Icebreaker One is working on a 10-month programme, funded by Tipping Point Fund on Impact Investing (TPF), to support our Open Net Zero (ONZ) service, putting net zero data at everyone’s fingertips. This project is dedicated to enhancing data infrastructure and practices in sharing impact investment data*. Our chosen use case for the programme is focused on the built environment.

Within the vast Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Ecosystem our primary focus has been aligned with our mission as a company, as we focus on the environmental component of ESG. And, through our research, we have been confronted with challenges in the access to, quality, comparability, transparency and therefore trust of environmental data within ESG disclosures. Our research is focussed on the measurable and quantifiable ‘E’ of ESG data.

Problem statement & use case

The following problem statement is a method of framing our efforts around the ways leveraging environmental data can aid organisations’ transition to net zero. From this, our Impact Investing Advisory Group prioritised two use cases that support our initial problem statement.

How can improving the data sharing infrastructure of a company’s energy and water use impact data (scopes 1-3), increase trust and data validation, including by rating agencies.

Primary use case: ‘Increased transparency and comparability of the Environmental data in ESG disclosures is needed in supply chains to better enable impact investment decisions in the commercial built environment.

The use case:

• serves as the basis/the starter for subsequent ESG use cases from different sectors within the UK, EU and USA.
• enables us to leverage our existing networks from previous IB1 projects which are centred around water and energy. 
• determines the initial requirements for an online Icebreaker One – Open Net Zero demonstrator
• enables improved impact investment decisions through the use of trusted and comparable ESG data.
• is of relevance for all ESG AG members and the sectors they work in.
• ensures scope 1-3 environmental data is intrinsic.  

Rationale for choosing the built environment

• The Impact Investing AG felt the built environment was an important industry to focus on, unsurprisingly as the EU’s Built Environment has the largest climate investment gap of any sector –  ‘Europe’s building sector is responsible for 40% of energy consumption, more energy than any other sector, and accounts for 36% of the EU’s energy-related GHG emissions[¹] 
• 97% of Europe’s buildings – as many as 215 million – will require some level of renovation before 2050 (²)
• With pandemic recovery investments and climate at the top of the EU’s agenda, now is a unique opportunity and crucial moment to mobilise private finance and investment in renovation (³).
• Today’s choices in the building sector will impact emissions for decades. Companies in the buildings sector are failing to take responsibility for reducing the in-use emissions from the operations of buildings. The longevity of buildings means that making the wrong design, construction, and renovation decisions today will have a lasting impact on society’s ability to decarbonise. 
• The built environment sector must fully embrace sustainable development. Interventions in the built environment should avoid short term objectives that may compromise the resilience of future generations. The built environment sector must ensure interventions unlock more value from existing infrastructure (⁴). 
• The building sector is also heavily reliant on its value chain to decarbonise. It’s here that we focus on the scope 3 emissions from our problem statement.

The outcome from our first use case will support our second use case: How to access reliable, standardised long-term risk data for the built environment globally.

Use Case Prioritisation

Icebreaker One defines a use case as outlining the tools (such as data) that a specific stakeholder (the primary actor) will need to achieve a specific, focused goal, and what needs to happen for the primary actor to achieve their goal.

Combining the input from our AG members as well as our own in-depth research interviews we produced a longlist of 16 use cases. A central theme ran throughout these use cases – the need to increase the transparency of company ESG data in order to improve impact investment decision making. And, using our 7 point assessment criteria, we then scored the use cases, arriving at our Primary Use Case.

Retrofit or construction?

According to the Institute for Market Transformation, the commercial real estate market tends to favour new and cutting-edge architecture, but which is better from a carbon reduction perspective—retrofits or new construction? Since the majority of a building’s embodied carbon is accounted for by the foundation, structure, and envelope, it typically makes sense to reuse these parts of a building rather than to demolish (which also emits carbon and air pollution) and rebuild. The carbon payback of new construction and retrofits can vary greatly depending on building type, location, climate, and grid mix but retrofitting a building generally saves 50 to 75 % of embodied carbon. 

