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Clean Energy Innovation Fund

The Clean Energy Innovation Fund is a specialist climate tech venture capital investor, drawing on CEFC finance and expertise to invest in innovative businesses helping to accelerate the transition to net zero emissions.

The transition to a net zero economy is creating enormous opportunities for new technologies, new business models and rapid innovation and commercialisation.

The Innovation Fund invests in companies with experienced and capable management teams, a competitive edge in technology and innovation, and the potential for both domestic and global market application of their technologies and solutions. It aligns these companies with climate tech investors, who are motivated by the positive environmental impact of climate tech innovation, as well as commercial potential and robust business fundamentals.

Innovation Fund investment priorities

The Innovation Fund is managed by Virescent Ventures on behalf of the CEFC. With no single solution to the complex challenge of economy-wide emissions reduction, Australia’s climate tech innovators and entrepreneurs are part of a global race to capitalise on the sustainable economy of the future. Opportunities exist across all areas of the economy, with the Innovation Fund prioritising activity across four high impact areas.

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Clean energy
transition

Low cost renewables, decentralised generation, widespread electrification

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Mobility and
smart cities

Multiple modes of transportation, optimised built environment, focus on embodied carbon

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Food and
agriculture

Supply chain redefined to feed more with less, enrich and build resilient soils

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Circular economy
and industry

Efficient production, industrial improvements, reuse and recycle to address the waste crisis

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Virescent Ventures

The Innovation Fund is managed by Virescent Ventures, a specialist climate tech fund manager in which the CEFC has a 30 per cent shareholding. The decision to establish Virescent Ventures as an independent investment management firm allows the CEFC to catalyse and attract significantly more private sector investors into Australian climate tech. Virescent is pursuing a capital raise in 2024, with a new Fund ll expected to be cornerstoned by the CEFC. Fund II will also target superannuation funds, institutional investors, large financial institutions and sophisticated wholesale investors. The goal of Fund II is to deploy a further $200 million or more into climate technologies over the next five years, complementing the focus of the Innovation Fund. 

2024 Climate Salad Cover

Read the report

2024 Australian Climate Tech Industry Report

The Australian Climate Tech Industry Reports are developed by Climate Salad, an active network to boost climate tech companies in Australia. As a major climate tech investor, the CEFC is pleased to support this work. 

2024 Australian Climate Tech Industry Report

 

Our mission is to redefine the economics of green hydrogen production through our innovative proprietary electrolyser technology. The support of this international syndicate of clean energy practitioners and investors validates our core technology and our approach to scaling and mass manufacture.

Paul Barrett
CEO, Hysata

At Morse Micro we’ve developed a new generation of Wi-Fi chips that are ultra-low power and reach 10 times further than conventional Wi-Fi, so that means we can cover 10 times the area or 1,000 times the volume of conventional Wi-Fi devices.

Michael De Nil
CEO, Morse Micro

Our technology has the potential to significantly decarbonise the lithium supply chain as well as unlock new lithium ore reserves and opportunities, providing low cost and environmentally sustainable lithium to a world that is rapidly racing towards an electric future.

Steven Vassiloudis
Founder and CEO, Novalith

Instead of mining for fossil fuels to create new plastics or relying on current recycling methods which sees only about nine per cent actually recycled, we can take plastic that already exists and infinitely recycle it.

Paul Riley
CEO and Founder, Samsara Eco

Carbon is difficult to store in soils in the long-term, it naturally reacts with oxygen or water and is released back into the atmosphere. Our technology aims to overcome this by storing the carbon in more stable forms.

Guy Hudson
Co-founder and CEO, Loam Bio

Using data and insights from Downforce, landowners and institutions can optimise their decision-making and investments, confidently and efficiently measuring the benefits as they build natural capital and revenues.

Josephine Wapakabulo
CEO, Downforce Technologies

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