CCD Editor: This is why the electorate is so disgusted with D.C. politicians. This is half a billion taxpayer dollars, and the Republicans signed off on this last December:
At a time when Republican opposition to President Barack Obama’s climate change initiatives is growing, the U.S. government announced Monday that it had deposited $500 million into the United Nations-backed Green Climate Fund (GCF). The payment marks the first tranche of the $3 billion the U.S. pledged for the GCF in 2014.
“This grant is the first step toward meeting the president’s commitment of $3bn to the GCF, and shows that the United States stands squarely behind our international climate commitments,” a State Department spokesman said Monday.
Developed nations have, so far, contributed over $10 billion to the GCF, which was established in 2010 with an aim to create a basket of funds to help developing nations mitigate the effects of anthropogenic climate change.
However, while the GCF has set an ambitious target of mobilizing $100 billion a year in climate finance from public and private sources by 2020, so far only a fraction of it has been raised.
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Moreover, in the U.S., where Obama’s ambitious Clean Power Plan — which seeks to drastically cut pollution from power plants — has run into legal hurdles, the government’s $3 billion pledge for the GCF has also become a hot button issue. In November, for instance, several Republican members of Congress threatened to block federal funds for climate aid, before relenting during budget negotiations in December.
