Publications

The EU Competitiveness Compass has made connecting decarbonisation and competitiveness a “strategic imperative” for Europe. This will be delivered by the all-important Clean Industrial Deal – the flagship policy package on which this new Commission hopes to upgrade Europe’s industrial base and tackle the climate crisis simultaneously.

The ecological transition can only happen if all households have access to solutions – public transport, electric vehicles, home insulation, heating upgrades, etc. The issue of the access to transition solutions is therefore crucial for climate policies. Special attention should be paid to low- and middle-income households, as the necessary investments may not be sustainable for them. 

A step forward for green industrial policy, or another stumbling block. Context. The world's largest economies are turning towards green industrial policy to support their cleantech manufacturing to accelerate their decarbonisation, competitiveness, and economic resilience. In this cleantech race, the EU has several disadvantages, including higher costs of energy and labour, a less dynamic investment environment, and the impacts of the Inflation Reduction Act and Made in China 2025.

France is facing a climate investment deficit relative to its climate objectives. Today, these investment are already putting a strain on public finances, whether in terms of investing in public facilities or co-financing projects by households and business. Increasing climate investments is therefore a challenge for public finances. But the scale of the challenge varies, depending on future policies. So what room for manoeuvre is there in terms of climate-related public spending needs?

I4CE's Landscape of Climate Finance is an overview of climate investments made by households, companies and public authorities. Such investments include retrofitting buildings, purchasing electric vehicles, installing renewable energy, as well as paying for rail, cycling and urban public transport infrastructure.

Residential real estate in France is a key target for transition policies, and a the sector is highly exposed to climate risks. With While housing home loans accounting for almost 85% of outstanding household loans in France, it is legitimate to ask how climate risks are passed on from the real estate sector to banks. This article, written with the Banque de France, explores investigates the exposure of residential real estate to present and future climate risks - present and future - and as well as their transmission to bank the lending activities of the banking sector.

The issue of access to the transition for all households, in particular, for low- and middle-income households, has become central to the French public debate, as recently shown by the French President’s speech on ecological planning, when he referred to “an ecology that is accessible and fair, that leaves no one without a solution”. This growing awareness is particularly in response to the yellow vests protests: expecting households to take steps towards the transition if they have no access to solutions (electric cars, public transport, home insulation, heating upgrades) results in a rejection of transition policies and leads us collectively to a dead end

The European Union (EU) Innovation Fund is Europe’s largest fund for climate innovation. It has a keyrole to play in European climate action, energy security and technological leadership. To unleash the full potential of European cleantech, greater public support is needed to help more companies and projects cross the so-called “valleys of death” that are inherent to cleantech innovation and scale-up. In this endeavour, relying solely on national public funds would create two risks. In countries where governments do not rise to the financing challenge, innovators will fail or flee. Conversely, governments with the fiscal means to spend big on cleantech may create a harmful subsidy race among EU member states, undermining EU solidarity and the integrity of the EU Single Market.

Industry: relocation and decarbonisation at the heart of the debate. The recent succession of crises (health, energy, geopolitical) and increased international competition have prompted France to look for ways to strengthen its industrial and energy sovereignty. It faces this challenge in addition to the challenge of decarbonising its industry. In this context, France and Europe are developing industrial policies with two objectives – relocation and decarbonisation – and with new tools such as the France 2030 plan and the Net Zero Industry Act at the European level. These policies target both ‘historical’ industries, such as steel and cement, and new clean technologies, from solar to batteries.

2022, France is paying dearly for a dependence on fossil fuels maintained by a chronic lack of investment in the decarbonisation of the economy. This edition of the Landscape of climate finance in France makes a detailed analysis of these critical expenditures by households, companies and public authorities, in the retrofitting of buildings, the purchase of electric vehicles, and renewable energies, as well as in rail, cycling and urban public transport infrastructures. Encouragingly, climate investments have increased significantly in the past year, driven, among other factors, by favourable regulations and by state support under the recovery plan. But this growth remains fragile, and analysis of several transition scenarios shows that climate investments need to increase further in order to stay on track to carbon neutrality and to ensure a lasting reduction in France’s dependence on fossil fuels.

Over 35°C in exam halls during the French baccalaureate, inhabitants affected by their residences overheated… Summer 2022 has once again shown that our buildings aren’t adapted for the new heat waves. And yet every year, tens of billions of euros are invested in construction and renovation projects that don’t always take climate change into account. In this study, I4CE proposes immediate actions on three levers to initiate the process of adapting our buildings, and three more structural changes, including changes to thermal regulations.  

A steep rise in investment in low-carbon vehicles and sustained climate investment in other sectors, a fall in the financing of fossil fuels, a climate funding deficit of over 13 billion that recovery measures are unlikely to offset...

The Landscape of Climate Finance is a comprehensive study of domestic investments which support climate mitigation in France. This study maps the financial flows supporting investments leading to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) across the French economy.

As part of the EUKI-supported project “Landscape of climate finance: Mainstreaming climate finance in the CEE region”, I4CE supported the Polish think-tank Wise Europa in the elaboration of a Landscape of climate finance in the sector of energy retrofitting of existing buildings in Poland.

From implementation to disclosure by companies in the TCFD framework   The transition to a low-carbon economy represents risks and opportunities for companies. Indeed, far-reaching changes are expected in socio-economic systems, with uncertainties about their timing and magnitude, and their economic and financial consequences. In this context, forward-looking methods –in particular scenario analysis – are […]

  It therefore brings risks and opportunities for economic actors, which they must anticipate in order to optimise their strategy in a context of uncertainty. Against this backdrop, the use of scenarios – which are plausible representations of uncertain future states – is very useful in order to better understand the medium- and long-term challenges […]

In September 2017, I4CE updated its database on carbon pricing policies. This panorama presents key trends regarding the implementation of explicit carbon pricing policies at the regional and national level in 2017. A world map, a detailed table and a graph provide comprehensive information on the jurisdictions that have implemented or plan to implement explicit […]