全球智库信息集成服务系统

As global mean temperatures rise, governments and public financial institutions are seeking ways to mobilize the several hundred billion dollars of finance required to limit the growth of greenhouse gas emissions in developing countries and develop climate-resilient economies. This working paper is one in a series of papers that examines how public funds can mobilize private investment to help meet the significant needs of developing countries. We examine two public actors—the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) and the Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im Bank)—which together intermediated 37% (over $2 billion) of total US assistance to developing countries for climate change activities from 2010 to 2012 by exclusively financing private sector projects.

The paper draws from the experiences of OPIC and Ex-Im Bank to inform other public financial institutions and mechanisms—including the Green Climate Fund and public intermediaries of climate finance—about how financial instruments can be employed to promote private sector investment in climate-relevant sectors.

The paper focuses on three aspects of OPIC and Ex-Im Bank’s climate-relevant financing activities:

1. Financial instrument offerings and trends in their use to inform how public institutions can tailor financial tools and terms to specific sectoral and project requirements;

2. Replicable financing structures that showcase how public financial institutions can work with each other and with the private sector to overcome unique investment barriers in climate-relevant investments in developing countries; and

3. Institutional barriers that can hamper public institutions like OPIC and Ex-Im Bank from more effectively deploying financial instruments to unlock investment in climate-relevant markets.