In today’s edition:

⚡️ World Energy Investment Report

🚜 Building houses from rice

🌳 Assessing firms' impact on nature

Forwarded on this email by a friend?

⚡️ Energy (1-minute read)

World Energy Investment 2023 Report Released

What is it? The report provides a global benchmark for tracking capital flows in the energy sector.

Highlights:

• For every dollar invested in fossil fuels, about $1.7 are now going into clean energy (five years ago, this ratio was one-to-one). Overall, clean energy investment is expected to rise 24% between 2021 and 2023.

• One shining example is investment in solar, which is set to overtake the amount of investment going into oil production for the first time

Lowlights:

• More than 90% of clean energy investment increase comes from advanced economies and China, presenting a serious risk of new dividing lines in global energy if clean energy transitions don’t pick up elsewhere.

• Investment in these countries is being held back by factors including higher interest rates, unclear policy frameworks, weak grid infrastructure, financially strained utilities, and a high cost of capital.

Takeaway: Much more needs to be done by the international community, especially to drive investment in lower-income economies, where the private sector has been reluctant to venture.

🚜 AgriTech (1-minute read)

Indian upstream agritech funding climbed by 50% in 2022

Startups innovating upstream in India (i.e., closer to the farmer/producer) bucked the downward trend of venture capital dealmaking within the agritech and food-tech sectors in 2022. Upstream agritech startups from India raised $617 million in 2022 — up from $ 409 million in 2021. This upward trend is expected to continue. Enhancing agricultural productivity, while reducing agricultures impact on climate change, remains a priority for agri-food organisations and investors.

Why the upstream focus? There is a need for tech innovation to safeguard food security in India, where 80% of the population lives in districts at risk of climate-change-induced hunger.

Building houses from rice

The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that the construction industry was responsible for 39% of the process and energy-related carbon emissions in 2018. 11% of emissions came from producing building materials. An Italian architectural firm uses the natural waste residues from rice production, such as rice straw, husk, and chaff, to create circular construction materials, such as thermal insulating plaster and prefabricated panels from the rice industry. The products can be applied using traditional techniques (without specialised equipment), and when they reach the end of life, they can be returned to nature to break down.

🌳 Nature (1-minute read)

New framework will allow firms to assess their impact on nature

What’s happened: The Science-Based Targets Network (SBT) is providing the first framework for companies to report their impacts on nature as part a efforts to help “get nature into the boardroom”.

Details: SBTN is releasing guidance for companies to measure how they contribute to land degradation, and the pollution of freshwater. Companies can then work out what impacts they should focus on reducing and what targets they can set to achieve that. Reporting systems for oceans and species abundance are set to be released in the coming year.

Why it’s important: Their is growing consensus of the risks to business from the loss and degradation of ecosystems. Nature-related and climate-related risks are inextricably linked as climate change drives the loss of nature and nature loss drives climate change. For this reason, business must address them together (2,600+ businesses are already signed up to current SBT)

💭 Little Bytes

Quote: “If these clean energy investments continue to grow in line with what we have seen in the past few years . . . we will soon start to see a very different energy system emerging.” Fatih Birol, executive director of the IEA

Stat: Investment in solar power expected to exceed oil investment for the first time this year

Watch: A 3D-printed fillet of fish

🗞 In other news…

• Norway’s huge oil wealth fund to back tougher climate targets for Chevron and ExxonMobil as it attempts to force policy change.

• Regulators from the US and EU want fashion brands to pay for their fashion waste, paying a fee based on the volume of garments they produce.

• Talks in Paris begin with a 55-nation coalition calling for restrictions on certain hazardous chemicals as well as bans on problematic plastics products that are hard to recycle and often end up in nature.

• Pacific island leaders will meet South Korea's President Yoon Suk Yeol in Seoul on Monday, their third summit in a week with a large economy as the region seeks stronger action on climate change as it becomes a focus of geopolitical power attention.

🎣 Gone Phishing

Three of these stories are true, one we've made up. Guess which:

• Indian official drains entire dam to find phone

• The man trying to drink 2,000 pints of beer this year

• Tom Holland invests in green hydrogen startup

• Samurai knights collect trash off Tokyo’s streets

📩 Submit deals, announcements, events & opportunities, or general curiosities for the newsletter here.

Written by Colin and Ollie - Drop us a message!