New buildings that are designed to be more efficient are attractive assets—however, the energy, water, and related carbon savings achieved once a new building is occupied can take a long time to reach the level of embodied carbon that was emitted during construction. A report by the Preservation Green Lab, Skanska, and other partner organisations found that new buildings can take anywhere between 10 to 80 years to pay back the emissions generated from the construction process, even if the new buildings are 30 percent more efficient than average. 

One step many businesses can take to achieve net zero is to retrofit their building. The initial scope of this use case is as follows:

Commercial retrofit

Given the importance of retrofitting buildings to reduce carbon emissions, we have narrowed the scope of our use case even further to focus on commercial retrofit buildings. 

“Over 85% of the EU existing buildings will still be in use in 2050. Renovating the existing building stock is an essential action to meet Paris Agreement goals. To ensure assets remain desirable in the future, owners need to plan on the renovation of their assets. Renovation will reduce the carbon emissions of their properties and will enhance the quality of life for occupants.” Ludovic Chambe Head of ESG & Sustainability Services, CBRE, Continental Europe.

ESG initiatives present an opportunity for investors, owners and occupiers to focus on value creation and mitigation of risks. Much of this opportunity is centred around the management, retrofit and refurbishment of existing real estate assets. (Carl Brooks Global Head of ESG, Property Management, CBRE)

PAS2080 updates to include retrofit:

The emphasis on retrofitting is further bolstered by the updates to PAS2080 ( in April this year) the world’s first specification for managing whole-life carbon in infrastructure. The British Standards Institute (BSI), with sponsorship from the Institute of Civil Engineers (ICE) and the Green Construction Board (GCB) has revised and updated the standard to accelerate the ambition and outcomes for decarbonisation. Three of the five new themes from the update relate to the value of retrofitting and also the need to consider the entire value chain and area as follows:

• An integrated approach to the built environment- widening the scope of PAS2080 beyond infrastructure to the built environment.
• Taking a whole-life view – addressing the urgent need to retrofit existing stock and balance capital carbon investment with operational and user benefit.
• Collaboration – highlighting the importance of working together across the entire value chain. 

Scope 3

One particular area of contention within our problem statement was Scope 3 emissions with many organisations finding it challenging to quantify and report on Scope 3 emissions. This voluntary disclosure includes waste generation (by source), water (consumption and treatment), business travel, staff commuting, product or service use, leased assets and outsourced operations.  It also includes the emissions from mining, extraction, and processing of the raw materials used, as well as those arising from the use and disposal of products produced and sold by the organisation. 

As outlined by the World Benchmarking Alliance, the building sector is heavily reliant on its value chain to decarbonise. As a result, it is critically important for companies within the Buildings Benchmark to engage not only with each other but with their suppliers, customers and other external actors in order to achieve emissions reductions. 

Research has shown us that within the impact investing field, there are issues with access to, quality and trust of environmental data. According to a global survey from CBRE in November 2022, companies are favouring environmental, social and corporate-governance (ESG) factors more heavily when making decisions on which buildings to lease or buy. What’s more, many are prioritising green-building certifications and features that reduce energy consumption or generate renewable energy, as demonstrated below:

Figure 2: How do you use sustainability certification programs (eg: LEED, BREEAM, NABERS) in your decisions? 

Source: CBRE Global ESG Survey, November 2022

Figure 3: How environmental building features impact a Real Estate transaction

Source: CBRE Global ESG Survey, November 2022

Investors and occupiers are more likely to pay a premium for buildings with on-site renewable energy generation and/or smart technology to monitor and adjust energy usage. Enabling investors, occupiers and owners to easily access this information in a transparent and trustworthy manner is the objective of the demonstrator that Icebreaker One is preparing for COP28, November 2023. 

