Andrew Facini

Today, more than a dozen distinguished European and UK defense leaders released an open letter calling for clean energy investments to be included in NATO’s 1.5% non-core defense spending target, set at the summit in June 2025. International Military Council on Climate and Security (IMCCS) Chair, General Tom Middendorp, IMCCS Senior Advisor, General Richard Nugee, and IMCCS member, Vice Admiral Ben Bekkering, are among the signatories.  

As the letter argues:

“Including clean energy in the 1.5% bracket will bolster European security, safeguard vital civilian infrastructure from attack, and protect Europe from the tyranny of fossil fuel strongmen. Increased military spending is a vital deterrent. However it is a false dichotomy to argue that it should come at the expense of action to tackle climate change, as some politicians and commentators have argued.

The NATO 1.5% target presents a historic opportunity to incentivise investments in clean energy that will keep us safe, bolster our economies, and help protect the planet.”

A Product of the Expert Group of the International Military Council on Climate and Security

Executive Summary

With climate impacts accelerating and the energy transition underway, militaries are increasingly considering the carbon footprint of their operations, infrastructure, and supply chains. Today, though there are gaps in measuring, reporting, and reducing these emissions, many countries already have initiatives to reduce their carbon footprint and improve the efficiency of their militaries.

This report analyzes the urgency of climate change for militaries and explores how military research and innovation might enable both emissions reduction and greater resilience of infrastructure and operations to climate impacts while improving the self-sufficiency of military units and facilities. While the report should be useful to militaries around the world, its recommendations focus on NATO member state militaries.

The report reveals a need for militaries to adopt a comprehensive approach to the climate challenge. This should include research and development (R&D) but also a wider range of policy and procurement changes. The climate crisis is not a challenge that can be solved by a single tool such as military R&D, but rather a broader set of partnerships, policies, and investments that make up a more complete sustainability toolbox.

There are, of course, limits to military research as a solution to climate mitigation and adaptation challenges. For example, when it comes to operational equipment, the decades-long lifecycle of this equipment means that large-scale implementation of new technologies will require an extended transition period. Progress is still important, but there is not a singular or immediate solution to meet emissions targets. Furthermore, military research focuses on mission-specific applications. While there are opportunities within this scope to explore resilience to climate impacts as a mission necessity (e.g. energy resilience on bases impacted by disasters), research on emissions reduction is much more likely to come out of commercial and civilian research efforts.

Yet, despite these constraints, addressing the environmental costs of militaries remains beneficial. Increased efficiency in energy use of platforms, even when incremental, has benefits both for operational capability and reduction of carbon footprint. Hybrid vehicles are a logical innovation that requires little to no change in supporting logistics systems and reduces the logistics burden. Artificial intelligence will increase efficiency, reduce costly accommodations for military personnel in vehicles, and potentially propel new avenues for research. It will be most effective to pursue decarbonization technologies that synergize with other advances that are occurring simultaneously. With these advances, gains in energy efficiency will also reduce the need to transport and secure fossil fuels, limit price volatility, increase self-sufficiency, and reduce environmental damages caused by fuel leaks or spills.

Research programs on technologies including, but not limited to, hybrid vehicles and energy use management by artificial intelligence provide pathways to innovations that will improve energy efficiency and the performance of systems in use. However, the best opportunities to reduce the military’s carbon footprint will be found in innovative procurement and policy approaches. While military research does not represent as large a portion of the global research enterprise as it once did, military procurement budgets remain extremely influential, often representing the single largest customer in their respective nations. As a result, acquisition choices can catalyze and steer markets toward particular policy outcomes even while prioritizing military missions.

After analyzing the urgency of climate change for the world’s militaries and assessing progress, shortfalls, and opportunities for emissions reduction and technology advancement in military operations, infrastructure, and supply chains, this report makes a few key recommendations.

1. Approach military innovation in an integrated and time-sensitive way. In addition to innovating to achieve energy efficiency, militaries must adapt to the impacts of climate change. Technologies that serve both purposes should be prioritized. Adopting these technologies early will give militaries an edge in both operations and international and domestic reputation.
2. Foster public-private partnerships to leverage civilian technological advances. Many useful innovations for the military will be made in the civilian sector, and militaries should support those advances. For example, given that fuel use, especially for aviation, is one of the largest sources of operational emissions, militaries should send strong market signals for sustainable aviation fuel.
3. Set targets for infrastructure decarbonization and strategies for emissions monitoring and sustainable procurement. Clear emissions reduction targets and monitoring strategies are the first steps to achieving military infrastructure decarbonization, including for products in the military’s supply chain (scope 3 emissions). A key way to achieve these targets is for militaries to procure carbon-free electricity for fixed installations. This can be done through targeted power purchase agreements or through the broader greening of the electric grid. Notably, the technologies that will enable this electricity shift already exist commercially.
4. Leverage education and training for climate literacy. Technological solutions are not enough: a climate-literate workforce is essential for transforming how militaries understand and respond to the opportunities and challenges arising from decarbonization. Given shared challenges and goals, there is an opportunity for NATO member state militaries, for example, to catalyze transnational cooperation on climate training.
5. Incentivize the energy transition within military supply chains, leading to lower defense industry emissions. Procurement preferences for and investments into lower embedded carbon levels in the products militaries purchase could accelerate this transition. For example, the EU could give companies that demonstrate a clear commitment to achieving net zero through realistic targets access to more credit by reforming their taxonomy and lending practices.

