Developing Bankable Climate Finance Proposals

Lecture 03 of 8

Building the climate rationale

Connecting a project to a climate outcome by a chain a reviewer can follow and dispute - the test every concept note is actually held to.

Video lecture45 minWritten questions to do

In this lecture

  • Write a defensible climate rationale
  • Distinguish causal claims from correlated ones
  • Handle a project that would have happened anyway

The chain a reviewer follows

0:00The chain a reviewer follows11:00
Design prototype - the transport is live, but no video file is attached yet.

A climate rationale has to connect an intervention to a climate outcome by steps someone else can check, not assert. This lecture rewrites a weak rationale - 'this project supports climate resilience' - into a chain of specific, checkable claims, and shows what each rewrite was fixing.

Projects that were worth doing anyway

A project is not disqualified for being sensible on its own merits. What matters is stating plainly what the climate finance specifically buys beyond what would have happened regardless - the increment, not the whole project, is the rationale's job to defend.

Materials

Yours to keep, and usable away from the platform.

  • Climate rationale worksheetWorksheet · 94 KB

Design prototype - the attachments are placeholders and nothing downloads yet.

Lecture quiz

4 questions, plus 2 written questions at the end - taken whenever you are ready. This is what unlocks the next lecture.

Take the quiz