The complexity that accompanies the energy transition was a constant factor across events that the ERM team and I hosted and attended during Climate Week NYC (CWNYC) 2026.

Discussions emphasized that the technologies, skills, and capital needed to address the energy trilemma and deliver secure, affordable, and sustainable energy are available. However, with geopolitical and macroeconomic volatility, inconsistent policy, and growing opposition to energy and infrastructure development, implementation is difficult.   

What struck me was that participants viewed this complexity not as an excuse but as an opportunity to collaborate and innovate more to find shared solutions. CWNYC 2026 left me upbeat about solving these challenges. For example, it’s impossible not to be excited at the seemingly unstoppable growth of renewable energy after a record 692 GW of capacity came online globally in 2025, a 15.5% annual increase. I was also encouraged by growing interest in how responsible AI use can help organizations translate ambition into measurable progress.   

There is hard work ahead. Converting momentum into results will require earning trust, increasing collaboration, and greater focus on execution. Read on to learn what led me to these conclusions.  

The energy transition trust problem  

  • I heard repeatedly at Climate Week that, as the energy transition enters its implementation phase, success increasingly depends on securing stakeholder support for climate-related projects from finance to renewables and grid infrastructure.  
  • Achieving buy-in at a time of growing mistrust in renewable energy siting and worries about kitchen-table issues like affordability requires a mix of acknowledging issues, demystifying impacts, and building relationships. It also requires working with policymakers to address questions like who pays for grid upgrades that neither companies nor communities can address alone.   
  • On ERM’s upcoming CWNYC podcast, I explore this challenge alongside Michael Regan, the former Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Our conversation reinforces how businesses and their stakeholders need to align around a common vision for a resilient and secure energy future, built on transparent communication, meaningful collaboration, and shared benefits. 

Climate mitigation and adaptation tensions exacerbate credibility issues  

  • It’s increasingly obvious that many companies will not meet the decarbonization goals they set for 2030 and beyond due to economic conditions, policy changes, and technological constraints. In response, businesses are revising, delaying, and sometimes outright abandoning prior targets as well as hesitating to set new ones. The credibility implications of these changes were not lost on CWNYC participants.   
  • Climate adaptation faces a similar credibility test. As climate impacts increase in severity and impose billions in damages, companies are spending more on adaptation and resilience. Investors and other stakeholders are scrutinizing these plans to test their ability to deliver the benefits promised – and to understand if those benefits will be shared.  
  • In this environment, the most recent white paper from the ERM-convened Council on Sustainability Transformation (CST), From Silo to System, recommends that companies prioritize climate investments that strengthen or protect performance and enable efficiency gains, revenue opportunities, or marketplace differentiation. A Fortune op-ed written by CST council member Johannes Teyssen that was published during CWNYC similarly urges companies to embrace ‘pragmatism over purity.’ Teyssen suggests that a climate-stressed world requires investing in adaptation efforts closely aligned with business continuity in addition to focused and achievable mitigation goals.

Responsible AI hinges on transparency and participation, not opaque promises  

  • In conversations with both technology and non-technology companies, people stressed that the private sector must be more forthcoming about AI development and use.  
  • With local resistance to data centers having a material impact on project delivery ($64 billion of U.S. data center projects were blocked or delayed in Q2 2026), participants remarked that communities are asking what these developments mean for affordability, reliability, jobs, land use, environmental impacts, and quality of life.  
  • A similar story is playing out in the AI application space. As companies integrate the technology into their operations, stakeholders are questioning whether it is a force for good that will accelerate decarbonization and productivity and enhance work, or whether it might raise emissions and eliminate workers instead of making them more productive.   
  • CWNYC discussions left me convinced these issues can be addressed, but that it will take conscious effort. This ERM piece on U.S. data center projects finds that meaningfully involving stakeholders in conversations from the start rather than promising outcomes and communicating decisions after they have been made often determines whether AI infrastructure projects proceed at all.

Price it to prove it: the business value of sustainability   

  • Lastly, many of the Climate Week convenings I joined emphasized the ongoing need for companies to prove the business value of sustainability. With political and market volatility placing pressure on sustainability programs, it’s imperative to quantify the worth of sustainability efforts to win executive and investor support.   
  • There is already evidence of that value. A 2025 CDP analysis found that companies with climate transition plans reported $54.4 billion in cost savings from energy efficiency and low-carbon generation. It also found that 51% of companies with transition plans identified opportunities like return on investments in low-emissions technologies, compared to 28% of companies without them.   
  • Capturing and demonstrating these returns requires a disciplined approach. As this ERM blog on sustainability-related value creation highlights, proving value depends on precise targeting, credible quantification, and a clear path from premium pricing to scaled growth. Without this rigor, sustainability programs will struggle to demonstrate their contribution to enterprise performance and compete for capital.   

Keeping faith  

While trust permeated so much of CWNYC 2026, I believe we will need more of it soon. The growing super El Niño and the UN finding that exceeding the 1.5°C target of the Paris Agreement is unavoidable are just two reasons why we are going to need deeper trust reservoirs to manage the economic and societal impacts climate change will deliver in bigger and more powerful doses.   

For me, CWNYC 2026 reinforced that effective solutions can only succeed when they command society’s confidence. Building that confidence will take time, credible commitments, cross-sector cooperation, and engagement with policymakers on the barriers that businesses cannot address independently.  

I left CWNYC 2026 with renewed – if sober – optimism. While challenges remain, there is urgency and pragmatism propelling the climate agenda forward. As we look ahead to COP17 in October and COP31 in November, ERM will continue to convene clients and partners seeking solutions across climate, nature, and people.