the pivot toward LNG has left the country vulnerable to global price shocks and power shortages while stagnating renewable energy growth, ultimately exacerbating the country's extreme vulnerability to climate change and heat stress.

This report assesses power sector data transparency across 39 Asian economies, evaluating them against six criteria: time granularity, publishing lag, geographic granularity, fuel breakdown, ease of access, and additional data. The analysis finds that overall transparency is insufficient to support a coal-to-clean electricity transition in the region, with more than half of the economies scoring poorly.

This report identifies best practices in power sector data transparency across Asia and Oceania, highlighting New Zealand, Australia, and India as leaders. It details the technical requirements for high-quality data—such as hourly granularity, real-time publishing, and unit-level geographical detail—and provides a case study on the public-private partnership between India's NITI Aayog and the Vasudha Foundation to create a centralized energy data platform.

The Asia Data Transparency Report 2023 evaluates power sector data transparency across 39 economies in Asia-Pacific and Central Asia. It finds that over half of the region suffers from poor or insufficient data transparency, which hinders the transition from coal to clean electricity. The report identifies high-performing economies, provides a case study on India's public-private partnership for data aggregation, and offers nine recommendations to improve data governance.

This report analyzes the 2022 activities of United Nations Human Rights Treaty Bodies (HRTBs) regarding state obligations in the context of climate change. It tracks the increasing frequency of climate-related recommendations in state review processes and examines specific trends in mitigation, fossil fuel regulation, adaptation, and the protection of vulnerable groups, including Indigenous Peoples and persons with disabilities.

This report by the Center for International Environmental Law and the Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights analyzes the 2022 activities of seven UN Human Rights Treaty Bodies (HRTBs) regarding climate change. It documents an increase in climate-related references in State reporting procedures and highlights key developments in General Comments and individual communications, specifically the landmark Billy et al. v. Australia case.