SDSN Global Commission for Urban SDG Finance in NYC

New York, September 2025 — During Climate Week NYC last month, the SDSN Global Commission for Urban SDG Finance convened a high-caliber plenary meeting to take stock of progress, catalyze new ideas, and sharpen strategies ahead of COP30 Brazil in November. With the climate finance agenda bearing heavily on cities, the Commission pressed on with its agenda to enable subnational actors to mobilize and deploy resilient, low-carbon infrastructure through climate finance.

Revisiting the Commission’s Momentum

Over the past months, the Commission has advanced multiple strands of research, dialogue, and partnerships. At the plenary in New York, Commissioners and invited experts revisited recent progress, assessing what is working, where obstacles remain, and what new avenues lie ahead as the global climate diplomacy calendar tightens.

This year is a critical year for climate finance. With COP30 looming in November, the ability of cities to secure the right capital, at the right scale and terms, will help determine whether global temperature goals remain within reach.

New Report Launch: Latin America’s Subnational Finance Landscape

One of the central moments in the plenary was the presentation of the Commission’s latest report, “Enabling Environments: Current Conditions for Subnational Access to International Finance in Latin America.” This work, developed under a technical cooperation with CAF – Banco de Desarrollo de América Latina y el Caribe, provides a deep dive into legal, institutional, and fiscal constraints facing municipalities and states in the region. It also identifies a shortlist of candidate countries for piloting the Green Cities Guarantee Fund, a mechanism the Commission envisions could unlock risk mitigation and leverage private capital into sustainable urban projects.

Commissioner Mauricio Rodas, Penn IUR Visiting Fellow and Former Mayor of Quito, Ecuador, presented the report, noting that Latin America’s urbanization trajectory and climate risk exposures make it a prime proving ground for innovation in subnational climate finance. The report’s recommendations feed directly into the Commission’s advocacy strategy ahead of COP30.

Commissioner Insights

The plenary also featured strategic interventions from Commissioners and partners, each bringing insight from their domains:

• Josué Tanaka mapped progress on the Baku to Belem Roadmap, a trans-regional initiative to align urban climate investment frameworks across geographies.
• Aromar Revi offered reflections on emerging themes from the IPCC Special Report on Cities, emphasizing the urgency of integrating adaptation, equity, and affordability in urban investments.

From the private sector, two presentations drew particular attention:

• Plenary Host Milbank LLP spotlighted the recent municipal bond issuance by Lima (2023–2025), intended to help bridge a USD 1.1 billion infrastructure financing gap. The bond’s structure, risk allocations, and lessons learned resonated with many in the room.
• VG Mobility, an electric mobility company, illustrated a business model designed to electrify transport systems in ways that minimize cost burdens on municipal budgets and transit operators.

Those contributions stirred discussion on how to combine public-sector leadership with private-sector innovation, and how to structure instruments that are bankable at scale.

Looking Ahead: Aligning for Local Leaders Summit & COP30

Beyond technical content, much of the meeting was forward-looking. Commissioners shared previews of their upcoming initiatives, including roadmaps, country-level pilots, and convenings slated for the Local Leaders Summit and COP30 in Brazil. The framing was clear: cities can no longer afford to wait for global regulator action. Subnational actors must be primed to deliver climate impacts and draw down capital.

As Commissioner Marvin Rees, Former Mayor of Bristol, put: “The truth is simple: the battle against climate change will be won or lost in cities… But for cities to play their full role, they need the right kind of finance, in the right form, at the right time.”

That statement resonated especially strongly amid the energy, ambition, and urgency of New York Climate Week, harnessing a sense of collective responsibility and momentum.

Impact on Urban Futures

Over half the world’s population lives in cities, which concentrate emissions, risk exposure, and infrastructure demand. As such, mobilizing finance for urban mitigation and adaptation is central to the global climate agenda.

However, municipal and regional governments often lack access to concessional, risk-tolerant, or blended finance instruments that global funders offer to national entities. To scale climate investments in urban contexts, the Commission sees bridging that gap as essential.

Beyond analysis, the Latin America report and proposed pilots serve as testbeds where theory, institutional design, and capital markets can converge. Success here could inform replication across regions.

With global attention now turning toward Brazil, the Commission’s New York presence underscored its intent to bring urban and subnational finance to the center of climate diplomacy. Equipped with new research, engaged partners, and a sharpened agenda, the SDSN Global Commission for Urban SDG Finance will ride the momentum of NYC Climate Week into next month’s global negotiations.

The Commission will be closely watching, convening, and advocating for the kinds of financial innovation that cities urgently need as 2025 comes to a close. Stay connected with the Commission’s work by following its LinkedIn page or visiting https://urbansdgfinance.org/resources.