Investment & policy gaps

To meet the EU’s 2030 climate target, €3.5 trillion of total investment will be needed this decade to decarbonise Europe’s buildings through renovation. Based on Member States’ current plans, the investment gap to 2030 is estimated at €2.75 trillion[⁵].

The 2022 UN Environment Programme (UNEP) Emissions Gap Report states ‘at the current rate of emissions, we are heading towards a 2.8C warmer world by the end of the century – even with the implementation of the Nationally Determined Contributions under the Paris Agreement. The report also highlights the gaps in several policy scenarios and ways to deliver the emissions cuts of many gigatons of GHGs required. This carbon gap makes the urgency for implementation of meaningful decarbonisation even more compelling, particularly for the built environment sector.’

Open Consultation

We are currently running an open consultation and gathering further input from our Impact Investment Advisory Group. The aim is to identify the data required to ensure essential environmental information is gathered at the earliest phase of decision making in retrofitting a commercial building. If you or someone in your network has knowledge in this field and would like to be part of our September focus group, please get in touch via: icebreaking@ib1.org

*The programme is using Global Impact Investing Network’s definition of impact investing: “Impact investments are investments made with the intention to generate positive, measurable, social and environmental impact alongside a financial return.

Please read the PDF of the Stream Blueprint Phase Executive Summary here(v 2023-02).

Stream is a sector-wide initiative enabling a scalable, repeatable approach to Open Data in Water. Stream aims to bring benefits to the water sector and beyond by establishing a widely accessible open data platform and associated governance and data standards, with a vision to unlock the potential of water data to benefit customers, society, and the environment. 

Working as a collective comprised of 11 water companies and 6 partner organisations, Stream has worked through phases to define the strategy and co-create an open data framework for the sector. The latest phase has produced this Blueprint, mobilising nine workstreams to gain a deep understanding of requirements, develop a detailed design for Stream, and identify timings, costs and requirements for the subsequent Implementation phase.  

This document is open for comment, click here for the report.

This use case report is part of the outputs from a partnership between Icebreaker One and the Office for Zero Emission Vehicles (OZEV). The project aims to close the data gaps required to roll out thousands more electric vehicle charge points across the UK by working together with industry to identify the data infrastructure needed to roll out more charge points.

Use case summary: More than 30% of households in the UK cannot install at-home electric vehicle chargepoints, highlighting the importance of affordable and nearby on-street charging. But how can local authorities deliver this infrastructure in a timely, efficient, equitable and cost-effective way, ensuring ‘location optimisation’? We explore how data can help the dilemmas that arise from the huge challenge of satisfying the coming demand for on-street charging.

View, add or edit entries here —http://bit.ly/ib1-CFI

[or use this web form]

An embedded view-only version of the sheet is below.

• governance and regulatory entities
• agencies, consortiums and research institutions
• assets that generate, produce or supply energy to the country 
• manufacturers, equipment and infrastructure providers
• energy transporters, transmitters, operators and distributors
• energy suppliers
• service providers including brokers, consultants, technology, and other services

We included energy investors and the investment community given their role as facilitators of energy connectivity, especially with regards to the transition to renewable energy and our legal requirements to meet emission targets. 

Our map of this ecosystem shows its complexity and how large energy generating assets (e.g. coal or nuclear plants) centrally transmit and distribute energy to reach the end consumer. 

A number of monopolies are involved, such as the transmission (electricity & gas) and distribution systems (DNOs for electricity & DNs for gas). Ofgem along with other regulatory bodies provide governance to ensure price controls in the wholesale market so that energy suppliers can utilize the transmission and distribution networks fairly, and offer a competitive marketplace for consumers to purchase their energy.

As a result, the ecosystem contains vast amounts of data that are currently fragmented and often siloed.

We believe that harnessing this data through a robust, decentralised and federated data infrastructure is key to modernising the energy system in the UK and attaining our targets for a carbon-net-zero future—we call for the development of an Open Energy standard to help address this.

