Settling Climate Accounts - by Thomas Heller & Alicia Seiger (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

As drivers of climate action enter the fourth decade of what has become a multi-stage race, Net Zero has emerged as the dominant organizing principle. Hundreds of corporations and investors worldwide, together responsible for assets in the tens of trillions of dollars, are lining-up for the UN Race to Zero. This latest stage in the race to save civilization from heat, drought, fires, and floods, is defined by steering toward zeroing out greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

Settling Climate Accounts probes the practice of Net Zero finance. It elucidates both the state of play and a set of directions that help form judgements about whether Net Zero is going to carry climate action far enough. The book delves into technical analyses and activates the reader's imagination with narrative accounts of climate action past, present, and future.

Settling Climate Accounts is edited and authored by Stanford University faculty and researchers. Thefirst part of the book investigates the rough edges of Net Zero in practice, exploring questions of hedging risk, Scope 3 emissions, greenwashing, and the business of asset management. The second half looks at states, markets, and transitions through the lenses of blended finance, offsets, debt, and securitization. The editors tease out possible solutions and raise further questions about the adequacy and reach of the Net Zero agenda. To effectively navigate the road ahead, the editors call out the need for accountability and ask: who is in charge of making Net Zero add up?

Settling Climate Accounts offers context and foundation to ground the rapidly evolving practice of Net Zero finance. Targeted at seasoned practitioners, newly activated leaders, educators, and students of climate action the world over, this book embraces the complexity of climate action and, in so doing, proposes to animate and drive hope.

From the Back Cover

"This powerful and often provocative book provides a comprehensive map of technical and political challenges, as well as much-needed choices, to give traction and content to the goal of a world with Net Zero carbon emissions. In a time when this approach has been embraced by so many corporations and governments, Settling Climate Accounts gives new lenses through which one can interpret and hopefully steer today's global negotiations and individual actions."

--Joaquim Levy, former Chief Financial Officer, World Bank Group and former Finance Minister of Brazil

"In setting 'Net Zero' goals far into the future, it can be tempting to gloss over the actual impacts of the transition toward those goals. Heller and Seiger tackle the issue head-on in Settling Climate Accounts, cautioning that aligning emissions toward zero must be married to real-world strategies to reduce economic risks to sectors and communities. This is an important historical reviewof what has and has not worked at the intersection of climate finance and policy, and a must-read for those looking to do better going forward."

--Kate Gordon, Senior Advisor to the US Secretary of Energy

"Net Zero has become the principal driver of climate action as evidenced by the commitments of leading firms and banks. This book effectively addresses key sustainable pathways from the intersection of climate sciences, business and public policy."

--Anne Finucane, Vice Chairman, Bank of America

Thomas Heller is the Charles and Nadine Shelton Professor of International Legal Studies (emeritus) at Stanford University Law School. He also currently directs the Precourt Energy Institute's Sustainable Finance Initiative and the Steyer-Taylor Center at Stanford. In 2009 Heller founded the Climate Policy Initiative, where he was Executive Director until 2018, and remains Senior Advisor and Board Chair. As of January 2021, hebecame Senior Director (Risk) at WillisTowersWatson.

Alicia Seiger is a lecturer at Stanford Law School and leads sustainability and energy finance initiatives at Stanford Law, Graduate School of Business, and the Precourt Institute for Energy. Alicia has served as an advisor to the Governors of California and New York, the New York State Comptroller, and numerous pension fund, endowment, and family office CIOs on the topics of climate risk, opportunity, and resiliency. A student of balancing human and ecological systems since the early 1990s, Alicia has been designing and executing climate and energy strategies for businesses, foundations, investors, and NGOs since 2004.

About the Author

Thomas Heller is the Charles and Nadine Shelton Professor of International Legal Studies (emeritus) at Stanford University Law School. He also currently directs the Precourt Energy Institute's Sustainable Finance Initiative and the Steyer-Taylor Center at Stanford. In 2009 Heller founded the Climate Policy Initiative, where he was Executive Director until 2018, and remains Senior Advisor and Board Chair. As of January 2021, he became Senior Director (Risk) at WillisTowersWatson. His research has focused on risk analytics, global energy use, international climate regimes, public finance and taxation, international technology investment, and the rule of law--with particular attention to legal and economic structures in the developing world. Professor Heller has worked with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (1995-2003), and has served as Jean Monnet Visiting Professor at the European University Institute, Deputy Director and Senior Fellow of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University, and Senior Fellow (by courtesy) at the Woods Institute for the Environment.

Alicia Seiger is a lecturer at Stanford Law School and leads sustainability and energy finance initiatives at Stanford Law, Graduate School of Business, and the Precourt Institute for Energy. Alicia has served as an advisor to the Governors of California and New York, the New York State Comptroller, and numerous pension fund, endowment, and family office CIOs on the topics of climate risk, opportunity, and resiliency. A student of balancing human and ecological systems since the early 1990s, Alicia has been designing and executing climate and energy strategies for businesses, foundations, investors, and NGOs since 2004. She has served on the management teams of multiple startups including TerraPass, a pioneer of the US carbon offset market. Alicia serves on the boards of Ceres and Prime Coalition and co-founded Stanford Professionals in Energy (SPIE).