UN boss unveils new clean energy proposals

The United Nations is leading early discussions on forming a new global coalition to boost battery storage as part of a wider clean energy platform, Axios has learned.

Driving the news: UN Secretary-General António Guterres laid out a five-point plan Wednesday morning to dramatically scale up renewable energy use worldwide, including tackling thorny technology sharing issues between the industrialized world and developed nations.

• A key part of his plan is to advance renewable energy storage.

The intrigue: It is likely the coalition would be led by a country or group of countries, rather than the UN itself.

• Tech companies, manufacturers and financial institutions would be involved in the coalition as well.
• Making such technology work is a key challenge to overcome for large-scale deployment of clean energy sources.

Details: In the video address accompanying the release of the “State of the Climate” report from the World Meteorological Organization, Guterres also said renewable energy technologies such as battery storage should be treated as “essential and freely available global public goods.”

• This would mean making it easier to share knowledge and technologies, free from intellectual property constraints, to help countries around the world shift to clean energy, he said.

Yes, but: Multiple climate agreements have called for technology sharing, but this has proved difficult to implement as companies and countries seek to hold onto their hard-won advances.