COP22: Mission Innovation Countries Launch in Marrakech Technology Challenges

Marrakech, 14/11/2016 (MAP) – Mission Innovation countries launched, on Monday at the UN climate change conference (COP22), a number of innovation challenges to target development of energy technologies that will accelerate the clean energy transition.

Through these Innovation Challenges, Mission Innovation members aim to encourage increased engagement from the global research community, industry, and investors, while also providing opportunities for new collaborations between Mission Innovation members.

On this occasion, Finland and the Netherlands were welcomed as the most recent members to join this global effort, which increases the total member country count to 23, including the European Union.

The member governments represent more than 80 percent of global clean energy investment, and have pledged to double their clean energy research and development funding over five years to around $30 billion (USD) per year in 2021.

This commitment to clean energy R&D will help drive steep cost reductions in clean energy, expand job creation for member countries, and deliver breakthrough technologies that will allow for increased global ambition to reduce carbon emissions that keep temperature rise below the dangerous level of 2 degrees Celsius.

“Mission Innovation participants are signaling their understanding that our global energy economy is going to be a low-carbon energy economy,” said U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, adding that “Commitment to Mission Innovation means that these countries want to create jobs for their people, and also build more low-cost, broadly deployable clean energy options.”

For his part, Commissioner Miguel Arias Cañete welcomed Finland and The Netherlands to the initiative, saying that “Through its partnership, Mission Innovation represents an unprecedented acceleration of research and development of clean energy technologies, which will bring sustainable energy to people all over the world. The combination of government efforts, alongside business and investors, will deliver exciting new energies for all.”

One year into its launch, Mission Innovation members have established the foundation for accelerating clean energy innovation by—among other efforts—working to secure and apply increased funding to country-led research and development efforts.

“Mission Innovation is one of the primary vehicles for driving forward clean energy innovation on a truly global scale,” said Minister Nick Hurd, U.K. Minister of State for Climate Change and Industry.

“Individually we can achieve a lot, but together we can go faster and further. The Innovation Challenges give a clear focus for the collective efforts of public and private researchers, innovators and investors, which will help to accelerate innovation in these areas,” he added.

Mission Innovation (MI) is a global initiative of 22 countries and the European Union to dramatically accelerate global clean energy innovation.

As part of the initiative, participating countries have committed to double their governments’ clean energy research and development (R&D) investments over five years, while encouraging greater levels of private sector investment in transformative clean energy technologies.

These additional resources will dramatically accelerate the availability of the advanced technologies that will define a future global energy mix that is clean, affordable, and reliable.

Mission Innovation was announced on November 30, 2015, as world leaders came together in Paris to undertake ambitious efforts to combat climate change.