The biggest lie about sustainable finance

It's great to be here. Thanks for having me.

Great. So yeah, I'm a partner at Green Crowd where as the name suggests, we're green focus on sustainability and the crowd is made up of experts in sustainability with a focus on finance. And we really look at how do we help solve the intractable problem of getting finance into sustainability related projects, companies and initiatives around the world. And we work with customers and clients, be they public sector or private sector to do that at different levels, all the way from startups through to the utility scale initiatives and projects and with governments on policy and a whole range of things. So, yeah, it's quite diverse, which is what makes it fun and exciting for us, but the focus is very much on impact and making a difference through sustainable finance.

Great question. It's a range of things, but typically there's an understanding of the outcome that's desired, but they're not sure how to get there or they need external independent support to do that. because we're able to pull in the crowd of experts, can do that throughout. We're our network base, so we can pull in the team that's closest to us or we can reach out and we work very well in partnership with others to do this. And so, it's helping them really define the problem and looking through to what that solution needs to look like so that it's actually executable, it's bankable, it's investable and it can be backed. So yeah, it's thinking through all the way from... the way the organization wants to get to and working through that pathway. And it sounds kind of obscure, but effectively is breaking it down into bite-sized chunks, looking at how do you deliver each thing, each step along the way that then adds up to the final outcome.

I think probably the one biggest misconception is that sustainability doesn't pay or it's nice to have or it's something that people do on the side, it's not really core. And that couldn't be further from the truth. a lot of, you know, cleantech is one of the fastest growing sectors globally. You only need to see the rise of China and how they've managed to corner the market in terms of clean energy, manufacturing, production, product development, and so forth to see that it's, you know, it's a huge opportunity. Unfortunately, not everyone sees it and they're missing out. But the, the real challenges working with organizations to really identify the value and see how they can capitalize on that.

I think so it really depends on what the project is, if we want to call like an engagement in a project. So we don't have a one size fits all approach. What we do is very bespoke. We come in, we look at really what are the challenges? What is the outcome that's desired? And we work through collectively with the client, with our team to really understand the challenges are. if there is a framework so to speak it's that we come in with a listening approach so we really look at what are the challenges that they face and try to unpick what it is that they're looking to achieve ultimately. I don't know if that answers your question.

Yeah, great question. When we set up. and got Green Crowd started is coming up to a decade now. We always had the vision of investing into what we wanted to bank. Ahead of doing that, we wanted to see what the challenges were, really get to understand what the problems were in the market. So we've spent the last 10 years through our advisory business, building up that knowledge, that data set, building our international partnerships and the fund is something we're looking to launch later next year. And in the meantime, where we've created a team, we've got a thesis, we've got pipeline of organizations we're looking to bank and we're starting at the innovation end of the scale. So very much at the startups that are coming out of the UK. So some of the finest technologies and innovations that can help shape and address issues around climate change, specifically in topics where there's a nexus between food, energy and water. And the learnings that we've gathered over the years are really coming to bear in that. So we understand, you know, that challenges with those topics aren't just restricted to Europe and the UK, but also globally. And the solutions can be developed and be used the investment term exploited internationally to do that. So yeah, they're complimentary. And what we've seen is that working with organizations around the world that, you know, there are some intractable challenges, but it's the ultimately it's people that bring all this together. So it's knowing who the right people are and how to source that innovation and how to best support them in scaling up.

It's really interesting you say that. So I think when we started out, renewables were still not quite new, but they weren't quite as commoditized as they are now. Some technologies were up that. deployment scale where they were mainstream. But now they're very much commoditized. Solar is now cheaper in some parts of the world. And market is cheaper to put up a solar panel as a fence rather than a wooden fence. And it generates power for you. you know, the way the technology has evolved over the years, just in a decade, has been absolutely fantastic to watch. The trends... It's interesting you mentioned AI is certainly part of how energy is being shaped and is helping shape how energy will be made and deployed and utilized. We see it as an enabler and as a tool. So Mark Andresen back in, I think almost a decade ago said, you know, software is eating the world and now AI is eating software. And we see the next play is actually hardware. it's AI, you know, it needs a place to live. And for us, you know, we're really looking at the hardware element and how the two interface. So being able to utilize software an AI but you really need the materials to deliver on that and utilize it effectively.