Acronyms unbundled

• DNO = District Network Operators (Also sometimes District Systems Operator DSO)
• ESO = Electricity System Operator
• NGESO = National Grid Electricity System Operator
• NGET = National Grid Electricity Transmission Plc
• TO/TNO/TSO = Transmission Operators (Network and Systems)

In this process, it is important that financial institutions consider not only the risk that climate change might pose to their business model and financials; but also how the institution’s investing, lending or underwriting choices might themselves have climate change risk implications. 

The endpoint to this process of identifying and managing risk is the disclosure of climate change related risk in a ‘decision-useful’ way to investors, credit rating agencies, customers and regulators. Regulated financial institutions in the UK are already mandated to report material issues under a number of different pieces of legislation and from different bodies; environmental risk is already considered a material issue, and so now too and separately is climate change related risk. A goal is for financial institutions to have the data, tools, process and governance to be able to produce and disclose their climate change related Risk Appetite and Capital Allocation; this is still at an early stage. 

The materiality of climate change related financial risk should be considered and assessed at the Board level of financial institutions, and explicitly considered in the Terms of Reference for Board Committees; and should be integrated into Key Performance/Risk Indicators managed by Chief Financial and Risk Officers. 

Proper management of climate change related financial risk requires financial institutions to identify risk exposures, both transition and physical, then model and quantify the risk, and integrate the results into existing risk management frameworks for the standard risk types: market/credit/operational/underwriting & reserving/reputational. The exposure needs to be quantified and translated into financial metrics whose impact on financial statements, capital ratios and market valuations can be measured. Value-at-risk (VaR) methodology should be extended to Climate Value-at-risk (CVaR). This work is of value not only for the purpose of external reporting and disclosure but also for operational decision making and strategic planning within financial institutions. 

Risk management strategy should be informed by and stress tested with scenario analysis. Scenarios are not predictions; they explore the potential range of climate outcomes and analyse the effect of alternative states in a structured way. Financial institutions should disclose their scenario selection; it is at the moment difficult to compare climate-related disclosures.

Innovation around climate change related financial risk includes defining the much-needed data infrastructure and ensuring it can operate at scale, bridging the current considerable data gaps and improving modeling tools and approaches. 

There also needs to be transformative financing from the institutional and retail sector (rather than from public funds) invested into new resilient zero-carbon solutions in infrastructure, assets and services, such as retrofitting buildings, electricity grid modernization to support high renewable energy loads, and electric powered surface transport.

The EU is advancing clearer language for green finance—this is a sign of positive engagement and leadership.

The taxonomy

1. brings clarity and consensus on what can legitimately be labelled “green”
2. helps investors and companies understand how to create credible impact, and how to report about relevant sustainability matters
3. helps governments more accurately diagnose and create robust economic policies
4. gives regulators capacity to monitor and act to balance the needs of the private sector and citizens with the environment

Positive or negative? 

The taxonomy brings harmonisation across the region with regard to the language and criteria for raising funds for sustainable projects. A common framework for labelling investments and reporting on their sustainable or unsustainable qualities leaves less room for ambiguity or suspicion and incentivises analytical rigour, therefore reducing risk. This should lead to greater mobilisation of private capital towards the funding of activities that actually are environmentally sustainable.

The labelling gives the public financial institutions and regulators such as the EIB European Investment Bank or the European Central Bank clarity to execute and measure policy outputs. The EIB, for instance, is a fundamental force in infrastructure development in Europe: the co-financing and syndication of infrastructure should have positive effects—if the implementing guides are properly defined.

However, we should be very cautious about expectations and rigorous about the development of the detailed rules and monitoring mechanisms in the coming months.

First, any ‘labelling’ exercise can turn barren if transparency rules and data standards are not in place. Sustainability is an extremely complex matter and still incipient in the geopolitical and financial fields, so we can -and should- expect the initial criteria to have gaps and mismatches, event substantial. The oil to grease the feedback machine so that the taxonomy is continuously improved, as expeditiously as possible, is transparency. The better the data and means of exchange, the more effective and durable the criteria will become.

