I’m taking some time to reflect on the challenges and priorities ahead. If you’re doing the same, I’d love to hear about it. When it comes to the environment, what’s on your mind? What should we be talking about — and taking action on — in 2021?
Climate adaptation. It is clear that climate change is happening faster than we had feared and yet we seem to continue to build infrastructure, grow food and invest as if our current BAU is infinite. How can we protect our communities and protect our investments better?
Thanks for the inspiration. A big topic that needs talking about is the university education and future employment of environmentally inclined teenagers. The millions of high school students who marched in Friday's For Future assemblies these past years must now be thinking about getting prepared for an uncertain future, and unsure about how to balance their environmental inclinations with employability in tomorrow's world. "What is the upcoming generation's role in this (what kind of college-graduate environmentalists are needed), and how we get ready?" is an unspoken question on the lips of many students (and parents) that needs answering.
I would love to see a concise summary of a detailed economic analysis (or summaries of different analyses) demonstrating that individuals and businesses will benefit economically from massive green investments. Your book discussed this quite well, but I think we need more and more of it to convince the deniers and skeptics. We need a “Manhattan Project” mindset to help solve climate change.
A growing approach, not talked about enough imo, is integrated landscape management. From a financial sector perspective there is a need to coordinate investments which can increase collective impacts and develop nature positive portfolios at scale.
Thank you for putting out consistent, thought-provoking content. One area I'd love to discuss is the pioneering of new markets to drive environmental change. What are examples of market innovators who have proven, or are attempting to prove, the viability of new business models. (It would seem innovation runs along a "continuum of progress").
For those models proven successful, how did they inspire the emergence of new investment capital and competition? For those earlier on the continuum, what obstacles do they face in order to achieve their objectives?
(Full transparency: my startup is in the process of proving a new market.)
Hi Mark, I agree with so many here that we have to find ways to reduce friction and communicate incentives for more blended finance deals. I think *maybe* they are too hyper specific which is hard to scale and have no standardized rating/measurement framework. Maybe a SPAC (gasp) type model that would aggregate a pool of funds (specific to a sector) and then allow deal makers to aggressively source the projects. DAFs *kind of* do this but they don’t have a 24-month spending/acquisition requirement like their Wall Street cousin. I also think we need to take a hard and honest look at climate/environmental action that isn’t working or is stagnate and leave it behind to free up resources and talent to focus on new things. It’s always tough to come to grips with the sunk cost fallacy but we need to focus on what’s working now and make strategic investments in new ideas too. Happy to connect on any of this! Thanks for writing about this, Mark!
Hi Mark - I think your focus on how NGO's & the corporate world can best interact to solve this challenge is great. There's already quite a few climatetech, climate VC newsletters, you really fill a niche & this is what I'd love to hear more about :)
Climate adaptation. It is clear that climate change is happening faster than we had feared and yet we seem to continue to build infrastructure, grow food and invest as if our current BAU is infinite. How can we protect our communities and protect our investments better?
Hi Mr. Tercek
Thanks for the inspiration. A big topic that needs talking about is the university education and future employment of environmentally inclined teenagers. The millions of high school students who marched in Friday's For Future assemblies these past years must now be thinking about getting prepared for an uncertain future, and unsure about how to balance their environmental inclinations with employability in tomorrow's world. "What is the upcoming generation's role in this (what kind of college-graduate environmentalists are needed), and how we get ready?" is an unspoken question on the lips of many students (and parents) that needs answering.
I would love to see a concise summary of a detailed economic analysis (or summaries of different analyses) demonstrating that individuals and businesses will benefit economically from massive green investments. Your book discussed this quite well, but I think we need more and more of it to convince the deniers and skeptics. We need a “Manhattan Project” mindset to help solve climate change.
Hi Mark,
A growing approach, not talked about enough imo, is integrated landscape management. From a financial sector perspective there is a need to coordinate investments which can increase collective impacts and develop nature positive portfolios at scale.
Hi Mark,
Thank you for putting out consistent, thought-provoking content. One area I'd love to discuss is the pioneering of new markets to drive environmental change. What are examples of market innovators who have proven, or are attempting to prove, the viability of new business models. (It would seem innovation runs along a "continuum of progress").
For those models proven successful, how did they inspire the emergence of new investment capital and competition? For those earlier on the continuum, what obstacles do they face in order to achieve their objectives?
(Full transparency: my startup is in the process of proving a new market.)
Hi Mark, I agree with so many here that we have to find ways to reduce friction and communicate incentives for more blended finance deals. I think *maybe* they are too hyper specific which is hard to scale and have no standardized rating/measurement framework. Maybe a SPAC (gasp) type model that would aggregate a pool of funds (specific to a sector) and then allow deal makers to aggressively source the projects. DAFs *kind of* do this but they don’t have a 24-month spending/acquisition requirement like their Wall Street cousin. I also think we need to take a hard and honest look at climate/environmental action that isn’t working or is stagnate and leave it behind to free up resources and talent to focus on new things. It’s always tough to come to grips with the sunk cost fallacy but we need to focus on what’s working now and make strategic investments in new ideas too. Happy to connect on any of this! Thanks for writing about this, Mark!
Hi Mark - I think your focus on how NGO's & the corporate world can best interact to solve this challenge is great. There's already quite a few climatetech, climate VC newsletters, you really fill a niche & this is what I'd love to hear more about :)