Bill Gates is staging a major climate intervention next week when he is expected to announce the world's largest clean energy research and development partnership. Gates is joining with fellow billionaires in Paris as the landmark Conference of Parties (COP) 21 talks get underway in the French capital on Nov 30 that will inject major momentum into the summit. All that is currently known is that a group of developing and developed countries – including the USA and India – will double their clean energy research and development budgets, helped by funding from Gates and his fellow billionaires. “I am doing it because I believe that the next half-decade will bring many breakthroughs that will help solve climate change," Gates said of his investment plan in a blog post. "We need to be able to power all sectors of the economy with sources that do not emit any carbon dioxide."

While it's unclear what direct impact the announcement could have on the climate negotiations, observers said it may help ease the concerns of developing countries about finance. Emerging powers such as Brazil have pledged mitigation targets alongside industrialized nations, but have called for a bigger fiscal boost to make the still-costly transition to clean energy. However, Hal Harvey, chief executive of clean energy consultancy Energy Innovation, felt that clean energy research in developed nations could also use a shot in the arm, citing the annual US budget of $5 billion that is a relative pittance. According to Harvey, the United States spends at least that amount defending oil fields in the Middle East every year. But boosting public money for research, development, and deployment of clean technology would help all nations tap into a global clean energy economy now valued at an eye-popping $5 trillion. "It's spectacular what public research and development has created in this country. You cannot name a single technology that hasn't had a huge boost [from public funding]," he said "We're not going to be in it if we don't decide R&D is one of our core strengths."

Canada also stepping up to challenge Gates’s announcement comes at a time when Canada is coming in from the cold after 10 years of Stephen Harper’s climate denial, by offering $2.65 billion in climate mitigation funding for developing nations over five years. Such assistance is another tool – along with Gates’s investment in clean energy research – that will likely soothe the concerns of developing nations who will bear the brunt of rising sea levels and extreme weather brought about by global warming. Like Gates’s investment, the Canadian aid money will also fund renewable energy growth in developing nations such as India, whose government has pledged a five-fold crash expansion of clean power sources. With files from Environment & Energy Publishing.