Funding the Race to Net Zero requires buy-in from private and public sectors
Prince Khaled bin Alwaleed, founder and CEO of KBW Ventures, participated in a fireside chat with Vijay V. Vaitheeswaran, Global Energy and Climate Innovation Editor of The Economist, during Abu Dhabi Finance Week (ADFW) staged November 30 in the United Arab Emirates.
The live interview, staged during the Race to Net Zero segment, covered Prince Khaled’s impact investment history and future plans, food technology’s pivotal role in the climate crisis, and the wider investment landscape viewed through the climate financing lens.
Speaking about his position on the Board of Directors of Alwaleed Philanthropies, Prince Khaled elaborated on the Foundation’s sizeable commitment to a Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV) fund. He explained that Alwaleed Philanthropies, founded by global philanthropist and business magnate HRH Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, was a first-mover in climate financing; an early participant in the climate financing drive.
The fund, and wider mission of BEV, is to back companies addressing five “grand challenges”; sectors Agriculture, Buildings, Electricity, Manufacturing, and Transportation, looking to “reduce greenhouse gases, at scale, by at least a half a gigaton every year, attract other investors, and fill critical gaps in climate tech that are often neglected.”
Vaitheeswaran and Prince Khaled also delved into the role of governments and the private sector, touching on the capabilities and limits of sovereign wealth funds in reaches microenterprises, startups and SMEs, instead considering the capital as “fund of funds” ripe for cascade deployment.
As part of ADFW and at the beginning of COP28, the Race to Net Zero leg looked at ways in which climate finance and the broader financial system could be reengineered to better combat climate change. The event analyzed climate finance as a tool for financial stability, the role of multilateral development banks in financing the net-zero transition, carbon markets and offsets as tools to tackle climate change, and the role of impact investors.
Related: Prince Khaled brings impact investing viewpoint to Abu Dhabi forum headlined by Bill Gates
