The Compact of Mayors was launched by
Ban Ki-moon and
Mike Bloomberg on 23 September 2014 at the
UN Climate Summit 2014. The announcement detailed a commitment by 228 cities to cut up to 13 gigatons of carbon emissions by 2050. Mayors
Eduardo Paes of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil,
Anne Hidalgo of Paris, France and
Park Won-soon of Seoul, South Korea joined in the announcement, representing C40, UCLG, and ICLEI. UN-Habitat provided additional support and oversight for the launch of the Compact. On 8 December 2014,
World Resources Institute, C40 Cities, and ICLEI revealed the Global Protocol for Community Scale Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventories (GPC), identified as the first set of standardized global rules for cities to measure and publicly report their carbon pollution emissions. This standard is the baseline on which Compact of Mayors was founded. At the C40 Latin American Mayors Summit on 27 March 2015, Compact of Mayors officials launched the first public recruiting effort, receiving commitments from twenty Latin American mayors to join the Compact and accelerate their push toward low-carbon economies. On 30 June 2015, Mike Bloomberg and Mayor
Anne Hidalgo jointly announced their plans to host a Climate Summit for Local Leaders on 4 December at Paris City Hall. The summit will convene mayors from around the world at the COP21 climate negotiations and build upon existing climate commitments under the Compact of Mayors. At the National Clean Energy Summit in Las Vegas on 24 August 2015, President
Barack Obama challenged 100 cities to commit to the Compact of Mayors as part of a larger push to advance clean energy across the United States. Rio de Janeiro became the first city to achieve full compliance with the Compact on 26 August 2015.
Vice President of the United States Joe Biden called out the success of the Compact of Mayors in promoting action against climate change during his address at the US-China Climate Leadership Summit in Los Angeles on 15 September 2015. Later that month, on 28 September 2015, Mike Bloomberg announced the launch of a new parent organization combining the efforts of the Compact of Mayors and the Compact of States and Regions at NYC Climate Week. Vice President Biden also cited the success of the Compact of Mayors while speaking on 5 November 2015 at the National League of Cities Congress of Cities in Nashville, Tennessee, USA. On 20 November 2015, the Compact of Mayors was recognized by the
White House for exceeding 100 U.S. member cities prior to the
COP 21 climate negotiations in Paris. Mayors and other leaders of hundreds of cities committed to the Compact of Mayors attended the Climate Summit for Local Leaders at Paris City Hall on 4 December 2015 during COP21. Following the Climate Summit, 428 global cities had committed to the Compact of Mayors, representing over 376 million people worldwide. The Compact of Mayors officially merged with the
Covenant of Mayors on 22 June 2016 in Brussels, Belgium. The newly created Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy unites more than 7,100 cities in 119 countries across six continents in the shared goal of fighting climate change through coordinated local climate action. The initiative represents more than 600 million residents, or more than 8 percent of the world's population. As of March 2024, the commitment has expanded to include over 12,500 cities and local governments. These cities hail from 6 continents and 144 countries. In total, they represent more than 1 billion people. == Leadership ==