Second, we should not forget that the new regulation directly addresses environmental aspects, but not social and governance aspects (which make up the “S” and the “G” in ESG). These two aspects are left to the generalities of global standards such as the OECD’s, which are not exempt of challenges themselves. So there is still work to do on that front.

Third, although a regulatory taxonomy is very important, it is in the day-to-day activity of sustainable finance -mostly private sector- where the actual successes or failures will take place. Collaboration with the private sector -including the setting up of explicit policies and instruments to encourage it- is of the essence from day one. 

Detailed analysis — what is it?

This so-called ‘EU Taxonomy for green investments’ is a regulation approved by the European Parliament and the EU Council in December that establishes the criteria for determining whether an economic activity (for example a manufacturing company) and any investment products associated to it (for example shares of corporate bonds) can be classified as environmentally sustainable. Prior to this regulation there was no harmonised standard in Europe to classify green investments.

It directly affects all regulations in the EU and its Member States that relate to the requirements on financial markets for products designated as environmentally sustainable, including the recent EU Regulation 2019/2088 on sustainability‐related disclosures in the financial services sector.

The regulation is far from final. Instead, it is a general framework laying out the guiding principles to elaborate the detailed technical criteria during the next two years. The complete screening criteria must be ready before 31st December 2021 and will come into force one year later.

Under this taxonomy, an economic activity must fulfill all of the following conditions to qualify as ‘sustainable’:

1. Substantially contribute to at least one of the six environmental objectives defined, namely: (i) climate change mitigation; (ii) climate change adaptation; (iii) sustainable use and protection of water and marine resources; (iv) transition to a circular economy; (v) pollution prevention and control; or (vi) protection and restoration of biodiversity and ecosystems.
2. Cause “No significant harm” to any of the other environmental objectives;
3. Comply with robust and science-based technical screening criteria; and,
4. Comply with minimum social and governance safeguards.

The regulation defines what “substantial contribution”, “no significant harm” and “minimum social and governance standards” mean, but not the screening criteria -as mentioned above- nor the mechanisms to verify and monitor the compliance with the criteria. 

Who is it for?

It applies to any financial products or corporate bonds that are made available as environmentally sustainable, any financial services companies subject to the obligation to publish non-financial statements, as well as any policies or regulations in the EU and Member States that may be related. In practice, we are talking about the whole financial sector -banks, investment companies, pension funds, insurance companies, etc. and the large companies and assets connected to the financial products they trade with: bonds, debt, securities, investment vehicles, etc.

Benefits

The new EU green investment label becomes the most important standard to date for investors and financial markets worldwide, reaffirming the EU leadership in the global effort to achieve carbon neutrality and sustainability. Clear definitions and rules are a fundamental pillar of the immense collective action that is required to achieve the vision to make Europe carbon neutral by 2050.

The taxonomy actually does bring harmonisation across the region with regards to raising funds for sustainable projects. In theory, both governments and the private sector should find it easier to raise funding for their environmentally sustainable activities in their countries AND across borders, since any economic activities or assets can be compared using a common language to describe how related investments contribute to environmental sustainability. This should, in turn, facilitate the flow of investments and economic activity across the EU.

The regulation is also a tipping point for the reporting and disclosure obligations of European companies and financial markets. Greater transparency about the environmental impact of all sorts of economic activities means investors will have much clearer and homogeneous information about the sustainable qualities of the assets they invest in, reducing the risk perceived and lifting much of the burden to check, compare and aggregate different financial products, potentially. On the other hand, the requirement for financial products and services to disclose how and to what extent their underlying activities are environmentally sustainable should spur more rigour, responsibility and diligence in the allocation of resources. This dynamic should steer financial markets towards actually meeting their social and economic purposes.

