17 April 2026, Washington DC. As the US administration attempts to derail the World Bank's Climate Change Action Plan (CCAP) and urges the Bank to include fossil fuels in its energy investments, the World Bank’s growing hesitance towards climate is raising alarm bells. Activists from around the world are urging the Bank not to backtrack on its climate commitments, amid an accelerating climate crisis and yet another global fossil fuel price shock.
Climate has not officially been on the agenda at the Spring Meetings but a power struggle has played out behind the scenes focused on the renewal or not of the CCAP, due to expire on 30 June 2026. The US, the Bank’s largest shareholder, has been public in welcoming an end to the CCAP and the Bank’s climate targets. Comments on terminating the CCAP and the Bank’s climate work came from US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent who also went on record this week as a climate science denier.
The 2026 Spring Meetings have taken place under the shadow of the war on Iran, genocide and huge loss of life in the region. People across the Global South are grappling with their vulnerability in a system that repeatedly exposes them to the impacts of extraction and exploitation. A lack of energy security and the direct impacts of fossil fuel price volatility exacerbated by geopolitical tensions mean that many countries are looking to accelerate their transition to renewable energy and would have hoped to discuss this during the meetings.
Members of the Big Shift Global coalition, a group of over 60 organisations from across the globe working on shifting finance out of fossil fuels for just transition, are demanding the Bank upholds its climate commitments and does not bow to pressures to water these down at a time when energy security and resilience are vital for development. Any shift away from climate work and any additional fossil fuel investments risk undermining the very countries the Bank aims to support.
Photos are available here of the stunt organised by Big Shift on the first day of the meetings https://apimages.photoshelter.com/galleries/C0000z27yGZNrPe4/2026-04-13-World-Bank-Keep-Your-Climate-Promises-photo-stunt
Members of the Big Shift Coalition issued the following quotes in response:
Shereen Talaat, Founder /Director of MenaFem Movement: “The World Bank is being tested as climate, debt, and war crises converge across the Global South. This is not about a policy framework. It is a political choice about whether to change course or sustain a system built on extraction and instability. War is driving energy price shocks, disrupting food systems, and pushing countries deeper into debt. Governments cut public spending. Households absorb the cost. Women manage daily scarcity.
In this context, weakening climate commitments or expanding fossil fuel finance will deepen volatility and lock countries into long-term risk. What is needed is public finance for renewable energy, protection of public services, and real governance reform.
The Bank must also withdraw from the so-called Board of Peace. It cannot claim to support development while being linked to processes that enable harm and suffering. The choice is clear. Transform the model or reinforce the crisis.”
Sunil Acharya, Lead for Just Transition, Recourse: “It is beyond absurd that the World Bank is poised to lose its only climate framework due to geopolitical pressure in the middle of a deepening global crisis. The ongoing conflict in West Asia has triggered energy price spikes that are hitting countries in the Global South the hardest. This volatility exposes a simple truth: fossil fuel dependency is unreliable, unjust, and economically unsustainable.
Instead of promoting a deeply problematic 'all-of-the-above' energy approach to appease political pressure, the World Bank must deliver what developing countries actually need: a just transition framework that enables them to break free from volatile fossil fuels and build secure, affordable sustainable renewable energy systems.”
Karabo Mokgonyana, Campaigns and Energy Advisor, Power Shift Africa: “The World Bank Group needs to come to terms with the fact that they have no credible justification for investing in fossil gas projects such as the Cap des Biches in Senegal and the Sahara LPG project. In the current geopolitical context, gas markets are increasingly volatile, exposing countries to price shocks, import dependence, and deep economic vulnerability. The idea of gas as a ‘transition fuel’ is fundamentally flawed; it simply replaces one fossil dependency with another, locking countries into long-term financial and infrastructural risk. Environmentally, it entrenches emissions in an escalating climate crisis, while evidence continues to show strong linkages between gas expansion and fragility, conflict, and violence (FCV), where resource control and geopolitical competition drive instability. In backing these projects, the World Bank is not advancing development, it is endorsing economic vulnerability, environmental harm, and pathways that risk entrenching instability in already fragile contexts.”
Catherine Vowles, Campaign officer, the Big Shift Global: “We came to DC to talk about climate, but what we’re actually talking about is so much broader. It’s about who gets to be here, who makes decisions, and who gets to have a life on this “liveable planet”, influenced by 80 years of the World Bank’s Mission Extraction agenda - and the Global South will continue to pay the price as long as the Bank is funding fossil fuels and defining development on their terms - and until we can organise ourselves well enough to stop accepting it.”
Niranjali Amerasinghe, Executive Director of ActionAid USA: “The United States continues to play a destructive role in global affairs. From the hyper focus on maintaining its own economic power while perpetrating catastrophe in the Middle East, to denying the macro criticality of climate change, the US administration is sowing more chaos. At the same time, the World Bank's participation in the Gaza Board of Peace, which is enabling further suffering, is shameful. You cannot claim to be an institution of development while being a silent partner to destruction.”
Dr. Wafa Misrar, Policy Lead for Climate Action Network Africa (CAN Africa): “Weakening the World Bank’s Climate Change Action Plan or reopening the door to fossil fuel investments would directly harm development outcomes and reverse progress already made. Strong climate action is essential to build resilience, safeguard stability, and secure long-term economic prospects, especially for countries most exposed to climate risks.”