Yes, great question. think, you know, we're excited about what we're seeing coming out of the research labs. We're excited about technology solutions. You know, we are heading into some some choppy waters with climate change. It's hard to ignore that. And so, you know, what we're excited about what in the space that we're working in is a combination of things. So making sure that the technology ultimately has a positive impact and that word tends to be used quite loosely. So we want to ensure that, you know, people can benefit from. whatever is deployed, whether that's helping them, you know, live a safer life, a cheaper life. with energy, it's, you know, energy helping serve humanity and AI needs to be able to do that. So, and not the other way around. But yeah, we're very excited about the direction of travel for technology because there's so much, so many good ideas out there and so much that is happening. hard to look through all of that and try and find the right solution. But yeah, we've got a good team working behind the scenes to do that. So we're excited about what we're planning to back over the coming months.

Yeah, there's so there's a few things here. There's a bit more context to that. So the markets that we see evolving are in the energy space, in the food space, in the water space. There's a lot of opportunity there for new financing to come in, new business models. What we see is that there's also opportunities to create markets through the advisory work that we do. So to put that into context, we're in South Africa next week. We're working with municipalities to develop and deploy capital into inclusive energy projects. So there we're creating a new market. It's a market that the private sector wants to get into and is struggling to do so due to constraints with legislation regulation, with the governance frameworks that are currently in place and so we're bringing stakeholders together to actually solve for that challenge which is to bank critical infrastructure in energy and water. And so I think it takes bringing people together, working collaboratively to design some of these markets and to create impact together. So it's kind of a mix of things. In the UK, you you've got New markets emerging with flexibility. You know, you've got new technology providers coming together to develop some virtual power plants and so forth. That's now migrating to places like South Africa where we're heading. And you can create those markets as well. So there's there's a few ways that sort of hands out.

I think if you're a depends on where you are in the in the value chains, so to speak. So if you're an asset owner, you and buildings, there's plenty of technical advisors, technology providers that can help assess, manage and evaluate. the sites that you own. Just speaking to one startup yesterday who's working with councils, they're able to map on a site level and a portfolio level, the size of the system, the investment thesis that can sit behind that, the returns, the savings, all of that. So there's plenty of solutions out there that can help. to do that, you just have to look, set the parameters, identify who in the business will make that decision to procure that service. You might actually have the skills and expertise to do that yourself if you're in the right business. it's, you know, working with the tools and there's so many tools and resources online to be able to do that, to start to build the business case. But it is quite technical, so I don't want to oversimplify it, you these are electrical systems, there's a lot of investment that can sit behind that. So it's been curious, I'd say, to start to look into this and push the business case internally.

That's a deep question. One of the things that I think would be interesting for my earlier self to hear would be to really look at collaborating with people outside of my comfort zone. So not just people who are working on issues that I think might have been important at the time, but really branch out and look at solutions that could have been brought forward a lot sooner. So what do I mean by that? Is looking at commercial solutions that, yeah, probably need to rethink this one a little bit, but it's really looking at how to expand and scale impact. look at ways of collaborating, look at ways of working with people and other organizations to deliver what I think is quite an important topic, is addressing climate change. So not trying to do this alone, but trying to work with others to do that.

We're online, we're at greencrowd.energy and you can catch me on LinkedIn. It's typically the platform that I'm most active on. So yeah, open to speaking to anybody and either helping signpost or if they want to collaborate and work together, then happy to do so. I should say, you know, your podcast, I suspect is listened to from people all around the world. We love working collaboratively with local organizations. And we make that a key feature of how we do that. think local context is really important to the point where in one case we're working on a project and we were told not to use a certain color in a presentation because it put off one of the stakeholders we were engaging with. So local context and knowledge is really important and we really value that.

Brilliant. Thank you, Mick.