The World Climate Summit is the most prominent annual forum convening leaders across business, finance and governments to accelerate solutions to climate change for industries, financiers, cities, regions, and nations.
PURPOSE
The World Climate Summit 2012 is part of a 10-year process (2020), which started with the inaugural World Climate Summit in Cancun, Mexico in 2010. The annual World Climate Summit takes stock of the state of the world climate and the low-carbon economy, and identifies the industrial, financial, political and innovation drivers needed to accelerate progress in mitigating and adapting to climate change. It is the goal of the World Climate Summit to provide and communicate concrete deliverables to the global community: toolbox of best practice, disruptive innovations, new policies, initiatives and technologies.
TARGET GROUP
The high-level conference is aimed at the climate arena’s leading 500+ decision-makers: CEOs, thought-leaders, business executives, investors, entrepreneurs, philanthropic figures, national, regional and city leaders. By gathering a cross-organisational segment of high-level influencers the summit aims to facilitate an ecosystem emphasizing public/private partnerships, bottom-up solutions across a wide range of industries and sectors.
2012 THEMES
The Summit will focus on the overarching theme of accelerating solutions to climate change, with a focus on Qatar, the Middle East and its relations to the rest of the world. Themes discussed will be finance and scale; public-private partnerships; renewable energy; gas; CCS; agriculture & water; legislation and policy; cities and regions; emission reductions; transportation; carbon pricing; energy efficiency; and business leadership.
FORMAT
The Summit will span over one day and will consist of the following elements:
• Key note plenary sessions addressing major issues (CEO-level)
• Marketplace of ideas and resources (e.g. Finance, Cities & Regions, Projects & Technologies, and Policies)
PARTNERS
The World Climate Summit is backed by the best global media corporations (Reuters, TIME & Financial Times), the climate arena’s strongest institutional partners, and the most relevant decision-makers and leaders. The 2012 summit is set to succeed the inaugural summit in Cancun and the second one in Durban, which was supported by 20 sponsors such as, Siemens, Coca-Cola, and Philips; 30 different institutional partners including OECD, and the World Bank; global media partners such as CNN; and more than 150 high-level speakers including President Zuma, President Calderon, Sir Richard Branson, Ted Turner, Christiana Figueres, Mary Robinson, and Lord Stern.
UNFCCC COP 18
The World Climate Summit is the biggest and most high-profile business event of COP 18. As a high-level conference that predominantly focuses on accelerating solutions to climate change on a global scale, the summit falls in line and complements the remit of the UNFCCC. In this context, the summit functions as a separate, independent and progressive platform, providing the premium medium through which the business, finance and political stakeholders can communicate solutions, engage in partnerships and complement the official UNFCCC COP 18 negotiations.
Read more about the event here.
