Climate of Hope by Michael Bloomberg

So my friend gave me this book as a gift. It is written by Michael Bloomberg, the founder of Bloomberg and the former Mayer of the New York City (NYC) from 2002 to 2013, as well as Carol Pope, an environmentalist.

Despite the poor translation of the Chinese title (can anyone tell me why 《Climate of Hope》 is translated into 《城市的品格》？）, it provides me with an overview on how Michael Bloomberg led NYC into a better and cleaner metropolitan city.

The book has in total of 15 chapters. The first four chapters have set a background, shared Bloomberg’s plan on revamping the policies in NYC, explained the science behind climate change and how it is affecting our lives. For chapters 5–14, Bloomberg has shared with us the climate adaptation and climate resilience initiatives in NYC such as renewables, energy efficiency, food, transportation, carbon emission and sustainable investment. The last chapter is about the market and political failure, and the importance of government-businesses-citizens collaboration.

For me, the value of this book is not about praising or worshipping the success of Bloomberg as an NYC Mayer. What’s appealing is to learn about how he leveraged his power as a Mayer to work with NGOs, to handle complaints from businesses and to gain support from citizens. Bloomberg also shared personal stories related to India and the United Nations.

In the sustainable finance session, it talked about the work of Bloomberg New Energy Finance and FSB (Financial Stability Board) chaired by Mark Carney. Bloomberg agreed the “desire for profit” can motivate businesses to invest in green projects. Though the book was published in 2017, it didn’t mention much about TCFD (Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures), which was set up by FSB in 2015.

This book can be a great reference for other policymakers, especially those in London, Tokyo and Hong Kong. As a citizen who grew up in Hong Kong, I am kind of sad to see how ignorant our government are. Sustainability and the wellbeing of citizens are always not on top of their agenda.

More about this book: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/32816557-climate-of-hope