Former Bank of England governor Mark Carney has declared a "watershed" moment in financing the world's move to net zero following news that $130 trillion of private capital was waiting to be deployed.
"Right here right now is where private finance draws the line," Mark Carney said on "finance day" at the COP26 summit in Glasgow.
"Up until today there was not enough money in the world to fund the transition. And this is a watershed. So now, it's [about] plugging it in," said Mr Carney, now UN special envoy on finance and the PM's finance adviser for COP26.
Earlier, Chancellor Rishi Sunak had announced that 450 firms controlling around 40% of global assets would align themselves to the Paris Agreement 1.5C warming limit, unlocking $130 trillion of private capital to fund the green transition.
"This is a historic wall of capital for the net zero transition around the world," Mr Sunak said earlier in a speech as he unveiled new plans, which had been trailed ahead of his speech.
The chancellor promised the UK would "go further and become the first net zero aligned financial centre," meaning it would force financial institutions and UK-listed companies to publish plans on how they will decarbonise and transition to net zero.
"Up until today there was not enough money in the world to fund the transition. And this is a watershed. So now, it's about plugging it in,"Mark Carney - Former Governor of the Bank of England
"Six years ago Paris set the ambition. Today in Glasgow we are providing the investment needed to deliver that transition," Mr Sunak said, referring to the agreement made in Paris at COP21 in 2015.
The $130 trillion of assets being "aligned with the Paris Agreement" comes from 450 company members of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), a private finance initiative led by Mark Carney.
Critics are sceptical about GFANZ's environmental pledge because it sets its own rules on what counts as net zero.
A report by NGO Reclaim Finance calls alliances like GFANZ "toothless" and "ineffectual", saying they "eschew tangible measures on fossil fuels and emissions reduction in favour of cumbersome target-setting".
This article first appeared on SKY NEWS