2026 Sustainability Outlook

In the first episode of Greenhub TV of 2026, the Greenhub team shared their outlook for the year, providing a snapshot of how sustainability topics and policies are evolving and focusing on a select few topics that are likely to (re)shape the landscape in the coming months.  

The analytical oversights established in 2023 remain relevant for understanding these dynamics. Sustainability considerations are not dwarfed by competing priorities; they are being reframed to align with resilience, strategic autonomy, and long-term value creation. The themes addressed throughout 2025 – transition planning, adaptation, transition finance, ESG backlash, and supply chain resilience – lay the foundation for developments expected in 2026. 

with green bonds returning to approximately 20% of total issuance, in line 2023 and 2024 levels. China is emerging as a key transition finance hub, while issuance dynamics in the United States remain more mixed. 

From a segment perspective, social bond issuance – particularly by agencies – is expected to increase. EU Green Bonds are also set to expand further in 2026, building on strong issuance momentum in 2025, when close to EUR 222 billion was issued across corporate and financial institutions. 

In 2025, issuance activity was characterized by accelerated updates to sustainability frameworks. Sovereign issuers such as France and Italy updated their frameworks in 2025, and Germany just released its updated Framework in Jan 2026. A reinforced integration of the EU taxonomy emerged as a defining feature, extending beyond EU Green Bonds and into broader regulatory discussions, including those linked to the Omnibus reform. 

Looking ahead, attention is focused on several developments: the potential scaling of climate transition bonds following guidance released in 2025, a continued decline in Sustainability-Linked Bond issuance, and the gradual emergence of nature-related green bonds supported by ICMA guidance and increasing investor interest. 

renewable energy. In Asia-Pacific, green loan issuance surpassed sustainability-linked loans for the first time, including significant real estate financing. 

Among corporate borrowers, some large issuers questioned the incremental value of sustainability-linked loans where sustainability strategies and targets were already well established. Market scrutiny increasingly focused on the robustness of sustainability frameworks and borrower readiness, with ESG-linked pricing mechanisms sometimes postponed when performance indicators were not sufficiently mature. 

Sustainable private debt remains a niche segment but continues to expand rapidly in both infrastructure and corporate lending.  In 2026, sustainable lending activity is expected to be supported by continued growth in green use-of-proceeds instruments, European policies promoting clean energy and strategic autonomy, sustained investment in data centers, and strong investor appetite for sustainable private credit driven by attractive yields and opportunities in infrastructure and climate technology. 

Sustainability-related data is increasingly expected to be collected on a transactional basisl rather than primarily through regulatory reporting, reflecting ongoing regulatory streamlining in Europe. 

In Ireland, for example, data centers account for 20% of national electricity consumption, leading to restrictions on new developments. While there is development of renewable energy to meet this increasing demand, it does not cover all the power needs. As a result, greenhouse gas emissions from data centers are projected to increase by approximately 9% per year[3]. 

Water use too represents a parallel challenge. AI-related water withdrawal is estimated at 4.2 to 6.6 billion cubic meters by 2027, equivalent to four times Denmark’s annual water consumption. In some US locations, data centers consume up to 25% of local water supply. This, as well as concentration of power consumption among other factors,  contributes to social opposition and resulting in USD 64 billion worth of projects being delayed or blocked. 

Finally land degradation relating to mining activities upstream the value chain of AI is also significant, as metals are necessary for the production of Graphic Processing Units (GPUs), the computing power of AI. Their number is expected to be multiplied by 5 in ten years between 2025 and 2035[4]. These GPUs are mostly made of metals, about 50% of copper, but also more than 20 other sorts of metals, including gold and rare earth metals. We thus have an increase in the demand for metals, and their extraction, with all the related environmental consequences. 

the exception of Media & Telecom and professional services industry. GenAI has been embedded in admin support, content creation, and analytics use cases, but few industries show the deep structural shifts associated with past general-purpose technologies (like the internet) such as the emergence of new market leaders, disrupted business models, or measurable changes in customer behavior or product delivery. 

Another interesting finding by this MIT study is that while most Generic LLM chatbots or consumer-grade AI tools like ChatGPT or Copilot show high pilot-to-implementation rates (at more than 80%) because they are familiar and easy to use, only 5% of custom enterprise AI tools reach production. In other word 95% of pilot fail. They fail mainly due to shortcomings in workflow integration, lack of contextual learning from current AI systems. Those models do not retain feedback, adapt to context or improve overtime. The core barrier to scaling is not infrastructure, regulation or talent, it is learning ability of AI. 

However AI is viewed by most executives as a competitive advantage for workflow optimization, and AI literacy is increasingly viewed as a recruiting requirement, reinforcing the importance of workforce training and adaptability in a context of AI deployment. 

The next wave of AI, namely Agentic AI, is expected to bring further disruption to the labor market as it seeks to address the learning gap of current GenAI systems by maintaining persistent memory, learn from interactions and autonomously orchestrate complex workflows. 

Green data centers are defined by their ability to mitigate negative impacts rather than generate direct environmental benefits. Key levers include energy efficiency, renewable energy sourcing, and reduced water consumption. 

Responsible AI deployment requires the definition of carbon reference trajectories and budget, assessment of functional scope, and evaluation of the energy-carbon cost in complement to economic costs. Optimization of AI models (smaller size, lower computing demand) and careful definition of deployment scope are central to limiting their environmental impacts. 

At the same time, AI systems can support sustainability objectives through processing of large amount of data, optimization of solutions and solving under constraints, predictive modeling, and scenario simulation. Applications include biodiversity monitoring, agricultural optimization, renewable energy integration, grid balancing and efficiency, and the integration of AI in digital twins to test infrastructure resilience under various conditions, including extreme weather events, and provide for predictive maintenance. 

Geospatial data also supports climate and nature stress testing, enabling assessment of production disruption and credit risk under current and future climate scenarios. Effective risk assessment, however, depends on better disclosure of asset-level mitigation measures by corporates. 

credible approaches to risk management and impact delivery.  

such as the Net Zero Industry Act, the Critical Raw Materials Act, and product-specific requirements including battery passports and domestic manufacturing requirements. 

Rising defense spending has not excluded sustainability considerations. Throughout 2025, investors and issuers integrated transparency, governance, and impact assessment practices into defense-related financing. Frameworks developed within sustainable finance have been adapted to traditionally sensitive sectors, reflecting a broader shift away from binary trade-offs between competitiveness, security, and sustainability. 

Sovereignty is increasingly functioning as a principle through which sustainability objectives are being reinterpreted and implemented. Reducing external dependencies, rebuilding domestic capabilities and shortening supply chains are now 

In 2026, sustainability will operate within a more pragmatic and geopolitically grounded framework. While backlash and regional divergence persist, sustainability continues to evolve rather than retreat, aligning more closely with resilience, sovereignty, and long-term economic competitiveness.  

[1] Source : Morgan Stanley
[2] Source : The Shift Project
[3] Source : The Shift Project
[4] Source: IdTechEx