Money is green

The promise of a green transition has become a key narrative of our time. Despite persistent climate denialism, governments, corporations, and multilateral institutions present themselves as champions of sustainability, climate action, and environmental protection. In the Americas, this discourse has taken root with force, rebranding old forms of extractivism and accumulation under the guise of “green” development. But beneath the surface, the reality is stark: the transition being promoted today is not a break from fossil capitalism – it is its reinvention as a kind of fossil gattopardismo, in which energy demand expands and the extraction of hydrocarbons intensifies as part of the approach to energy transition, under the illusory umbrella of “net zero” policies. As Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa wrote in his 1958 novel Il Gattopardo (The Leopard), “If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change.”

In this special issue of the NACLA Report on the Americas, we critically examine the rise of green capitalism in the region. We analyze how its logics and instruments are shaping policy and territory, enabling new forms of dispossession, and deepening historical inequalities. We expose the traps of a corporate-led transition that claims to be clean and just, but in practice reinforces systems of exploitation and domination. And we highlight the movements, communities, and visions from below that challenge these false solutions and point the way toward just ecosocial transitions.

The idea that capitalism can solve the climate and ecological crisis it has created is not only misleading but also dangerous. Today’s green capitalism extends the reach of markets under the banner of sustainability, expanding profit frontiers while coopting environmental narratives under a new capitalist “decarbonization consensus.” Under this framework, nature is positioned as a financial asset, territories as green sacrifice zones, and Indigenous and traditional communities, once again, as obstacles to development. The result is a green colonialism that naturalizes dispossession, often in the name of climate justice, creating new dynamics of extraction and appropriation of raw materials, natural goods, and labor, all in service of a so-called “green” energy transition.

In this context, COP30 – set to take place in Belém, in the Brazilian Amazon, in November 2025 – is both a symbolic milestone and a political paradox. While grassroots organizations prepare to bring local demands and climate justice agendas to the global stage, corporate actors and states continue to define the rules of the game. As gina cortes valderrama and Isadora Cardoso remind us in this issue, the dominant frameworks of climate policy reproduce colonial and racist logics, marginalizing decolonial and intersectional approaches that center justice, autonomy, and care.

The Corporate Transition and the New Face of Extractivism: Green capitalism thrives on rebranding. Across the Americas, extractivism is being painted green to fit into the transition discourse. In Brazil, for example, the so-called “Lithium Valley” exemplifies this shift: a region marked by water scarcity, community resistance, and environmental degradation is now being promoted as a hub for sustainable development and climate leadership.