Fwd: The $10 trillion antidote to Trump

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Loretta Lohman

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Nov 5, 2025, 8:46:03 AM (3 days ago) Nov 5

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It’s easy to see the climate failures all around, from banks watering down their net-zero ambitions to the second term of US President Donald Trump. But the data shows signs of progress. Halting, uneven and not fast enough to be sure, but there’s an undeniable transition afoot.

Today’s newsletter dives into that data and what it means for this year’s climate talks. Plus, EU countries hammered out a deal for its 2040 emissions reductions target after a marathon meeting that went on for over 15 hours.

And don’t miss the three big takeaways from our event in Sao Paulo to get you ready for COP30’s kickoff next week.

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The trillion-dollar reason COP still counts

By Laura Millan

The United Nations climate summit in Dubai two years ago had run into over time – as these annual talks often do – so reporters and negotiators queued in front of the last food trucks that remained open, hoping coffee and cold sandwiches would get us through the night.

Suddenly I got a message from a colleague: “Xie is on the move.” That was Xie Zhenhua, China’s legendary climate envoy, who had headed for a UN building in the giant Emirati exhibition center. A few minutes later, a golf cart delivered his American counterpart and long-time friend John Kerry.

A night of talks eventually produced a deal. COP28 avoided the dreaded impasse by delivering a headline accord: Virtually every nation had agreed to “transition away” from fossil fuels, marking the first time the root cause of global warming was mentioned in an official COP text.

Xie Zhenhua and John Kerry at COP28 in Dubai in 2023 Photographer: Hollie Adams/Bloomberg

To veterans like then-German climate envoy Jennifer Morgan the deal marked a turning point. To others, including delegates from poorer nations battered by climate-driven disasters, it didn’t even scratch the surface. If two weeks of talks attended by more than 90,000 participants could deliver no more than a statement on something everyone knew – whether it suited their interests or not – then what were COPs for, really?

Fast forward two years, and the question of what international climate diplomacy can (and can’t) deliver has become even more relevant as COP30 talks get underway with a world leaders’ summit on Thursday in Brazil. The mood in climate circles has soured at the 10-year mark from the Paris Agreement, which initiated an era of grand climate ambitions.

The US is now exiting that agreement for a second time, with President Donald Trump calling climate change a “hoax” and clean energy a “scam.” Fewer heads of state are bothering to attend this year. Wall Street is walking back from past net-zero promises, and far fewer financial and business leaders are expected to turn up in the Amazonian city of Belém to participate in the summit.

The answer to the existential angst is in the data. Over $10 trillion flowed into the clean energy transition between 2014 and 2024, with a record $2 trillion spent last year in everything from renewable power to battery storage, cleaner shipping and grids, according to research from BloombergNEF. That’s hardly a snapshot of stasis.

Climate diplomats look back at the signing of the Paris Agreement at COP21 as the event that kicked off that momentum. It was the world’s first clear signal from the very top – almost 200 countries and the EU joined the accord – that it’s necessary to cut emissions and limit rising temperatures.

“When we built the Paris Agreement elements and the communication around Paris, I knew that the essential element was the expectation that the economic sector will finally share this idea that the transition transition is unstoppable and inevitable,” said Laurence Tubiana, France’s climate ambassador during the 2015 meeting and one of the accord's architects. “This is continuing even if you have, of course, highs and lows.”

Look beyond the grim headlines of climate-skeptic politicians and disasters fueled by the warming planet, and there are signs of change. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change made its first ever forecast for total global emissions to decline, projecting a 10% reduction from 2019 levels by 2035.

Yes, the Paris goal to keep warming close to a 1.5C increase from pre-industrial times is now dead. But a worst-case scenario of 4C warming by the end of the century is no longer a likely outcome. The world is heading for warming of 2.8C by 2100, according to a new UN report.

So there’s progress — and it’s tinged by greater awareness, one decade after Paris, about what the style of grand climate diplomacy practiced at COP can deliver.

“We have actually moved to a completely new chapter, which is how do you now take the decisions that were taken at the international level, at the multilateral level, to the ground,” said Christiana Figueres, executive secretary at the UNFCCC until 2016. “Otherwise we’re expecting the COP to do something that it can't do and it shouldn’t be – let us look for progress elsewhere.”

That’s what Bloomberg Green did in today’s Big Take. We looked at rooftops in Poland, methane plumes in the Sahara, electric vehicles in Vietnam, nuclear reactors in China, solar farms in Colombia, plastic bags in Nigeria and trees in the Amazon. What we found are signs that jargon-filled climate deals made by bureaucrats at past COPs are resulting in real change. The progress on these fronts will prove insufficient to reach the goals enshrined at Paris a decade ago. But that’s not the same as failing to drive change.

I hope you’ll take the time to read the full story.

Please subscribe to Bloomberg News for more data deep dives.

Almost there

11,500 GW

The renewable capacity countries pledged to install by 2030. The world is on track to hit 9,530 gigawatts, according to the International Energy Agency.

What $10 trillion buys

“Technology is working. It is increasing its market deployment and its efficiency exponentially.”

Christiana Figueres

Costa Rican diplomat and former executive secretary of the UNFCCC

Three takeaways from Sao Paulo

Attendees at the COP30 Business and Finance Forum in Sao Paulo. Photographer: Jonne Roriz/Bloomberg

By Brian Kahn

COPs are like gigantic balls of yarn: climate finance and adaptation are all tangled up with the grammatical minutiae of whether to use “shall” or “should” in crafting a final agreement.

