Apple, Amazon, and others band together at COP26 to create a market for low-carbon technologies

A group of corporations, including Apple, Amazon, Bank of America, Delta Air Lines, and United Airlines, have committed to create a market for emerging low-carbon technologies in an effort to stoke innovation in areas such as sustainable fuels, electric vehicles, and other low-emissions technologies.

The announcement is the latest corporate pledge to come out of COP26, the United Nations global warming conference in Glasgow. Earlier this week a group of banks and insurers managing $130 trillion said they would commit to targets to deliver their “fair share of 50% emission reductions this decade.”

The coalition is a partnership of the World Economic Forum and U.S. climate envoy John Kerry.

“We won’t solve it only with governments,” says Antonia Gawel, head of the climate action platform for the World Economic Forum. “We won’t solve it only through private action. We need kind of both, and we need collaboration between the two.”

Gawel notes that the goal of limiting global temperature increase to less than 1.5 degrees Celsius, or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit (scientists say if temperatures rise above that threshold a global warming crisis with deadly heat waves and food shortages becomes likely), can only be reached with the development of new decarbonizing technologies.

The new group, dubbed the First Movers Coalition, can help create demand for these emerging products by committing to buy zero-emission goods and services. Each member of the coalition has made at least one purchasing agreement.

Potential technologies the coalition members can agree to purchase include sustainable aviation fuels, zero-emission heavy-duty vehicles, and near-zero emissions steel.