ANALYSIS — Climate Tech Innovation

THE WORLD NEEDS IMPACT

“Greenhouse gas emissions keep growing, global temperatures keep rising, and our planet is fast approaching tipping points that will make climate chaos irreversible”

Antonio Guterres, Secretary General, UN

NOW, ONLY THE REMARKABLE WILL DO!

Over 50 years ago, the world watched on in wonder at the first moon landing. The seemingly impossible was happening right in front of our eyes; the race for the ‘Moonshot’ had been won.

Some 50 years later and mankind has another, more pressing, seemingly impossible task to achieve; that of saving our planet.

In 2006, Al Gore published An Inconvenient Truth, which brought global warming into the minds of the public. With many naysayers, it took several years to move beyond scepticism to belief, but in that time, those that understood the consequences had already begun to move mountains to identify what needed to be done to stop carbon emissions and thus reduce global warming.

Moving onto 2021 and the global meeting of the Conference of Parties (COP26), Sir David Attenborough said, “We are after all the greatest problem solvers to have ever existed on earth. We now understand this problem. We know how to stop the number rising and put it in reverse. We must halt carbon emissions this decade.”

Through climate and clean technologies, we have the chance to stop that number rising. The below provides analysis of the sector and investments within it.

2021 - A RECORD YEAR FOR CLIMATE TECH INVESTMENT

2021 was a record year for climate tech investment with over $111bn raised globally. Of this figure 53% were for deals in excess of $250m suggesting a maturing of the market. However, despite this climate tech represented 15.3% of investment into tech startups, behind the healthtech and fintech sectors.

Whilst USA is the largest contributor in terms of investments at $39bn, as an investment per tonne of CO2 emitted, they sit 8th on the list at just $6 per tonne of CO2 emitted, with Estonia taking top position at $79 per tonne of CO2 emitted.

Unicorns abound in the climate tech space with 160 valued at over $1b, 91 of which are in the USA and 6 being from the UK.

With 437 companies being acquired in 2022, the majority of founders are taking this popular choice, however we are also beginning to see a trend towards listing on public markets with nearly 100 companies moving to IPO.

Number of Companies in Climate Tech

The number of climate technology companies globally, has shown a sizeable increase since 2010. The sector is also on trajectory for another bumper year.