Many of these recommendations can be encapsulated in one central tenet—acquisition and procurement innovation. To address the climate challenge, militaries will need to think fundamentally differently about how and what they buy. This encompasses procurement policy, process, and requirements that meet both mission and sustainability requirements. Military acquisition leaders should send this market signal to civilian and commercial energy researchers and catalyze clean energy research by committing to purchase the products that are developed.

By broadening the framing of innovation to encompass not only research programs but a fundamentally different way of managing military and defense organizations, military innovation can help reduce its impact on carbon emissions and help militaries confront the climate challenge.

The report concludes that military innovation can indeed make a significant contribution to addressing the climate challenge, but militaries need stronger partnerships with other government agencies, policymakers, and private industry to do so in a manner that’s adequately commensurate to the challenge.

On January 24, 2024, U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (DASD) for Force Education and Training Caroline Baxter spoke to attendees of the conference “Integrating Climate Change into Professional Military Education” co-hosted by the International Military Council on Climate and Security (IMCCS) and the Swedish Defence University.

DASD Baxter’s remarks are published below with permission from the U.S. Department of Defense. You can read more about the conference and find follow-up resources on gaming, training, and curriculum development in the full conference report. 

Introduction 

Thank you, Erin, and thanks to the International Military Council on Climate & Security and the Swedish Defence University organizers for inviting me to speak today. I also want to express my gratitude to you for allowing me to give these remarks virtually. This topic is incredibly important to the Department of Defense, and I regret that I could not join you in Stockholm for this event. 

My portfolio includes military training and exercises, defense language programs, career broadening opportunities like fellowships, and two of the topics for which we are here to discuss today—professional military education and climate literacy. I chair the Department’s Climate Literacy Sub￾Working Group, which is tasked with integrating climate considerations into DoD education and training programs. Professional military education—or PME—has been a cornerstone of our climate literacy work. I will talk more about our progress in this area a bit later, and share some best practices and lessons learned from our work. 

By Elsa Barron

As the International Military Council on Climate and Security (IMCCS) kicks off another year of climate security action, the network is excited to announce two new institutional partners to bolster its global engagement: the Climate Change & (In)Security Project and the Swedish Defence University. IMCCS institutional partners come from over a dozen countries and contribute a wide range of climate and security expertise to the network. 

With a focus on the UK and its interests, the Climate Change & (In)Security Project (CCIP) explores the insecurities created by climate change and how to respond to them. CCIP is a collaboration between the University of Oxford and the British Army’s Centre for Historical and Armed Conflict Research (CHACR). CCIP channels the highest quality research and analysis into military, government, and other practitioner understanding and decision-making.

The Swedish Defence University is a world-leading university in the fields of defense, crisis management, and security. Its mission is to generate and disseminate knowledge in these areas and create partnerships and collaboration in service to society. Through research, education, and collaboration the Swedish Defence University contributes to Sweden’s defense capability, total defense, national and international security, and sustainable democratic societies.

The IMCCS welcomes these new additions and looks forward to a fruitful collaboration.

By Elsa Barron

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has set off a tsunami of global effects, including food, fuel, fertilizer, and finance crises, explained Dr. Patrick Verkooijen, CEO of the Global Center of Adaptation at the International Military Council on Climate and Security’s (IMCCS) 2022 World Climate and Security Report Series Launch. 

In the midst of these developing problems, NATO’s Assistant Secretary General for Emerging Security Challenges Hon. David van Weel explains that, “Climate change is an ongoing challenge, if we fail to slow it down, the results may be similar to those we can see in wars—famine, loss of land and livelihoods, and migration.”

These overlapping and intersecting crises underscore the need to accelerate the energy transition, which, as IMCCS Director Erin Sikorsky stated, is a win-win-win situation. “It protects soldiers and operations, it undercuts petro-dictators like Putin, and it combats long-term climate security risks.” Therefore, moving from word to deed on decarbonization is a prerequisite for global security. Gen. Tom Middendorp (Ret.), Chair of the IMCCS, noted that militaries, as some of the largest emitters, have an important responsibility to be a leading part of the solution. 

The first report in the World Climate and Security Report Series, Decarbonized Defense: The Need for Clean Military Power in the Age of Climate Change, addresses this responsibility and highlights the tools required to enact change. “You can’t manage what you don’t measure,” said Hon. Sherri Goodman, Secretary General of the IMCCS. At the series launch, she noted that one of the most important contributions of the Decarbonizing Defense report is standard-setting for measuring military emissions in order to advance emissions reductions–a process in which NATO can play an important role. 

Luxembourg Deputy Prime Minister François Bausch pointed to the advantages of collaboration between NATO and the European Union around decarbonization in order to boost research and innovation around sustainable technologies. This innovation is particularly important for decarbonizing heavier operational systems, which is one of the largest challenges facing militaries. The technology development required to decarbonize these systems provides additional opportunities to reduce emissions in hard-to-abate civil sectors, leading to multiplicative benefits. 

Concluding his remarks, Minister Bausch expressed his hopes that, “the proposals made in this World Climate and Security Report will help us to further fuel and shape more concrete action towards climate neutrality in the defense sector,” a key step to achieving the long-term security of a global system increasingly destabilized by climate change. 

You can watch the full event recording here and read the Decarbonizing Defense report here.