British pension funds may soon need to explain how they are fighting climate change under a global framework as the United Kingdom aims to reach carbon neutrality by 2050. British pension funds managed some $2.8 trillion in assets in 2018, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

Sustainable investing is one of the fastest-growing areas in money management as pension plans and other large investors plow money into the strategy. About $30.7 trillion was held in sustainable or green investments in 2018. 63% of money managers cited a lack of quality and consistent sustainability data as the biggest challenge in making such decisions.

The federal government wants to put more pressure on bituminous coal power plants than previously planned. Power stations could be switched off without compensation as early as 2024. The exit from sub-bituminous coal had been clarified in separate negotiations with the operators. Both are to be brought together in one act of law.

The German government plans to compensate utility RWE with around 2.6 billion euros for costs related to the country’s planned coal exit. Mining company Mibrag, owned by Czech energy group EPH, is likely to get 1.75 billion euros of compensation. The payments will begin when coal-fired plants are turned off until the broad final coal exit date.

Only 276 new wind turbines with an output of 940 MW were put into operation in 2019. Compared to the average expansion in the past 5 years, it is a decrease of 77%. The reasons are long approval procedures, insufficiently designated areas and many lawsuits. Many local initiatives against the construction of wind turbines have been formed.

Green bonds are red hot. Issuance smashed through projections in 2019 and will continue expanding this year as sustainability minded investors snap up almost every deal that hits the market. Moody’s had to revise its projection for the year 2019 from $200 billion to $250 billion. The average offering is more than three times oversubscribed.

The Finish EU presidency, the European Commission and the European Parliament on Monday evening all agreed on the common classification system for environmentally-sustainable investment. The final confirmation will be done by EU ambassadors on Wednesday and by a plenary vote that will probably take place in January 2020.

Prodded by their own governments into slashing emissions and getting out of coal, European companies are a step ahead of their US counter parts. “There’s definitely a trend here,” said Peter Henry, managing director at HW Anderson Ltd. in New York. “There are opportunities for them to apply similar strategies that have worked in Europe.”

Germany gets 23.5% of its energy from wind. But in the first half of 2019, only 35 wind turbines were added — an 82% drop compared with 2018. Last year was bad, too: Just 743 turbines were added, compared with 1,792 in 2017. Local opponents of the wind farms often go to court to stall new developments or even have existing towers dismantled.

Report released by the Rocky Mountain Institute. Public policy, manufacturing, research and development, and economies of scale will drive battery performance higher while pushing costs as low as $87/kWh by 2025 (currently $187/kWh). These changes are already contributing to cancellations of planned natural-gas power generation.

The market for green bonds has exploded, with global sales increasing by more than 300% in the past five years to reach $162 billion this year. The Bloomberg Barclays Euro Green Bond Index shows a total return of 18% since 2014. Investors appear entirely unwilling to forgo wealth to invest in environmentally sustainable projects.

The European Central Bank has been buying the debt as part of its asset repurchase program. Hungary and France’s central banks have each created funds dedicated to ecological investments. The Bank for International Settlements started an open-ended fund for central bank investments in green bonds last month.