Global Climate Change Summit in Paris

Gates is launching a multi-billion dollar clean-energy initiative at the summit.

As these two clean energy initiatives demonstrate and those to be announced through the Action Agenda in the coming days only reinforce, the transition to a clean energy future is accelerating and coming up fast. Together, all 20 countries represent over 80% of global clean energy research and development budgets.

The coalition includes names like Mukesh Ambani, Ratan Tata, Jack Ma, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Vinod Khosla and Meg Whitman, among others and is expected to give a huge push to clean energy. In a statement, the White House said 20 countries are committing to doubling their investment over five years, including the five most populous nations: China, India, the United States, Indonesia and Brazil.

Scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs can invent and scale the innovative technologies that will limit the effects of climate change while also providing affordable and reliable energy to everyone, the Breakthrough Energy Coalition stated on its website.

The project will focus on technologies that permit better use of clean energy from wind and solar, even when there’s no wind or sunshine. Joining them will be a group of 28 worldwide investors, including Marc Benioff, chairman and chief executive of Salesforce.com; Virgin Group founder Richard Branson; and Prince Alwaleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia.

The announcement of Mission Innovation was timed to coincide with the Paris climate talks and double down on global commitment to addressing climate change and creating clean energy. Obama is taking part in this week’s big global climate change summit in Paris. The tech leaders want their new fund to complement government-backed initiatives that seek to develop green technology to increase the output of energy on the planet while at the same time reducing the impact of the burning of fossil fuels. “The new model will be a public-private partnership between governments, research institutions, and investors”.