AMSTERDAM, The Netherlands (AP) – Investors wanting to put money in climate-friendly businesses would be wise to look at Germany, Brazil or even China rather than at the United States, an international investment group said Monday.

Other lower-risk countries among the world’s leading economies are Australia, Japan and France, said a report by the Deutsche Bank.

Those countries have the most comprehensive and transparent policies that give greater certainty to investments in such businesses as renewable energy and energy efficiency, and they are likely to attract the capital needed to reduce global emissions of greenhouse gases, said the report.

The riskiest country is Italy, which is short on regulation and enforcement, the group said. The United States has had “on-off” regulatory policies, and its future remains uncertain, it said.

It is the latest study to suggest that current policies and plans will fail to cut emissions by enough to avert serious changes in the world’s climate. Scientists have warned that continued unchecked carbon emissions, mainly from burning fossil fuels, will disrupt weather patterns, melt glaciers and the Arctic ice cover to raise sea levels and spread pests and diseases.

But it was unusual among the flurry of climate studies by activists, scientists and international agencies in taking the investors’ viewpoint and examining countries according to their climate-favourable business environment.

The bank’s researchers compiled 270 policies, regulations and mandated emissions targets to create a risk profile for investors. Its overall risk assessments, however, were general, ranking countries or regions on a scale of one to three and most listed as a two.

Delegates from 192 countries are to meet in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December for a decisive UN conference intended to agree on a successor to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which controls carbon emissions for most major economies. The United States rejected Kyoto, but says it wants to be part of the agreement due to replace it in 2012.

Kevin Parker, global head of Deutsche Bank Asset Management, said only private capital can raise the investment needed, estimated between US$300 billion and US$700 billion a year, for new industries like solar and wind power to keep the Earth from overheating.

“The policies that are in place today don’t get us there, not even close to there, under the best of circumstances,” Parker said in a conference call with journalists.

Investors will go where risks are low, and will move on to safer businesses unless climate industries are better regulated, he said.

Deutsche Bank collaborated with the Columbia Climate Centre of Columbia University to find that under the policies in place in 2007 the world will emit 59 gigatons of greenhouse gases by 2020 from 47 gigatons emitted in 2007. Scientists say emissions should be kept to 44 to 46 gigatons to remain in a relatively safe zone.