Canadian alternatives manager, Brookfields, has launched the largest-ever net-zero transition fund, with its $US15 billion Global Transition Fund.
It’s pegged as an impact fund, with a focus on reducing greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption in hard to abate sectors.
The fund will be led by both Mark Carney, who is UN Special Envoy on Climate Action and Finance and Brookfield Vice Chair and Head of Transition Investing, as well as Connor Teskey Brookfield Renewables CEO.
“With the global carbon budget being rapidly run down, now is the time for comprehensive, determined action. That means deploying capital across the economic spectrum from scaling clean energy generation, to transforming traditional utilities and to providing sustainable solutions for heavy industries like steel and cement. This Fund provides significant scale of capital with catalytic long-term investment the world needs to help put our planet on a sustainable net-zero pathway.” Mark Carney says.
The fund was reportedly oversubscribed, and while Brookfield was the fund’s biggest investor, it says more than 100 investors contributed, including sovereign wealth funds, insurance companies and pension plans.
Some $US2.5 billion in deals have already been done. The fund acquired German solar company Sunovis, as well as Urban Grid Solar Projects. And it boght into Entropy Inc, a provider of systems that capture carbon dioxide produced in industrial processes and store it underground.
While the focus has been on the eye-watering dollar figures of the so-called ‘impact fund’, so far little data has been released on the potential real-world outcomes of the investment fund.
Brookfield has a total of $US725 billion in assets under management.