Focused acceleration

A strategic approach to climate action in cities to 2030: McKinsey Center for Business and Environment November 2017

There is now widespread recognition in the international community that the commitments made by national governments under the Paris Climate Agreement in 2015 cannot be achieved without concerted action by cities. Fortunately, many mayors have shown

strong commitment to tackling climate change and a willingness to collaborate to achieve this goal. C40 Cities, a network of mayors of the world’s megacities committed to addressing climate change,

responded to the Paris Agreement by publishing an analysis— Deadline 20201—of the emission reduction pathway their cities would need to achieve to play their part in keeping global average

temperature rise within “safe” limits (below 1.5°C). As individual C40 cities now increase the ambition of their climate plans accordingly, this report takes that work a stage further by analyzing the biggest opportunities for cities to accelerate the reduction of their carbon emissions.