Climate change is going to be a major determinant of economic growth, as well as one of the biggest drivers of policy decision-making and social change over the coming years and decades. Being a dominant theme in our forecasting and analysis, our country analysts look at how climate change and the energy transition affect growth and domestic policy, while our industry analysts explore how sectors are adapting, as well as the risks and opportunities inherent in businesses throughout this transition.

To this end, we examine the economic transformations taking place, most prominently in the energy sector, but also in sectors as diverse as electric vehicles (EVs), land use and agriculture, shipping, aviation, and others. Additionally, as the impacts of climate change become more apparent, we provide insights on the increasing need for economies to adapt and build resilience to the rapidly increasing risks of fires, floods, droughts, heatwaves and other physical risks. We also monitor the pool of financing that is growing at an unprecedented rate to fund these massive transformations, but that still struggles to meet the needs of the moment, while placing these trends in the context of the global political and diplomatic efforts to kick-start this change, which as of now is both unprecedented but still insufficient.

In this paper we select a handful of key charts from recent analysis produced by the team and explain why a trend or issue that often seems to be country- or sector-specific can shed light on these larger issues. We aim to show how EIU’s country- and sector-level approach to understanding the impact of climate change, and the implications of the transition towards lower emissions, can give us a unique perspective on the larger picture.