By Shawn Cumberbatch
Barbadian Financial Analyst Avinash Persaud, who is the special adviser on climate change to the President of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), is proposing the creation of a fund that could quickly double investment in renewable energy “in one step”. Persaud says the fund would not focus on new green projects in the developing world, but existing loans local financial institutions already have on their balance sheets for performing renewable energy projects in Latin America and the Caribbean. “The fund buys them with a premium that the banks lose if they don’t re-invest the proceeds in the sector within a tight period like 12 to 18 months. This way, we can quickly double renewable investments in short shrift,” he explained. “And we can do it again and again until we get to the pace we need. It’s fluid mechanics: getting water to flow uphill by creating a vacuum at the top of a pipe.”