Indonesia gets $20 billion to reduce its dependence on coal

Help to achieve carbon neutrality ten years earlier than planned. A group of rich countries and international institutions have pledged to pay Indonesia 20 billion dollars (19.25 billion euros) to reduce its dependence on coal. This agreement, announced by the White House on Tuesday, November 15, on the sidelines of the summit of the major G20 economies on the Indonesian island of Bali, will allow Indonesia to advance its objective of carbon neutrality to 2050.

The United States, France, Canada and the United Kingdom are among the group of rich countries contributing to this investment plan. The funding obtained over a period of three to five years is shared equally between public and private, in the form of aid, loan guarantees or private investment. The principle of this mechanism was launched Monday at a ceremony in Bali.

“Indonesia is home to nearly 300 million people, tens of millions of whom are at risk of natural disasters due to climate change, especially those living in low-lying areas.”, in this archipelago of 17,000 islands, said Indonesian Finance Minister Sri Muliani Indrawati during the ceremony. She said she hoped her country could “accelerating the transition to renewable energies”anticipating the closure of coal-fired power plants, while recognizing that this was not “not easy”in particular because of the costs.