Digital Finance and Citizen Action: In Financing the Future of Climate-Smart Infrastructure

This inquiry examines how digital finance technologies can mobilise citizen engagement to support climate-smart infrastructure within the transition to low-emission, climate-resilient economies. It situates the analysis within significant global investment needs and insufficient financial flows, highlighting citizens as contributors, users and beneficiaries of infrastructure finance. Based on desk research, interviews and case examples, it analyses four areas: business model innovation, new sources of finance, consumer behaviour, and data systems. It identifies opportunities enabled by financial technology alongside structural barriers, risks and regulatory challenges, and outlines how digital tools can strengthen participation, transparency and financial decision-making across the infrastructure investment value chain.