Bank of Englands Carney named as Boris Johnson advisor for climate change summit

Mark Carney, the outgoing governor of the Bank of England, has been named as the U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s finance advisor for this year’s COP26 climate change conference in Scotland.

In an announcement Thursday, the Bank of England said Carney’s “key focus” in the role would be on “mobilizing ambitious action from across the financial system needed to help achieve the 1.5°C goal of the Paris Agreement.”

The Paris Agreement was reached at COP21 in 2015. It was at COP21 that world leaders committed to making sure global warming stayed “well below” 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. They also agreed to pursue efforts to limit the temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

In a statement, Carney said he was “honored” to have been appointed to the role of finance advisor for the summit.

“To seize it, all financial decisions need to take into account the risks from climate change and the opportunities from the transition to a net zero economy,” he added.

Carney’s newly announced position will dovetail with his role as the UN’s special envoy for climate action and finance, which was announced in December. He will begin both appointments when he leaves the Bank of England on March 15.

The Canadian, who has been at the Bank of England since 2013, has previously said that climate change “will affect the value of virtually every financial asset.”

COP26 will take place in the city of Glasgow in November. The U.K. government said delegates at the conference will discuss “ambitious ways in which the world can lower emissions to keep global temperatures below 1.5 degrees of warming.”