South East Asia is "woefully off track" on green investments to reduce emissions and needs new policies and financial mechanisms to help bridge the gap, the global consultancy Bain & Company said on Monday.
With energy consumption in the region expected to grow 40% this decade, climate-warming carbon dioxide emissions remain on the rise, with the region still dependent on fossil fuels, said an annual report compiled by Bain, green investment group GenZero, Standard Chartered Bank and Temasek.
While green investment grew 20% last year, it is way short of the $1.5 trillion required this decade, and emissions in the 10 countries in the region could overshoot their 2030 pledges by 32% if they continue on their current trajectory, it warned.
"We believe that an acceleration of effort by countries, corporates and investors is imperative as Southeast Asia remains woefully off-track," said Kimberly Tan, GenZero's managing director.
"There is over $1 trillion of unrecovered capital in young coal plants and that's predominantly in Asia," said Tim Gould, chief energy economist at the International Energy Agency.
"It doesn't allow much room for renewables to grow ... so there is a need for creative financing approaches," he told a conference in Singapore.
Meanwhile, only four of the 10 countries in the region - Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and Vietnam - have made progress in putting a price on carbon.
