Just a few years ago, when Mr Clifford Lee, head of fixed income at DBS, sounded out potential clients about their appetite for green bonds – debt sold specifically for sustainable purposes like building a wind farm – conversations were short and tended to end with “no”.

That’s because green bonds were no cheaper than their conventional cousins and sustainability for some just wasn’t a thing back then. But in the wake of the Paris Climate Accord, and a series of vicious storms and steadily deteriorating air and water quality in the region’s biggest cities, investors are coming around.

“There was always a long pause. Being practical Asians, it ended the conversation,” Mr Lee recalled of those exploratory conversations around the beginning of the decade.

Outside South-east Asia, green bonds have been in increasing demand, giving their socially conscious sellers bragging rights that they are serious about environment. About US$130 billion of the specialised debt will be sold this year.

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Creaking infrastructure and deteriorating air and water quality are already exacerbating challenges faced by beleaguered residents of Asia’s biggest cities.

Cyclists in Jakarta this month occupied the capital’s Dutch colonial city hall to threaten court action against the local government of Governor Anies Basweden to clean up air pollution. Research last month from the University of Chicago indicated air pollution in the worst affected parts of India can shorten life expectancy by a decade.

Continue reading at The Straits Times…