💨 ClimateHack Vol. 49: Google's latest climate investment.

Hey There,

This week we officially launched HackCapital, the financial infrastructure to support impact Funds and Startups with their capital raises (checkout the coverage in TechCrunch, Sifted, EU Startups).

Born from close collaboration with community members in the FoodHack and ClimateHack ecosystem - HackCapital takes the hassle out of fundraising and financing to help close the $7tn funding gap needed to meet our climate objectives.

In the last year, we’ve supported 30+ impact organisations with our Feeder Funds for VC’s and Roll-Up Vehicles for Startups - and working on launching new tools to help founders and capital allocators from launch to exit.

If you’re looking to launch your first fund, or next fundraising round - leave your interest here and let’s speak soon.

In today's edition:

👀 VC fund Fifth Wall starts investing into early stage funds.
⛽️ French oil giant TotalEnergie sells off its climate portfolio.
💨 Google Ventures back uk-based carbon removal platform.
⛏ Pluton Biosciences raise $16.5M for "Micromining Innovation Engine".

Digest x Climate

📈 What’s up? A team of more than 40 international scientists say that Earth is past almost all of its safe limits for humans, and we’re now heading into “the danger zone”.

🔎 Useful: HolonIQ’s global climate tech landscape 1.0 is a brilliant visual taxonomy for the future of climate adaptation and mitigation.

👀 Cool: Check out climate impact strategist Tamara Giltsoff’s take outs from this year’s HackSummit as visualised, nature-informed investment themes.

💡 Here are the 100 Solutions selected by The Arch after a European call for research projects which “give visibility to concrete solutions that contribute to the ecological tipping of the economic fabric,” covering city-housing, food-health, energy, industry-digital, and mobility.

Carbon x Climate

⛏ Pluton Biosciences, based in the US, secured $16.5 million Series A funding for its Micromining Innovation Engine, which discovers novel microbes to sequester carbon and nitrogen, and help address climate change.

💨 UK-based carbon removal platform CUR8 raised £5.3 million pre-seed funding, including investment from Google Ventures. It works with companies removing carbon via methods such as direct air capture, biomass storage, soil rewilding, enhanced rock weathering and accelerating carbon cycles in oceans, then sells carbon credits on its platform in the form of portfolios.

🔎 French startup Riverse secured €1.5 million pre-seed funding for its carbon credit platform. It will use the funds to further enhance its certification platform and research efforts on Life Cycle Assessment, while expanding its presence into Germany and the UK.

Food x Climate

🍓 Paris-based Bene Bono raised €7 million to expand its operations into Barcelona. It rescues organic fruits and vegetables rejected by major supermarkets for aesthetic reasons, and its goal is to save over seven tonnes of imperfect fruits and vegetables every week to help reduce food waste in the city.

🧬 National Innovation UK has granted £1 million to a ‘Pea Protein’ breeding programme which will research pea genetics to develop new flavourless varieties of peas that still retain the same nutritional value, with the aim of reducing the UK’s reliance on imported soy.

🥤 PepsiCo opened a new factory in Poland, which it describes as its “greenest facility in Europe”, since it operates with circular economy practices such as collecting rainwater and heat process water for reuse and generating its own energy via rooftop solar panels.

💡 Good Read: Anja Bless from the University of Technology Sydney has published new research illustrating why regenerative agriculture may not be the answer to fixing our food systems.

Energy x Climate

🏭 German monocrystalline wafers maker NexWafe raised €30 million to accelerate the construction of a commercial-scale facility for its green solar wafers for the world’s photovoltaic manufacturers.

☀️ Beem, based in France, raised €20 million Series A funding to roll out its Beem Kit, a connected plug-and-play solar kit for the market which enables production, consumption and storage of energy for the average household.

🔬 US-based fusion energy startup Realta Fusion secured $12 million to build out its team and complete the physics design for its device, BEAM.

🏭 Munich-based Proxima Fusion raised €7 million pre-seed funding in a round led by Plural Platform and UVC Partners. It is developing fusion power plants based on stellarator technology, with the aim of launching a plant in 2030, a decade earlier than previously expected.

⛽️ Spanish startup Jolt Electrodes secured €6 million Series A funding to build a production plant for its “next-generation” activated electrodes for electrolysers and fuel cells, designed to support the green hydrogen industry.

📊 Vensum Power, based in Finland, raised €3.8 million to further develop its power converter technology, which adapts to changing conditions and varying requirements to make sure the most is made of power conversion, reducing wasted energy and driving down energy usage.

🔋 Italy-based i-TES secured €1.4 million for its innovative thermal storage batteries with phase change materials and thermochemical materials, which exploit the physical phenomenon of change of state to accumulate and release large amounts of energy.

🌊 A team led by the US Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory has developed a low-cost catalyst for a process that extracts clean hydrogen from water.

Construction x Climate

🏗 London-based Qflow raised £7.2 million Series A funding for its tech which allows teams running construction sites to collect real-time materials and waste data, helping them to also track their carbon inputs and outputs.

Transport x Climate

🔌 Belfast-based Weev secured €50 million from Octopus Investments to begin the roll out of thousands of public EV charging points and end-to-end EV solutions for workplaces and fleets across Northern Ireland

🚲 French startup Loewi raised €1 million pre-seed funding. It refurbishes electric bikes to ensure an accessibly-priced market for those looking for a greener transport alternative, and it will use the funds to increase its reconditioning capabilities to refurb 300 bikes per month in 2023.

🛴 Irish micro mobility provider Zeus is launching its latest pilot project in Regensburg, Germany. Its solar-powered wireless e-scooter charging stations will be installed at three locations in the city.

Funds x Climate

💰 London-based VC Talis Capital has closed $100 million for its third and largest fund, which will back tech infrastructure, climate, synthetic biology and consumer internet businesses at the seed to Series A stage of up to $10 million.

🌱 Global food tech investor Big Idea Ventures announced the first close of its New Protein Fund II, which is aiming to raise $75 million within the next year, securing funds from players such as AAK and Bühler to support alternative protein startups across the world.

🇦🇺 Australian agrifoodtech investor SparkLabs Cultiv8 has selected ten climate tech startups for a new program to fund and develop them, including Carbonaught, which makes carbon-capturing organic fertiliser from enhanced rock weathering, and Ten Carbon Chemistry, whose unique antimicrobials extend the shelf life of fresh produce.

👀 Fifth Wall, the largest VC fund focused on proptech and climate tech, is now also actively investing into seed funds and accelerators.

❌ French oil giant TotalEnergies has closed its venture capital arm, TotalEnergies Ventures, and sold its portfolio of climate tech startups, which includes the likes of smart meter company Tado and EV subscription service Onto, to French VC Aster.

HackCapital x Climate

🚀 Launch: Thanks to TechCrunch for the coverage on our launch: “Much in the way that AngelList and CircleUp have helped U.S. startups with angel investing, HackCapital wants to do the same for Europe’s impact solution-focused startups. Helping founders, fund managers and syndicates in the climate tech industry raise capital from their networks for their own raises.”

Today’s edition was written from the tiny island of Isola Bella on Lago Maggiore - if you happen to be around, hit reply to let me know 👋

How did you like today's email?

Love it 😁 Meh 😐 Hate it 🙁

Editorial by Arman, Curation by Nicola.