Figuring out the most important themes can be a challenge. But we’re starting to learn what this year’s big ones will be from events taking place across Brazil this week, including one hosted by Bloomberg Green yesterday.

Bloomberg journalists talked with government officials, bankers and diplomats about what they’re watching for at COP30. There were also canapes. Unfortunately, we can’t share those via a newsletter, but we can share three takeaways.

Methane is having a moment

Cutting the potent greenhouse gas has been on many a past COP agenda, including a pact at the 2021 climate talks in Glasgow to reduce emissions 30% by 2030. The greenhouse gas is likely to once again be a priority at this year's meeting.

Getting just a few major methane polluters to clean up their operations can produce outsized results: “Less than 1% of the infrastructure from oil and gas, coal and landfills is responsible for more than 30% of the total methane budget. We find when we notify and incentivize operators, they generally take action quickly to fix and repair leaks and malfunctions,” said Riley Duren, chief executive officer of the NGO Carbon Mapper.

Because the gas spends a relatively short period of time in the atmosphere, reducing methane emissions offers a way to rapidly dial down the temperature and buy time while the world cuts carbon dioxide. Yet so far, it’s an area where there’s great potential but little progress.

Brazil lowers expectations for a forest fund

The country is actively raising money for an ambitious fund designed to protect the world’s rainforests. While a number of leaders are expected to announce contributions when they meet in Belém later this week, Brazil might not get as much as it hoped.

Fernando Haddad, the country’s finance minister, said that he believed the fund could raise $10 billion by next year. That’s less than half of the original target of $25 billion for the so-called Tropical Forest Forever Facility. The funding challenges grew even steeper on Tuesday night with news the UK won’t be a contributor.

The initial funding would then be leveraged to create a $125 billion vehicle that will help keep trees from the Amazon to Indonesia from being cut down.

“It may not be perfect, but if we don’t start and tackle this issue, then we won’t get anywhere. So I think it’s important to think that it’s incremental,” said Dana Barsky, global head of sustainability strategy and net zero at Standard Chartered, a bank.

Carbon markets might turn a corner

It’s been a rough few years for carbon markets, which have been marred by low-quality projects that fail to deliver meaningful emissions cuts and a decreased flow of capital.

But the bad vibes may finally be shifting. Ravi Menon, Singapore’s ambassador for climate action, called them “a vital and critical” tool and pointed to the $10 billion committed this year to carbon projects — more than three times as much as during the same year-earlier period.

In the first six months of 2025, companies used more carbon credits to offset emissions than at any point before, according to figures compiled by MSCI Carbon Markets. The past issues are also informing a new wave of projects that are investing more in verifying that they’re delivering on their promise.

“The market is a lot more discerning about high-quality, high-integrity carbon credits,” he said.

— With assistance from Amanda Kolson Hurley, John Ainger and Fabiano Maisonnave

This week’s COP listen

Photographer: Christophe Morin

The Paris Agreement was a huge deal when it was signed in 2015 at COP21. But after 10 years and $10 trillion dollars invested into decarbonizing our economies, what has it accomplished? As we approach COP30 in Belém, Bloomberg Green’s Laura Millan and Akshat Rathi look back at a decade of the Paris Agreement, and speak to Christiana Figueres and Laurence Tubiana, two of the architects of the deal.

Listen now, and subscribe on Apple, Spotify or YouTube to get new episodes of Zero every Thursday.

The EU’s new target

EU commissioners Teresa Ribera and Wopke Hoekstra Photographer: Simon Wohlfahrt/Bloomberg

EU members sealed a deal to reduce emissions by 90% through 2040 compared with 1990 levels, a climate win that came together after over 15 hours of negotiations that in the end required some proposals to be watered down.

Concessions included allowing countries to claim a greater share of their emissions reductions by buying international carbon credits. The limit will be increased to 5% of the bloc’s baseline net emissions in 1990, compared with 3% originally proposed by the European Commission.

The deal also paves the way for the EU to submit an updated climate pledge to the United Nations at the COP30 summit. The bloc settled for a range of emissions cuts between 66.3% and 72.5% to be presented as its updated green commitment.

Read the full story on Bloomberg.com.

More from Green

Norway’s parliament voted to pause “ethical” divestment from its $2.1 trillion sovereign wealth fund while it rewrites the rules, marking an historic moment for the world’s largest investor and raising questions about its approach to ESG.

Malaysia is considering setting its planned carbon tax on polluting industries at an initial rate of 15 ringgit ($3.58) per ton of emissions, as it aims to curb the nation’s climate footprint.

A quant fund is beating the Australian market using ESG signals. The A$1.9 billion ($1.2 billion) RQI Australian Value Fund uses factors like corporate culture and climate impact as indicators for efficiency when selecting stocks.

Photo finish

The Iana III, where Lula will stay during COP30 Photographer: Tarso Sarraf/AFP/Getty Images

Lodging at COP30 has been a hot topic, with Belém scrambling to undertake a billion-dollar transformation to accommodate the tens of thousands of delegates that typically descend on climate talks. Everything from cruise ships to so-called love hotels have been spruced up to accommodate the influx of visitors. Yet there are still worries that there may not be enough rooms available.

So, what’s a host country president looking for a place to stay to do? Rent a boat apparently. The Iana III will accommodate President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and his team, “operating as a floating hotel,” the Brazilian government said in a statement.

The boat was rented through a travel agency. The statement didn’t disclose the cost of the lease or explain why the president opted not to stay in a hotel.