McKinsey Estimate Cost of Net-Zero Transition at $275 Trillion
A report by McKinsey published in January 2022 estimates capital spending on physical assets for energy and land-use systems in the net-zero transition between 2021 and 2050 would amount to about $275 trillion, or $9.2 trillion per year on average, an annual increase of as much as $3.5 trillion from today.
They look at the economic transformation that a transition to net-zero emissions would entail—a transformation that would affect all countries and all sectors of the economy, either directly or indirectly. They estimate the changes in demand, capital spending, costs, and jobs, to 2050, for sectors that produce about 85 percent of overall emissions and assess economic shifts for 69 countries.
Underestimate?
They do not give a figure for the cost of replacing fossil-fuel electricity generation with clean energy, which we estimate will cost $105 trillion. However, given how much else would need to be done, we guess their figure is significantly underestimated.