Fossil fuels are a systemic source of economic and financial instability. The online and in-person Central Bank workstream will identify practical steps that central banks and supervisors can take to use their monetary, prudential and other tools to support the clean energy transition as an investment in stability and sustainabilty.
Nick Robins is Senior Director, Climate Finance and Private Sector at the World Resources Institute, which he joined in October 2025, based in London. At WRI, he focuses on strategies for transforming the financial system to deliver climate, nature and people goals (including through the transition away from fossil fuels). Nick is also a board member of the Tracker Group, and co-founder of its two key initiatives, Carbon Tracker and Planet Tracker. He serves as a Commissioner on Scotland’s Just Transition Commission.
Nick has over 25 years’ experience with sustainable finance, working in investment management, banking, financial policy and research. Prior to joining WRI, he was Professor in Practice at the London School of Economics. At LSE, he was co-chair of the INSPIRE initiative focusing on the role of central banks in climate action, and co-chair of the NGFS-INSPIRE study group on financial stability and biodiversity. At LSE, he also led international work on financing the just transition and founded the Just Transition Finance Lab where he remains a Special Adviser. From 2014 to 2018, he was Co-Director of the UN Environment’s Inquiry into a Sustainable Finance System, co-authoring its 2015 report, The Financial System We Need . Prior to this he was the award-winning Head of HSBC’s Climate Change Centre of Excellence (2007-2014), producing investment research, for example, on the green stimulus following the Global Financial Crisis. Earlier, he was head of SRI research and then head of SRI Funds at Henderson Global Investors (2000-2007), releasing the world’s first carbon footprint of an investment fund. Earlier sustainability roles included IIED, the European Commission and the Business Council for Sustainable Development.
He co-edited with Cary Krosinsky Sustainable Investing: The Art of Long-Term Performance (Earthscan, 2008) and is author of a history of the English East India Company, The Corporation that Changed the World.
Isabelle Jiani Zheng is a Fellow at the Council on Economic Policies (CEP). Her work focuses on macro-financial policy and sustainable finance, with a particular emphasis on China. Prior to joining CEP, she finished her PhD at the University of Zurich (UZH) focused on sustainability related risks in the real economy and the financial system. In that context, she has also contributed to the development of climate transition risk metrics and to their application for “A Carbon Risk Assessment of China’s Overseas Energy Portfolios”, referenced by international financial regulators and super-visors. She has also been co-leading programs on sustainable finance at UZH. She holds a M.Sc. in Economics from UZH and a Bachelor’s in Finance from Fudan University in Shanghai, China.