A study conducted by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) Group and Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) finds that the Latin America and the Caribbean region is attracting a growing share of global clean energy investment, rising from 5.7% of the world total of US$302.3 billion in 2011, to 6% of the 2012 total of US$268.7 billion.
16 October 2013: A study conducted by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) Group and Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) finds that the Latin America and Caribbean region is attracting a growing share of global clean energy investment, changing from 5.7% of the world total of US$302.3 billion in 2011, to 6% of the world total of US$268.7 billion in 2012.
The report, titled ‘Climatescope 2013: New Frontiers for Low-Carbon Energy Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean,’ attributes the rise to stronger policy support and expanded local supply chains in the region. The report, the second in a series first published in 2012, provides an assessment, index and interactive web tool rating the ability of 26 countries in the region to attract low-carbon energy investment, based on 39 indicators under four overarching themes: enabling framework; clean energy investment and climate financing; low-carbon business and clean energy value chains; and greenhouse gas (GHG) management activities.
Key findings include: an increase in total renewable capacity in the region from 11.3 gigawatts in 2006 to 26.6 gigawatts in 2012; a diversification of investment to countries other than Brazil, especially Chile, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, and Uruguay; an increase in net-metering, tax-based subsidies and other low-carbon energy policies from 80 reported in 2011 to 110 in 2012, with 19 of the 26 countries tracked having at least one such policy in place. The study also notes that the region’s growing prominence in global clean energy investment is at least partially due to its decline in investment of only 3.8% between 2011 and 2012, relative to a global decrease of 11% during the same period.
The interactive web tool accompanying the study supports queries by country and indicator, and presents graphics on country rankings, power capacities by source, electrification rates, and energy policies.
The report was sponsored by IDB’s Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF), which supports private sector-led development by providing access to markets, finance and other tools to increase incomes for the poor, in particular, for micro and small and medium-sized enterprise business models. [IDB Press Release] [Publication: Climatescope 2013] [Climatescope 2013 Website] [IISD RS Story on Climatescope 2012]