Global Apollo Programme


The Global Apollo Programme is a call for a major global science and economics research programme to make carbon-free baseload electricity less costly than electricity from coal by the year 2025.

Inspiration and aims

Launched in June 2015, the project - named for the Apollo Program, which brought together thousands of scientists and engineers to put mankind on the moon - calls for developed nations to commit to spending 0.02% of their GDP, for 10 years, to fund co-ordinated research to solve the challenge. This equates to $150 billion over a decade, roughly the same cost committed to the Apollo Program in 2015 money. Some developed nations, including the UK, already meet the GDP percentage target spend, but many do not and there is little international coordination to maximise the results.
It has been modelled on the more recent International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors, an international research collaborative that is credited with greatly and swiftly improving the quality and economics of semiconductor manufacture.

Key areas of focus

Launch report authors

The initiative is spearheaded by the chemist Professor Sir David King, former Government Chief Scientific Adviser to HM Government. Amongst the Apollo group are economists Professor Lord Stern and Lord O'Donnell, businessmen Lord Turner and Lord Browne, cosmologist and astrophysicist Professor Lord Rees and labour economist Lord Layard.

Endorsers

The following were signatories on an open letter published to The Guardian newspaper, alongside the launch report authors, in September 2015.
Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Professor of Sustainable Development and Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University has separately publicly endorsed the programme.
Professor Sir David King has publicly stated that Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi is "keen" on the programme.

Reaction

Key dates