We couldn’t be everywhere all at once during Climate Week NYC, but Aspen Business & Society team members were listening intently for insight into how the sustainability field is responding during this period of great pressure. For our team, Climate Week was also an important opportunity to zoom out and get a global perspective, which can be hard to do when the US news cycle is so intense and all-consuming.
I, for one, was struck by the high levels of optimism about global renewable energy. At an Influence Map session on the topic, representatives from European companies shared examples of large scale and highly collaborative renewables build outs. My colleague, Felicia Davis, heard similar sentiments at a session hosted by Climate Group, where Dr. Fatih Birol, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency, shared that countries are racing to install solar and batteries as fast as they can, with double the amount going to clean tech as fossil fuels. We’re on track for 30 percent of global car sales to be EVs this year vs five percent in 2021. Seventy gigawatts of nuclear power are under construction worldwide. Despite geopolitical turbulence, tremendous innovation is underway to create a cleaner, more resilient, and more affordable energy system.
It would not be Climate Week without doses of criticism and cynicism, but the general posture was forward-looking and solution oriented. Below are more of the observations, reflections, and takeaways that stood out to our staff while on the ground at Climate Week.
What stood out to me this Climate Week was a genuine sense of hopefulness emerging from several years of pressure. After being severely tested, leaders have emerged with better focus. They report clearer paths to more durable impact ahead. I heard versions of this at our First Movers/EMF reception: last year it felt like the priority was to simply keep the ship from sinking, but this year there’s real energy to navigate new waters. For example, the disruption around data centers is opening opportunity for clean energy investment and more integrated, collaborative problem-solving. It left me wondering whether coming to terms with the permanence of this polycrisis is actually a precondition for a new way of working, rather than just a burden to manage.
– Eli Malinsky, Deputy Director, Business & Society Program
One insight from Climate Week was the recognition of the widening responsibility-authority gap facing Chief Sustainability Officers. Their role, as Ellen Weinreb’s recent CSO report puts it, is “to future-proof their business” by scanning the horizon for risks and opportunities. Yet CSOs often lack the formal authority to address today’s compounding uncertainties—from AI and economic instability to policy and geopolitics—and the risks they pose to businesses. The result is not simply a demanding job, but a structural source of stress: great responsibility coupled with limited agency.
Adding to the stress is the increasing onus to partner with finance to clarify the business returns of these efforts. CSOs have long been corporate chameleons, but in 2026, let’s ask ourselves whether their essential contribution is to future-proof the business, or to demonstrate the ROI of sustainability. And what additional skills, learning, and support do these individuals need to provide the leadership that is required of this moment?
– Megan Shea, Director, Aspen Leaders Forum & First Movers Fellowship
One insight from a panel on driving innovation across the value chain is that what innovators actually need to scale climate solutions are committed buyers. As Dow’s Haley Lowry put it, “A target is nice, but a purchase order or a contract changes the investment decision.” She pointed to Dow’s new partnership with Amcor on low-carbon materials as an example of how long-term offtake agreements and first-mover commitments let buyers and suppliers de-risk investment together. The takeaway is that partnerships which convert good intentions into firm, contracted demand are what move climate solutions from pilot to commercial speed.
– Felicia Davis, Assistant Director, Business & Society Program
Debates about AI and data centers reveal the cost of mistrust. At the Business & Society Program’s participatory debate, we heard well-reasoned perspectives arguing that investors, multinational companies, consumers, and even American workers might come out on top in the AI-future we’re headed towards. The next day, a more traditional debate hosted by Deloitte pitted accelerationists against preppers. The “Build Faster” coalition lost to their “Slow Down!” adversaries, despite their well-reasoned arguments that America needs more data and more energy, and fast.
The absence of a shared roadmap and shared values makes it difficult for stakeholders with varied interests to trust that their interests align with others. Will the promised value of AI materialize? Whose interests will be protected? Will we come out better for having invested in something that will surely benefit the frontier developers and their investors? The present “trust recession” makes it harder to collaborate towards shared ends and, yes, trust that we’re all in this together.
– Alicia Bonner, Director, Aspen Business & Society Summit
Companies are underutilizing the talent they have within their sustainability functions.
Sustainability professionals are drawn to the field to innovate, but their actual roles have been data collection, reporting, and translating competing regulatory regimes around the world. Now, with jobs on the line, sustainability staff are asked to reframe their duties in terms that are easily understood by those who manage accounting, legal affairs, or supply chains.
We will not solve our most important problems without corporations at the table; the talent, connections and experience of these professionals is awesome and not easily replaced. Yet in some companies, key employees with great vision and responsibilities are left to manage what looks to them like diminished ambition.
– Judy Samuelson, Executive Director, Business & Society Program
We would love to hear your Climate Week takeaways. What left you excited or surprised? And what frontier topics do you think we will be talking about next year? Let us know on LinkedIn!
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