Beyond incorporating climate change risk into our investment decisions and engaging with companies to encourage them to take action, we also invest in a range of climate solutions. As our Chief Investment Officer, Sam Sicilia, highlighted during his Annual Members’ Meeting address, we have put in place a roadmap of actions to ensure we are transitioning our portfolio to capitalise on sustainable opportunities without compromising the financial interests of our members, which is, of course, our number one priority.
As one of the largest Australian investors in venture capital, we invest in a range of assets that aim to change the world for the better - in areas including medical therapies, alternative food sources, collaborative tech, robotics and clean energy – while aiming to deliver future investment returns for our members.
Hostplus’ members are invested in companies and assets that are at the forefront of developing the technology and solutions we will need to transition to a low-carbon economy. These include:
Powering Australian Renewable Fund (PowAR)
PowAR aims to develop and own approximately 1,000 megawatts of large-scale renewable generation projects. The fund consists of four assets across wind energy and solar energy and will assist Australia’s transition to a more sustainable energy future.
Swift Solar
Swift Solar is a US start-up developing lightweight and flexible solar cells. They have invented new technology using a mineral called perovskite, which can be more efficient, more affordable, and more scalable than conventional solar technologies. The company is well-positioned to initially serve high-value markets such as aerospace, electric vehicles and telecommunications, and if successful, could ultimately provide the lowest-cost source of zero-carbon electricity in the world.
Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS)
CFS is a company developing a new generation of super conducting magnets, to be used in smaller more economical fusion reactors. Fusion energy, unlike fission energy used in conventional nuclear reactors, has the potential to produce clean, carbon emission free baseload power, without the by-product of long lived highly radioactive isotopes. It’s the same reaction as occurs in the production of the sun’s energy.
Rialto Bio Fuel
Rialto Bio Fuel is a resource recovery facility under construction in Rialto, California that will provide organic waste recycling and renewable energy generation to local government authorities and solid waste haulers, who are under regulatory requirement to divert organic waste from landfills in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The facility will convert biosolids into a fertilizer product and organic waste into renewable natural gas for use as a carbon negative transportation fuel.
Terra-Gen
Terra-Gen is a vertically integrated US renewables platform, with a pipeline of late-stage development projects in addition to a mature portfolio of wind, solar, geothermal and battery storage assets primarily located in the California market. Terra-Gen currently operates over 1.6 gigawatts (GW) of facilities and has more than 3 GW of projects under development.
Wheelabrator
Wheelabrator is the largest pure-play energy-from-waste company in the UK. It owns and operates four energy-from-waste power plants and has three sites in advanced stages of development, which will provide a total electricity generation capacity increase of 143MW and waste processing capacity of 1,200,000 tonnes per annum.
Finerge
Finerge is Portugal’s second-largest renewable energy producer, operating 53 Wind Farms and 16 PV solar plants. More than 700 turbines harness the energy of the wind, and thousands of photovoltaic modules collect energy from the sun, transforming it into 3,100 TWh of clean electricity annually and avoiding more than 1.8 million tonnes of CO2 emissions.