U.S. President Barack Obama is expected to sign an executive order requiring federal agencies to take climate change into consideration when investing in development programs overseas.
The White House said in a statement the programs and investments will be designed to help communities deal with the effects of climate change.
The measures will be officially announced during the climate change summit at the U.N. General Assembly.
More than 120 world leaders are expected to meet and discuss ways to reduce their carbon emissions, part of a goal set in 2009 to prevent Earth's temperature from rising more than 1.1 degrees Celsius from where it is now.
But leaders from China and India, some of the top emitters of greenhouse gases, will not be in attendance.