The Green Accelerator was launched in Hong Kong on Monday as officials, regulators and industry leaders urged the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area to draw on its capital, industrial and connectivity strengths to support Asia’s push to develop homegrown green finance solutions and turn climate technologies into profitable projects.
The launch took place at the 2026 Hong Kong Green Finance Association and Greater Bay Area Green Finance Alliance Annual Forum, the opening event of Hong Kong Green Week that will run through Friday.
Speaking at the forum, Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury Christopher Hui Ching-yu said that the Green Accelerator is designed to transform green technologies into investable, scalable projects in emerging markets and developing economies.
By providing systemic pre-finance support and project restructuring, the initiative aims to tackle a critical bottleneck — the shortage of investment-ready green projects, Hui said. He added that it will help channel private capital toward climate solutions where it is most needed, while creating new opportunities for Hong Kong’s professional services sector.
Hui said Asia’s rapid growth has created strong demand for low-carbon, climate-resilient infrastructure investment. He emphasized that Asia should shape its own solutions tailored to the region’s diverse economies and development stages.
“Hong Kong is in a unique position to facilitate this leadership,” Hui said, describing the city as “not merely a financial center, but the ‘super connector’ that links the Chinese mainland’s productivity and manufacturing strengths with international capital and expertise”.
Ma Jun, chairman and president of the Hong Kong Green Finance Association, said technological advances have reduced the cost of green goods and services. The cost of solar modules in China, for instance, has fallen 67 percent over the past seven years, while battery costs have dropped 17 percent.
“These technologies mean that the green projects that were not profitable five to seven years ago are becoming profitable and therefore bankable,” he said, adding that many projects will no longer need government subsidies.
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Ma said the Green Accelerator has been created to promote wider adoption of such technologies in the Global South and help close the bankability gap.
Hun Kim, chief partnerships officer at the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank — one of the accelerator’s founding members — said Asia does not lack green ideas but needs more reliable pathways to turn promising technologies into investable projects.
Kim said the AIIB’s plan to open an office in Hong Kong within the year represents “a long-term commitment to Hong Kong’s financial community and to the city’s role in connecting Asia with global capital”.
Financial leaders also pointed to the growing green cooperation across the Greater Bay Area. Henrietta Lau Hang-kun, executive director of the Monetary Authority of Macao, said the authority is finalizing supervisory guidelines on climate risk management for implementation within this year. The guidelines will introduce an incentive measure allowing banks to reduce capital charges for green exposures.
Lau said Macao is also encouraging green bond issuance. Another sustainability-themed bond issuance by Shenzhen is expected soon, following the Shenzhen government’s first climate-focused green bond sale in Macao last year, she said.
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Cheng Wen, deputy director general of Guangdong Local Financial Regulatory Bureau, said Guangdong province’s bond issuances in the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions in recent years have raised funds for a range of environmental protection projects.
Guangdong is stepping up the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries as well as infrastructure development, Cheng said. Projects in areas including water networks, new power grids, and computing-power networks all require support from green finance and transition finance, opening up expanded opportunities for financial cooperation among Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao, he added.
