The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has circulated a proposal for a new field of activity for a new ISO standard, Green Finance: Assessment of Green Financial Projects. As the U.S. member body to ISO, the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) invites all relevant and interested stakeholders to submit comments on the proposal by the end of the business day on Friday, August 4, 2017.
The proposal, submitted by the Standardization Administration of the People's Republic China (SAC), the ISO member from China, describes how green finance is a kind of financing of investments that provide benefits in the broader context of reduction in air, water and land pollution, reductions in GHG emissions, and improved energy efficiency while utilizing natural resources and their co-benefits. Green finance also has the potential to facilitate the growth of high-potential green industries, promote technological innovation, and create business opportunities for the financial industry.
While the green finance market has seen recent rapid growththe global value was close to 90 billion USD in 2016the development of finance faces general challenges including:
There is no universally accepted definition of green financial activities at an international, country or market level.
There are no common guidelines for assessing green financial projects before investment decisions.
All interested stakeholders are invited to review the proposal, which includes a listing of relevant existing documents at the international, regional, and national levels, and stakeholder categories that may benefit from the proposal.
Please submit comments to Steve Cornish, ANSI senior director of international policy ([email protected]), by close of business on Friday, August 4, 2017. Based on the input received, the ANSI ISO Council (AIC) will then be asked to approve an ANSI position and comments to submitted to ISO before its September 12, 2017 deadline for voting on this proposal.
ANSI has published an explanatory information document outlining the process used to develop U.S. positions on issues and activities under consideration by ISO and IEC.