Publications & documents
Publications
The Green Climate Fund issues a range of publications for our direct and indirect stakeholders on a diversity of issues – for the general public to industry experts. Stay in tune with our mission and activities around the planet with the issues that speak to you.
SAP Technical Guidelines: Energy Efficiency for Industry and Appliances
August 2019
This publication provides technical guidance for the preparation of SAP proposals. Energy efficiency (EE) is the process of reducing the energy consumption of infrastructure, facilities, machines, devices, products, services, business processes, activities and transport. It can be thought of as the first fuel of a sustainable world and as such it has a key role in ensuring cost-effective energy transitions.
SAP Technical Guidelines: Renewable Energy
August 2019
This publication provides technical guidance for the preparation of SAP proposals. Renewable energy (RE) is produced using natural resources that are constantly replaced within the human timescale. Just as there are many natural sources of energy, there are many technologies that can help to harness RE sources. Solar photovoltaic (PV) is the most well- known, wind power is the most widespread and hydropower is one of the oldest. Other RE technologies harness geothermal energy, solid waste or...
Accelerating REDD+ implementation
June 2019
REDD+ is vital for global efforts to combat climate change. The Paris Agreement, adopted in 2015 and entering into force in 2020, treats forests as an integral part of the climate solution, and highlights REDD+ as key intervention to achieve the new ambitious global target. The UNFCCC specifically recognized the GCF as a key funding avenue for channeling REDD+ RBPs.1 The GCF began offering such payments in 2017, and funding activities that are necessary to achieve REDD+ results since it...
SAP Technical Guidelines: Forests and Land Use
June 2019
This publication provides technical guidance for the preparation of SAP proposals. The thematic area of forest and land use encompasses forests and other multiple land-cover types where forests are a prominent component of the landscape. This can range from natural forests, where ecosystems are not directly impacted by human activities (e.g. primary forests) to more intensively transformed landscapes – such as secondary growth forests, degraded forest landscapes, agroforestry systems and trees...
SAP Technical Guidelines: Cities and Climate Change
June 2019
Traditionally, cities are defined as large human settlements, with no one standardized definition applied internationally. Frequently, national governments have criteria they use to define urban areas. These criteria can vary to include aspects such as administrative boundaries, living conditions or population density. Another approach is what is termed “urban agglomeration”, which considers the extent of an urban area, or sometimes, that of a built-up area, to identify a city’s boundaries.
SAP Technical Guidelines: Transport
May 2019
The publication provides technical guidance for the preparation of SAP proposals. Although there is no one standard definition of the transport sector, it can be described as including all kinds of transportation, such as road, rail and maritime transport, and aviation.
SAP Technical Guidelines: Ecosystems and Ecosystem Services
May 2019
The thematic area of ecosystems and ecosystem services encompasses all natural environments and the productive uses that are based on them. This can range from environments not directly impacted by human activities – for example, remote rainforests, alpine regions or coral reefs – to environments that are intensively managed – such as agricultural areas or managed forests for timber production. Given that there are thematic areas specifically addressing water security, agriculture and food...
Turning ambition into action: How GCF catalyses transformational change
May 2019
GCF is the world’s largest dedicated fund helping developing countries reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and enhance their ability to respond to climate change. It was set up by the UNFCCC in 2010, and has a crucial role in serving the Paris Agreement, supporting the goal of keeping average global temperature rise well below 2C. It does this by channelling climate finance to developing countries, which have joined other nations in committing to climate action. This publication provides a...
Adaptation: Accelerating action towards a climate resilient future
April 2019
This working paper contributes to adaptation knowledge from the perspective of climate financing. It provides an overview of adaptation and resilience challenges, the distinction between them, and discusses the avenues that GCF is developing to tackle them, together with countries and many stakeholders including the private sector. Ultimately, it is hoped that this paper will inform the design and scaling up of more successful adaptation investments. Through focused investments in these...
GCF in Brief: Enhancing Direct Access
March 2019
The Enhancing Direct Access (EDA) pilot has been designed to provide Direct Access Entities (DAEs) with opportunities to move beyond the financing of individual projects towards a more comprehensive and stakeholder-driven programmatic approach. This factsheet provides an overview of the EDA pilot.
Project Preparation Facility Guidelines
March 2019
GCF's Project Preparation Facility (PPF) provides financial support to Accredited Entities (AE) in preparing funding proposals for submission to the Green Climate Fund (GCF). The PPF supports AEs in preparing full Funding Proposals for consideration by the Board, based on a Concept Note that has been cleared for project preparation support vis-àvis GCF investment criteria. This publication provides practical guidelines to help AEs in preparing and submitting PPF requests to the GCF secretariat.
GCF in Brief: Support for Technology
December 2018
Technology solutions and innovations are instrumental to facilitate the move towards low-emission and climate- resilient pathways. Climate technologies can cover sectors such as energy supply and distribution, industry, transport, waste and agriculture. GCF supports developing countries in mitigation and adaptation actions as well as in capacity-building and technology development and transfer.
GCF in Brief: Simplified Approval Process
May 2018
The Green Climate Fund is moving quickly to build a large and transformative project portfolio, with many projects already under implementation. To simplify and streamline the approval of certain small scale projects, GCF’s Board has approved a new approach: the Simplified Approval Process (SAP). The simplifications in this new approach should lead to a reduction in time and effort required to go from project conception to implementation.
GCF in Brief: REDD+
May 2018
REDD+ is a financing model negotiated under the UNFCCC to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries. It is divided into three phases, which are roughly associated with readiness, implementation, and payment for results. This factsheet provides an overview of how GCF offers support for REDD+ across all three phases.
GCF in Brief: Direct Access
May 2018
One of the Green Climate Fund’s distinctive features is the provision for developing countries to access financial resources through national entities, meaning that climate finance can be channelled to the country directly. This factsheet explains how direct access works and the support provided for direct access Accredited Entities.
GCF in Brief: About the Fund
May 2018
Learn more about the Green Climate Fund (GCF), an operating entity of the financial mechanism of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and Paris Agreement, dedicated to supporting global efforts to respond to the challenge of climate change.
GCF in Brief: Safeguards
May 2018
The Green Climate Fund makes sure the climate finance it provides developing countries is not accompanied by negative effects to local communities and the environment. You can find out more about how GCF avoids harm through its Environmental and Social Policy and Indigenous Peoples Policy in this factsheet.