Small Steps Vol 54: Australia's clean protein opportunity 🌿; flipping healthcare with value-based companies 👩‍⚕️; and HolonIQ’s state of impact funding 💸

Australia has some 16 Pacific Island neighbours — some with a landmass a millionth our size — who unanimously declare climate change the “single greatest threat” to the region.

More than 3000 electric vehicle chargers will be installed across NSW under a multimillion-dollar plan by the state government to boost regional tourism

Enduring Planet, a new fintech firm that exclusively funds climate entrepreneurs, is taking the wraps of its first product after securing $5 million in debt and equity financing.

Investors are pouring money into start-ups that want to build a greener economy

In recent years, ESG — which stands for environmental, social, and governance — has become a dominant term. Within the narrow world of the sustainability expert community, the battle royale is raging about sustainability versus ESG and the implications of shifting semantics. I don’t want to litigate what these words mean, but I do want to look at why ESG has taken over so fast and discuss some risks I see from the term’s adoption.

Global consulting major is enhancing support for sustainable tech clients, building on the McKinsey Sustainability division created to consolidate its E&S business services.

The billionaire venture capitalist said the study of climate change and sustainability would be the “new computer science.”

Dining on the likes of lab-grown meat or ground-up insects could lead to big savings in carbon emissions and water, as well as freeing up land for nature.

A new study illustrates how geoengineering doesn’t just turn back the clock on climate change, it alters the climate in new and perhaps profound ways

It has been our long held thesis that we are in the early stages of a decade long shift where ‘externalities’ are priced into financial and corporate decision making. The rapid development of the carbon and climate markets are the next exciting evolution of this theme.

In valuing real assets we’ve over indexed current revenue streams. Carbon is being priced and becoming an asset and this is a new vector of potential monetisation of natural assets and the environment. We will need infrastructure to support this shift.

Leaft Foods is enabling the extraction of protein from the most abundant commodity of any plant - its leaves. On the back of this breakthrough, the company has raised a Series A round of $15M

It’s easy to feel pessimistic when scientists around the world are warning that climate change has advanced so far, it’s now inevitable that societies will either transform themselves or be transformed. But as two of the authors of a recent international climate report, we also see reason for optimism.

Colossal, the company known for its mission to resurrect a woolly mammoth (or at least, an elephant with some very mammoth-like traits), is back with $60 million in Series A funding. But despite the fanfare and cash, there’s not a ton of scientific progress to report.

The world's farms produce only a handful of varieties of bananas, avocados, coffee and other foods – leaving them more vulnerable to the climate breakdown

Actor and environmental campaigner Cate Blanchett and clean technology expert Danny Kennedy explore eco-anxiety, optimism and hope in the face of climate change.

There is a solution to reducing carbon emissions that gets less attention than solar panels or electric cars: “choice architecture,” or behavioral design, that can help influence consumers to make better decisions for the climate.