In the world of climate, there are a lot of giant, hairy problems and a lot of “wtf!” moments—but there are also moments when ancient methods meet modern advancement to create opportunities with huge, important potential to mitigate climate change. So let us tell you a little about geothermal energy.

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released their sixth assessment report in March with a shockingly stark visualization of how different levels of warming will affect those who were born in 1950, 1980 and (importantly) 2020. Mayday! This is not a drill!

Happy new year! We always enjoy the experience of taking time to look back at what happened last year — it's amazing what you can pack into just 12 months. Following a year of building our team and growing our assets under management by 7X, in 2022 we hit the accelerator with nine new portfolio companies, nine follow-on investments, exit number two, over 50 final pitches to our investment committee and hundreds of other companies evaluated. But the list of transactions only tells half the story.

This month marked the close of COP27 in Egypt, the 27th United Nations Climate Change Conference. The close of COP is always a bit of a high/low in the climate world — high because we have to be optimistic about the progress delivered by the global gatherings, low because there’s usually some counterbalancing force that pulls the progress back.

Tom and Mike just got back from the annual SOCAP conference in San Francisco after a three year COVID hiatus. SOCAP is one of the largest conferences in the impact investing/"social capital" world, with over 2000 attending in person and another 2000-ish online. A couple key takeaways from their experience…

From electric cars (EVs) to solar panels — there is a particular cocktail of minerals required by the clean energy economy of the future. The transition is necessary, therefore the resource components are necessary — but where those minerals come from, how they are extracted and who benefits from their extraction really matters.

Buckle up because we’re about to ruminate on a pretty contentious topic: meat and climate change. The impact of eating meat as it pertains to climate is clear: there are more greenhouse gas emissions associated with meat calories than plant calories. It’s a huge source of optimism to see the rapid adoption of plant-based diets, and the quality and availability of new alternative product options. But we also recognize that it’s unrealistic to expect the whole world to stop eating meat any time soon.

We were all set to lead this newsletter with a cranky roundup of the climate policy backtracking that happened in the US and Europe in July … but then the news got a lot rosier! Just when it looked like the coal-industry funded senator from West Virginia was about to sewer any hopes for meaningful climate action, the surprisingly robust $370B USD Inflation Reduction Act was announced.

It’s immeasurably frustrating that the Supreme Court of the United States has ruled in three cases against the will of the vast majority of citizens, against progress and against reason. Women’s rights and bodily autonomy, and the ability to restrict guns have been under attack for years. We definitely have thoughts on both, but for the purposes of this newsletter we will focus on the big blow to the Environmental Protection Agency's power to regulate emissions delivered last week.

Like the rest of the world, exclusive of industry, the hot topic around here is inflation and market downturn. Canada's consumer price index rose 6.8% last month compared to 2021 and groceries jumped 9.7% — the largest increase since September 1981. Oh, and gas prices are up 36.3% year over year! And, just like every family, founders are feeling the crunch right now.

When people think of the "why" behind working to mitigate climate change, the livability of the planet for future generations is often front and centre. But this planet right now is inhabited by a single human species, members of which are affected by climate change in vastly different ways. This raises the important issue of climate justice.

Last week the Canadian federal government released their 2030 Emissions Reduction Plan with Justin Trudeau making the announcement at the GLOBE conference here in Vancouver. The plan details a reduction in emissions across the whole economy by 40-45% below 2005 levels by 2030, and net zero by 2050.

Our hearts are with all those affected by the invasion of Ukraine. Every week we close our team huddle with a “Why” leader and this week we focused on the devastating events in Europe. The human toll is top of mind for all of us but for the purpose of this newsletter we are going to stay in our lane and focus on how this conflict relates to climate and sustainability.

We believe the most important thing businesses can do to succeed is to create the right culture. And, it’s better to hire early in anticipation of future bottlenecks rather than reacting when the bottlenecks occur. This is the conundrum that has dominated our last nine months as we’ve doubled our team to ten people.

2021 was the biggest year ever for this humble fund that started in the basement of the Winterfield house. It hardly seems real that in one year we doubled our team to nine people and upgraded our office, invested in eight new portfolio companies (which is five more than we made in 2020), had our first exit and distribution AND launched/closed Fund II surpassing our goal … all while Fund I achieved nearly 6X revenue growth.

The climate crisis is the global challenge of our time, but it is especially alarming when the impact hits so close to home. We’re talking about the devastating BC floods that are wreaking havoc on homes, livelihoods and supply chains. The June heat dome, summer forest fires and now atmospheric rivers — the past six months have shown how serious the damage from extreme weather conditions is to our region and the planet.

We’ve mentioned it plenty of times before but it bears repeating: for our companies to compete and succeed, they must attract and retain exceptional talent. Filling sales, tech and operations roles with high-quality candidates is fundamental to the growth of our portfolio companies, and their ability to reduce emissions at scale. Yet the talent market is increasingly competitive.

It’s important for us to keep our minds on the natural systems that regulate the climate while we are searching for technological solutions to mitigate climate change. Last month, our own Sophie Endl led a ‘Lunch & Learn’ session on the key role the ocean plays in the context of climate change and how we can invest for meaningful impact.