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Congressional Research Service
informing the legislative debate since 1914
Updated April 24, 2023
U.S. International Climate Finance: FY2024
U.S. International Climate Finance
Over the past several decades, to varying degrees, the
United States has delivered financial and technical
assistance for climate change activities in the developing
world through a variety of bilateral and multilateral
channels with appropriations passed by Congress and
implemented by the executive agencies. Climate finance is
funded primarily through programs at the Department of
State, the Department of the Treasury, and the U.S. Agency
for International Development (USAID). Funds for these
programs are requested in the President's budget under the
International Affairs function (Function 150) and funded
through the annual State, Foreign Operations, and Related
Programs (SFOPS) appropriation. Many activities are
funded at agency subaccount levels, with allocations left to
the discretion of the agencies under congressional
consultation. Some additional international assistance is
funded at other federal agencies (e.g., U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency; National Aeronautics and Space
Administration; National Science Foundation; Peace Corps;
U.S. Trade and Development Agency; and Departments of
Agriculture, Commerce, and Energy).
U.S. Administrations have typically divided international
climate finance into three main programmatic initiatives or
categories:
* Adaptation: programs that aim to assist low-income
countries with reducing their vulnerability to climate
change impacts and building climate resilience.
* Clean Energy: programs that aim to reduce greenhouse
gas emissions from energy generation and energy use by
accelerating the deployment of clean energy
technologies, policies, and practices.
* Sustainable Landscapes: programs that aim to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and forest
degradation.
Congress oversees U.S. government assistance to lower-
income countries for climate change initiatives.
Congressional committees of jurisdiction have included, but
are not limited to, the House Committees on Foreign
Affairs, Financial Services, and Appropriations and the
Senate Committees on Foreign Relations and
Appropriations. Congress undertakes several activities
regarding international climate change assistance, including
(1) authorizing federal agency programs and multilateral
fund contributions, (2) appropriating funds for those
authorizations, (3) providing guidance to the agencies on
authorized programs and appropriations, and (4) overseeing
U.S. interests in the programs.
The Biden Administration's
International Climnate Finance Plan
With Executive Order (E.O.) 14008, Tackling the Climate
Crisis at Home and Abroad, of February 1, 2021 (86
Federal Register 7619), President Joe Biden directed that
climate change shall be an essential element of United
States foreign policy and national security. The United
States will work with other countries and partners, both
bilaterally and multilaterally, to put the world on a
sustainable climate pathway. As called for by the E.O., the
United States released the U.S. International Climate
Finance Plan. According to the plan, climate finance
refers to the provision or mobilization of financial
resources to assist developing countries to reduce and/or
avoid greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and to build
resilience and adapt to the impacts of climate change. The
plan includes a strategy for international climate finance
with a 2025 horizon; summarizes steps and instruments
through which the U.S. government would mobilize climate
finance; and outlines how the U.S. government plans to
support climate-aligned finance flows more broadly. In it,
the Administration pledged that
[t]he United States intends to double, by 2024, our
annual public climate financing to developing
countries relative to what we were providing during
the second half of the Obama-Biden Administration
(FY2013-16). As part of this goal, the United States
intends to triple our adaptation finance by 2024.
The Biden Administration has since doubled the pledge
again. Speaking at the United Nations General Assembly on
September 21, 2021, President Biden stated he intends to
work with Congress to increase annual U.S. climate
financing to $11.4 billion annually, an amount he said was
necessary to support the countries and people that will be
hit the hardest and that have the fewest resources to help
them adapt.
FY2024 Budget Request and Authorty
For FY2024, the Biden Administration's State, Foreign
Operations, and Related Programs budget request specified
approximately $4.3 billion in direct and indirect climate
finance from State and USAID accounts and $1.4 billion in
direct climate finance from Treasury accounts (Table 1). In
December 2022, President Biden signed P.L. 117-328, the
Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023. Funds appropriated
by Congress for climate finance in FY2023 totaled not less
than about $1 billion, although some discretionary spending
in larger accounts may be categorized as climate-related by
the agencies in future reporting (Table 2). In April 2023,
the Biden Administration announced plans to contribute
$1.0 billion to the Green Climate Fund with FY2022-2023
budget authority from the State Department's Economic
Support Fund account.](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.crs/goveljz0001&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)