The arrival of Earth Day today coincides with disturbing news from the UN’s World Meteorological Organisation that the effects of climate change are relentlessly intensifying. In 2020, the global temperature was 1.28C higher than pre-industrial conditions and the effects are de-stabilising the world as we know it. In the face of this, how can we ‘restore the earth’, which is the theme of this year’s Earth Day? Gaby Amiel, CEO and co-founder at technology company Sennen, considers the role of investment in making the structural shift that is needed.
Financial markets speed up change. They remove capital from sectors in decline and allocate it to growth sectors. They are central to enabling change and there has never been a more urgent transition to be made than the one we face now – removing investment from fossil fuels and transferring it to renewable technologies and associated infrastructure.
Time is running out to achieve the 1.5°C Paris Agreement goal. All the evidence shows that the gap between where we are and where we need to be is actually widening, not decreasing. We have around 10 years to deliver a 45% emissions reduction. This is going to require a speed and scale of deployment of new technologies that has never been seen before.
