Green Finance Professional Certificate
An eight-week professional certificate in sustainable finance, taught at the University of Twente and published by the Erasmus+ GREEN FINANCE project. Every deck, and the syllabus behind them, is free to download.
Course Overview
| Week | Topic | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Green Finance Fundamentals | Market overview, instruments, regulatory landscape |
| 2 | Green Bonds | Framework comparison, greenium analysis, SLBs |
| 3 | ESG Integration | Rating providers, screening strategies, portfolio construction |
| 4 | Climate Risk Assessment | TCFD, scenario analysis, carbon metrics |
| 5 | Project Finance | Renewable energy, LCOE, IRR sensitivity |
| 6 | Global Regulatory Frameworks | EU Taxonomy, SFDR, ISSB standards |
| 7 | Impact Investing | IRIS+, SROI, SDG alignment |
| 8 | Integration | Portfolio decarbonization, engagement strategies |
Learning Approach
This course uses discovery-based learning with a 3-goal structure per week:
- Foundation (WHY) - Theoretical foundations and core concepts (Slides 1-10)
- Build (HOW MUCH) - Quantitative methods and analytical tools (Slides 11-20)
- Apply (HOW TO) - Practical implementation and case studies (Slides 21-30)
What the certificate asks of a participant
| Length | eight weeks, 108 contact hours, 13 to 14 hours a week |
| Format | in-person instruction with workshops |
| Audience | finance professionals moving into sustainable finance |
| Prerequisites | none |
| Class size | up to 25 |
| Credential | a professional certificate issued by the university |
Assessment carries four parts: four weekly assignments and case studies, 30%; a midterm financial modelling project, 20%; a research paper, 20%; a final integration project and presentation, 30%. The syllabus, 20 pages, gives the session-by-session breakdown and the reading behind each session.
Participants work in Microsoft Excel and in Python 3 with pandas, numpy and matplotlib, and use the ESG data platforms the host institution provides for the duration of the course.
Course materials
- Eight weekly decks totalling 296 pages, free to download from the slides page
- 21 discovery challenges, three in each of weeks 2 to 8
- Every figure carries its source on the slide it appears on
The certificate and the micro-credential
The project publishes two programmes, and a reader who arrives at one of them should know which they are reading.
| Professional certificate | Micro-credential | |
|---|---|---|
| Length | eight weeks, 108 contact hours | five modules, 30 lessons, 4 ECTS |
| Written by | University of Twente | the consortium, with one partner leading each module |
| Audience | finance professionals in practice | students and professionals in Southeast Asia and Europe |
| Where it is | this section | Curriculum |
The two overlap in subject at one point worth naming: week 4 here and Module 4 both cover climate risk, the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures, scenario analysis and carbon metrics. Module 4 goes further into stress testing and into the exposure of Southeast Asia.
Weekly Modules
- Week 1: Green Finance Fundamentals
- Week 2: Green Bonds
- Week 3: ESG Integration
- Week 4: Climate Risk Assessment
- Week 5: Project Finance
- Week 6: Global Regulatory Frameworks
- Week 7: Impact Investing
- Week 8: Integration
Resources
- Syllabus
- All Lecture Slides
- Project Overview - About the Erasmus+ GREEN FINANCE project
(c) Joerg Osterrieder, University of Twente