Climate Adaptive Infrastructure Raises Over $1bn, One of the Largest Inaugural Sector Focused Fundraises

Climate Adaptive Infrastructure, an investment firm that targets control investments in large-scale, low-carbon real assets in the clean energy, water, and urban infrastructure sectors, today announced the successful close of its inaugural fund, Climate Adaptive Infrastructure Fund, raising more than $825m in equity.

In addition, alongside the Fund, CAI has an affiliated co-investment program of over $200m, for a total of over $1bn in equity to deploy. The Fund attracted an institutional set of global limited partners comprised of endowments, foundations, insurance firms, pensions and superannuation funds, and fund of funds, in addition to prominent family offices and high net worth individuals.

CAI is led by Founder & Managing Partner Bill Green and a deeply experienced team of professionals who have dedicated their careers to sustainable infrastructure investment, asset operations, and policy in the energy and environmental sectors. The Firm seeks to combat systemic climate change issues by investing in real assets that support the day-to-day needs of growing populations and address the “triple threat” of the climate crisis: physical risk, regulatory risk, and political risk. CAI utilizes a proprietary screening protocol to evaluate investments, their long-term carbon emissions, and viability as a hedge against climate losses.

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Bill Green said, “For far too long, our society has invested in infrastructure based on the belief that our future would look just like our past. The climate crisis is now wreaking increasing havoc with assets that were built for a planet that no longer exists. At CAI, our mission supports the development of real assets purpose-built for the future, with the lowest feasible carbon emissions profile and designed to withstand the impacts of the climate crisis.”

To date, CAI has deployed 39% of the Fund across three investments — Intersect Power, a clean energy company providing low-carbon electricity, fuels, and related products to customers across North America; Sentinel Energy Center, an 850 MW critical peaking power plant in Riverside California; and Rye Development, a leading U.S. developer of low-impact hydropower generation and pumped-hydro energy storage.

“CAI and Bill have been instrumental in Intersect Power’s success and trajectory since the company’s inception. The need for infrastructure that helps to prevent and mitigate climate change is core to both CAI and Intersect Power’s vision. Not only are we aligned in our view of the future state of infrastructure, but also in our shared hope for a livable planet. This critical alignment of values and business has forged an enduring partnership,” said Sheldon Kimber, Co-Founder and CEO of Intersect Power.

Julian Pearson, Co-Founder of FirstPoint Equity who served as the exclusive placement agent for CAI, said, “We are proud to have partnered with Bill Green, a visionary investor with an impressive pedigree and track record of success in the climate and infrastructure sectors. CAI’s mission clearly resonated with the market amid a challenging and crowded fundraising environment, resulting in one of the largest first-time fundraises for the sector. Notably, CAI’s fundraising process was conducted almost entirely through a virtual process.”

“We are thrilled with the substantial support we received from our investors, which will help finance the future development of critical, low-carbon climate infrastructure. Moreover, we could not be more impressed with our internal team, with FirstPoint Equity, a leader within the private capital solutions space who did an outstanding job for us under unprecedented pandemic conditions, and with Kirkland & Ellis, serving as legal counsel, who demonstrated extraordinary skill in navigating the challenges of this major fundraising across infrastructure and real assets,” Mr. Green concluded.

Source: Business Wire

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