ITDP champions electric public transport at Ethiopia’s green mobility week
Ethiopia’s Ministry of Transport and Logistics (MoTL) recently hosted its annual Ethio Green Mobility Week, convening regional policymakers and stakeholders in Addis Ababa to highlight the country’s growing leadership in zero-emission mobility. The event comes on the heels of Ethiopia’s landmark 2024 policy to ban the import of diesel vehicles, efforts that have now positioned the country as a global model for electric transport and energy security. ITDP Africa played a key role by hosting and moderating a high-level closing event focused on “Unlocking Green Financing: Funding Solutions for Electric Mobility and Infrastructure.”
The discussion featured transport officials and partner institutions, such as the Global Green Growth Institute, who joined ITDP in highlighting blended finance models to advance bus and minibus electrification. With ITDP’s continued technical support and policy guidance, Ethiopia’s MoTL is making strides in its push for more integrated public transport and active mobility in Addis Ababa. This includes expanding on the city’s fleet of 100 e-buses deployed on its bus rapid transit system last year, as well as extending 200 kms of cycle lanes citywide by 2032.
Events like this help ITDP spotlight the need to scale public-private investment in East Africa’s future of sustainable urban mobility and infrastructure.
Europe’s battery electric car market closes 2025 at a 19 percent average, up 4 percentage points from 2024
Throughout 2025, Europe experienced intense political debate over the transition to electric mobility, driven by economic pressures, tariff threats, and rising international competition. Early in the year, the EU eased CO2 compliance rules, allowing automakers to average fleet emissions over a longer compliance period (2025–2027).
Despite political uncertainty and softened compliance, ICCT analysis shows that 2025 marked the strongest year-on-year growth in Europe’s battery electric car market since 2021. Coordinating with Agora and other partners, ICCT published data findings that battery electric cars accounted for 19 percent of new registrations, up 4 percentage points from 2024. Hybrids and plug-in hybrids gained 3 and 2 percentage points, respectively, while internal combustion engine vehicles lost 10 percentage points. The EV expansion drove declining average CO₂ emissions, bringing automakers significantly closer to regulatory targets.
ICCT’s analysis helped shape the EU’s Fit for 55 package of next-generation emissions standards, and its 2024 research informed Fit for 55’s definition of ambitious vehicle emissions targets. The ICCT will continue to defend the EU’s standards through independent research, public outreach, and support for European policymakers in 2026 and beyond.
India is raising the bar on appliance efficiency and consumer transparency
Four efficiency policies took effect in India in January 2026, for appliances ranging from domestic refrigerators to agricultural pumps. Together, the policies are projected to avoid 135 Mt of CO2 emissions by 2050. With strong efficiency standards now in place for 43 appliances, India is rapidly approaching its 2030 goal of regulating 50 appliances.
In a big win for consumer transparency and accountability, India also introduced stricter appliance labeling guidelines at the point of sale. Now an appliance’s efficiency metrics must be clearly visible, whether in online marketplaces, on brand websites, or in stores. This strengthens consumer trust and sends a strong signal to manufacturers that communicating efficiency is a priority.
CLASP worked closely with India’s Bureau of Energy Efficiency on recent policies and labeling guidelines, contributing technical and market analyses, policy recommendations, and labeling and compliance guidance. By making appliances more efficient and easier to compare, these changes help households make more informed choices and ensure that appliance efficiency delivers real impacts for both people and planet.
Accelerating financing for green buildings in Indonesia
Buildings and construction account for roughly 10 percent of Indonesia’s GDP and around 60 percent of national electricity use, yet receive less than 2 percent of total lending in the form of green building loans. This creates an opportunity for the construction sector to mobilize private capital to help Indonesia close its immense climate finance gap. GBPN and the Green Finance Institute (GFI) are now collaborating to develop a Green Finance Accelerator to bridge this gap, which will support municipalities, starting with Denpasar, Bali, to pilot local green incentives, explore financing options for sustainable buildings, and build a coalition to align policies, mobilize finance, and accelerate market transformation.
GBPN and GFI kicked off the Indonesia Accelerator with a multi-stakeholder forum in Jakarta to discuss how to scale green finance for the building sector, including cost-efficient building design, Sustainability-Linked Loans, and projects that could meet green finance criteria. GBPN is working on a similar initiative in Kenya and will continue to share learnings and best practices through its network.
A timely convening helps shape industrial transformation agenda for 2026
Last month, Agora Industry and E3G convened a Global Clean Industry Diplomacy meeting in Germany, bringing together 30 senior decision-makers from governments, multilateral institutions, and leading policy organizations at a formative moment for global industrial decarbonization.
Building on momentum from COP30, the convening included representatives linked to past and upcoming COP presidencies—Brazil, Australia, and Türkiye. Agora played a central role in designing the agenda and ensuring a globally balanced guest list, steering discussions toward practical solutions. Drawing on its prior work with the UN Industrial Development Organization on steel decarbonization, Agora helped align perspectives across steel, cement, and chemicals, where technologies exist but deployment and finance lag.
With major climate diplomacy moments ahead—such as COP31, the G20, and the Climate Club processes—the meeting created a rare space to collectively identify barriers and align priorities, even as national strategies for 2026 are still being shaped. The convening identified priority areas for joint action, notably green iron trade, demand creation, and standards alignment. As a follow-up, Agora will organize a workshop on green iron trade in March 2026 to turn the dialogue into concrete action and help ensure that upcoming climate diplomacy is shaped by a shared understanding rather than fragmented agendas.
Agora research shows that designing grids for climate also saves billions
Effective grid planning and build-out will determine Europe’s ability to reach its climate and energy goals. Enabling large-scale electrification based on renewables requires modern grid planning, while legacy approaches risk locking in dependence on fossil fuels. Recognizing these challenges, the European Commission launched its EU Grids Package in December 2025 to modernize planning frameworks for a more integrated, flexible, and resilient energy system.
Anticipating this need, Agora began work in 2023 to redesign infrastructure planning for a climate-neutral Europe. Together with partners across Poland, Romania, France, and Italy, and alongside experts from Fraunhofer IEG, Fraunhofer ISI, and d-fine, Agora combined integrated, cross-sector modeling with extensive stakeholder engagement. The analysis demonstrated how transparent, system-wide modeling can unlock major efficiencies—saving over €560 billion between 2030 and 2050—while reducing fossil fuel dependence.
Agora’s recommendations directly informed the Grids Package, including the proposal for a top-down central planning scenario, with Agora’s work referenced throughout the Commission’s process. Moving forward, Agora will continue to support negotiations to ensure the rapid delivery of the infrastructure underpinning the transition to net zero.
Launch of new Crux cross-sectoral initiative to drive grid transformation and flexible electrification
The Crux Alliance is excited to announce the launch of our new Grids Initiative, led by Agora Energiewende in close collaboration with RAP and the full Alliance, which will drive global grid transformation and flexible electrification. Because grid modernization cuts across electricity systems, transportation, industrial electrification, and building decarbonization—each with its own technical requirements, regulatory frameworks, and stakeholder dynamics—it demands exactly what the Crux Alliance was built to provide: coordinated expertise from world-renowned policy centers working in lockstep across sectors.
The first phase of the initiative will focus on the development of a comprehensive policy toolkit to address three critical dimensions of grid readiness: planning, deployment, and operations. The toolkit will be designed as actionable guidance that can be adapted to diverse institutional contexts and market structures. Agora Energiewende recently hosted the project partners in Berlin for the project launch. Insights from the gathering of experts will guide the work in the months ahead. Stay tuned for future project updates!
