Australia has launched its very own Sustainable Finance Taxonomy, a long-awaited framework to classify what counts as ‘sustainable’. It follows global moves led by the EU, and aims to categorise a range of economic activities, highlighting ‘green’ leaders, as well as sectors making the ‘transition’. To help you understand what it’s all about I found the perfect guest to join me on the Good Future podcast, and that’s Linda Romanovska! In the episode she helps us understand why it’s important...
7 months ago • 1 min read
Amid all the noise, climate change persists Politics will sway like a pendulum, businesses rise and fall, but looking long-term the trajectory is clear, we're pushing our environmental systems ever-closer to collapse. Shifting your focus from the short-term to the long-term is never easy, but this is how investors position themselves ahead of the rest. To recognise the huge challenges on the horizon, and deploy capital to support those delivering solutions. Impact investing is a lens you can...
about 1 year ago • 1 min read
In 2019 Hampus Jakobsson was convinced climate investing was the obvious next step for venture capital investors, but to his surprise, the other partners at his fund (despite being smart and progressive) just didn’t get it. So strong was his conviction that he left the firm to start his own fund, Pale Blue Dot. Fundraising was no easy task, with many potential investors having similar reservations. Some were scarred from the clean-tech bubble, and others couldn’t see past the eye-watering...
over 1 year ago • 1 min read
Australia is playing catch-up in a world where subsidies have become the industrial policy of choice for governments to achieve ambitious decarbonisation goals. In the latest budget, the Albanese government committed billions of dollars to support critical minerals exports, and nurture climate-tech leaders; but what does this means for investors? What was the catalyst for this protectionist trend? While the trillion-dollar US IRA plan is an obvious high-water mark in the flood of subsidies,...
almost 2 years ago • 3 min read
Measuring the carbon emissions of your portfolio can be a useful tool to assess progress on decarbonisation and net zero targets, but relying on backward-looking data, and making only marginal improvements from one year to the next, is not going to drive the radical cuts in GHG emissions that we need to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. But also, it’s not going to attract institutional investment capital that wants a stake in the industrial disruptors of the future. These investors...
almost 2 years ago • 1 min read
All over the world governments are rolling-out new climate-risk reporting rules, and that means all investors are now sustainable investors. This represents huge progress in the way capital markets view environmental risks, and while we still have a long way to go in decarbonising our economy… we’ve reached a critical mass of positive change. At this juncture, a set of exciting opportunities have emerged for investors to fund and support the new breed of climate-focussed companies. A new...
about 2 years ago • 2 min read
It’s been a hot summer, and as we watch global weather conditions become increasingly volatile, it can be hard to stay optimistic about the work we’re doing. It can feel like a seesaw. It's a feeling that sways between optimism about all the progress we’re making in decarbonisation and climate impact investing, and then pivoting back to pessimism, as another glacier sinks into the sea, and another dozen species are lost to rising temperatures and pulped rainforests. It’s a malaise that many...
about 2 years ago • 4 min read
In just the last month of 2023 we've seen COP28 has kick-off in Dubai, the Australian government will underwrite large-scale renewable energy projects, and, climate-tech startups continue to raise big funding rounds in spite of a global downturn. It’s been a huge year, and in my final note for 2023 I’m looking at the highlights that have pushed climate-impact investing forward! Nature Took Centre Stage - Finally The past decade has seen a huge focus on reducing carbon emissions, but it was...
over 2 years ago • 4 min read
Australia is very good at clearing land, but that’s bad news for biodiversity, and it’s making climate change worse. To go deeper in our exploration of Investing in Natural-Capital we’re shining the spotlight on deforestation, to help investors understand the risks and opportunities, but also, to highlight the work WWF Australia is doing to save Koala habitats by shifting incentives away from land-clearing. Australia Leads the Way on Deforestation, And That’s a Big Risk for Investors...
over 2 years ago • 1 min read