The Commission Executive Vice-President Valdis Dombrovskis event ventured to state that “… this piece of legislation will be a game-changer in terms of tackling climate change, because it will enable billions in green investments to flow”.

One should remain very skeptical about such grand statements. There are many things that could go wrong along the way.

Challenges and risks

A taxonomy is a sort of vocabulary plus classification criteria for families of things, in this case investments, and in this case to label them as either sustainable or not sustainable. The fact that a taxonomy has been defined does not mean that investments will actually be sustainable within a small margin of error, unless it has been thoroughly verified, or rigorous contingencies have been put in place to adjust the criteria in case things go wrong. First of all, there are reasons to believe that the margin of error is quite wide in the field of estimating the degree of sustainability of an activity or project. Research conducted by the MIT Sloan School of Management shows ESG scores from different rating agencies are aligned only in about 60% of the cases. The Economist newspaper has also looked into the issue recently, concluding that, unlike credit ratings, ESG scores are poorly correlated with each other, so rating firms disagree about which companies are good or bad. 

Therefore, the task of defining the detailed evaluation criteria during the next 24 months is crucial.

Another reservation to hold is the fact that the regulation leaves the social and governance aspects of investments to the generalities of global standards such as the United Nations-supported Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI). The rise of inequality in many advanced economies points to considerable shortcomings either in the standard, or in its application, or both.

But there is an even more fundamental problem of data. What data is available to test and validate the criteria, and furthermore to evaluate a wide range of economic activities and assets against these criteria? The sad answer is: very few. Without an information strategy and adequate data exchange standards, both for the investments themselves and for the governance mechanisms (public and private) there is a great risk that the standardisation exercise might become a technocratic nightmare, or a massive greenwashing machine, or both.

We see this already happening in the private sector globally, where standards and metrics for sustainability issues have mushroomed in the past two years: GRI, PRI, IRIS taxonomy, IFC principles, TCFD policies, WBSCD, SASB, assessment methodologies by rating agencies and “big four” accounting groups, etc. (see references below). We are currently nearing a tower-of-babel situation, with companies yearning for harmonised metrics for the UN goals “so we don’t have to argue with everybody”. This has led both the private sector and public authorities to seek consensus.

The new EU taxonomy is, to some extent, a consequence of this gap. Europe has had the boldness to take the first step and lead the global movement. The US is following, and congress has recently asked the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) to develop detailed criteria and metrics for ESG disclosure and establish a Sustainable Finance Advisory Committee.

The EU Taxonomy is a noteworthy milestone that sets a common language for collaboration in sustainable finance. We are at a crucial time now to make this language work for collective action, and this needs us to focus on the detailed criteria and governance mechanisms that will unlock the much-needed resources.

Links/References

1. Official Press Release on the approval of the Regulation, with statement from the Commission Executive Vice-President Valdis Dombrovskis
2. Full text of the Regulation as approved by the EU Parliament and EU Council
3. EU Regulation 2019/2088 on Sustainability‐related Disclosures in the Financial Services Sector
4. European Investment Bank – Green Bonds
5. Berg, Florian and Kölbel, Julian and Rigobon, Roberto, Aggregate Confusion: The Divergence of ESG Ratings (August 17, 2019). MIT Sloan Research Paper No. 5822-19. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3438533 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3438533
6. The Economist, December 7th 2019 Edition. Poor scores – Climate change has made ESG a force in investing
7. Global Reporting Initiative – Standards
8. Sustainability Standards Accounting Board (SASB) – Standards
9. World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) – Reporting Exchange
10. Task Force for Climate Change Financial Disclosure (TCFD) – Recommendations 
11. UN Principles for Responsible Investment
12. Global Impact Investing Network – IRIS Taxonomy
13. S&P Ratings – ESG Rating Methodology
14. US House of Representatives Bill requesting the SEC to developed detailed ESG criteria and metrics

Over the past 18 months we’ve spoken to many hundreds of people representing hundreds of organisations.

One observation is that there isn’t a clear category for those working at the intersections of climate and environment, finance and infrastructure. Another common question is how might Icebreaker One fit with other initiatives out there?

Why are these intersections important?

To address our climate and biodiversity emergencies we need to make the right investment decisions that minimise environmental impact. The largest investments we make—in the $trillions—are around our infrastructure. A common ask from everyone has been “we need better data” (better access to existing data, to better quality data, and to new data).

There are many disparate initiatives, but a fragmented landscape is also a good sign— it indicates there are strong drivers from many organisations who are trying to solve a common problem. At some point many will collaborate or combine or develop specific, localised solutions. We aim to play a role in enabling this. To identify the category of programmes and organisations in this space, we abbreviate to CEFID to cover Climate, Environment, Finance, Infrastructure and Data.

Mapping the CEFID landscape
We’ve identified over 200 collaborative initiatives (so far):  

View, comment and add to
The CEFID directory — http://bit.ly/ib1-cefid

NB: we are not adding individual commercial solutions providers to this list, that’s for another time

What we’ve learned so far

There are many different types of initiatives and many different self-descriptions: which is causing confusion. For example, the word ‘platform’ is used to mean many different things: a ‘platform for discussion’ and bringing people together (e.g. UN DRR), a social network, a database, a dashboard, a technology stack, a funding initiative, or ‘portal’ (which also has many uses).  So, while ‘platform’ works in context, it is too dilute in a broader context, so we have chosen different words (e.g. ‘tool’, ‘network’). 

Some are overarching principles, such as the Principles for Sustainable Insurance (PSI), the ClimateWise Principles or the Poseidon Principles. These are frameworks within which their signatories operate, and standards of reporting to which they conform. 

Others are tools, such as MapX or ResourceWatch, that help monitor the use of Earth’s resources, and make this information available to researchers and policymakers. 

We’ve mapped facilities and programmes such as the World Bank’s Global Facility for Disaster Risk Reduction or the Global Index Insurance Facility, which fund and further specific products or aims. Others are ‘risk pools’, such as the African Risk Capacity or the Pacific Catastrophe Risk Insurance Company which provide insurance at an intra-governmental level.

We’ve looked at partnerships and alliances that bring together diverse actors such as the InsuResilience Global Partnership, the Insurance Development Forum and the Geneva Association.  Each one works with a slightly different set of actors – for example, InsuResilience focuses on the protection gap and increasing the reach of insurance in the V20. The Insurance Development Forum explores how to extend the use of insurance and related risk management capabilities to build greater resilience. The Geneva Association brings together the CEOs of major insurers and reinsurers to support research programmes pertinent to board-level discussions.

Where is Icebreaker One on the map?
We have not found any initiatives in the specific space where Icebreaker One sits—“sorting out the plumbing” (standards) that enable data sharing across businesses for research, tools, analysis, and decision-making.  Icebreaker One seeks to address use-cases and blockers faced between finance, policy and science to help people reduce risk and develop new products, to find efficiencies and create resilient businesses. 

With our partners, we’ve been compiling user-stories based on “if this – then that” scenarios: what if the environmental and financial data they needed to make decisions were easily addressable? What if they were able to make the data they have available easily findable and usable by others (in both commercial and non-commercial settings)?

Action
If you think we might have missed someone, or you’d like to contribute to the map, get in touch with gea@ib1.org or simply add directly using this open spreadsheet: http://bit.ly/ib1-cefid

We launched our first provocation & discussion paper at the 2019 UN Disaster Risk Reduction Global Platform

Printable 5-page summary

Printable 68-page summary – open to comment Google Document

Example social media message, if you wish to share:

The time for theory is over — https://ib1.org is starting the conversation about ‘Environmental intelligence for everyone’ #DataEmergency #ClimateCrisis [tweet]

Related discussions: Declaring a #DataEmergency & What is Shared Data?