$107B Invested, 2,000 Climate Projects: My Chat with Jigar Shah (#194)
Avoid career suicide. Don’t be part of this 50% statistic.
Today’s topics:
INVESTOR SPOTLIGHT: Lessons from $107B in low-carbon investing.
CLIMATE NUMBERS: 6x gap in global climate finance needs.
READER POLL: Are you going overseas for more climate-friendly partners?
AI INSIGHT: Avoid career suicide. Don’t be part of this 50% statistic.
MINDFUL MOMENT: Taoist wisdom from 2,400 years ago.
1. INVESTOR SPOTLIGHT
Lessons from $107B in low-carbon investing.
Jigar Shah, Former Director of the Department of Energy Loan Programs Office, was my recent guest on our Entrepreneurs for Impact (EFI) podcast.
Previously, Jigar was co-founder and president at Generate Capital, raising over $10 billion and investing in 50+ technology and development partnerships with more than 2,000 assets globally.
Some topics we discussed:
Climate VC Is Broken
He says the 100x-return VC model doesn’t fit most climate tech companies. He pushes for an “East Coast” model: Aim for 18% IRR, win 7 of 10 bets, and skip (some of) the moonshots.
Evergreen Capital versus the 10-Year Fund Model
At Generate Capital, he turned down big checks for conventional fund structures to build an evergreen structure that aligns with long-term climate infrastructure. It’s less lucrative for managers but way better for founders.
FOAK Risk, Explained
He breaks project finance into five risks: tech, feedstock, offtake, construction, and operations. We brainstorm how private capital or family offices might fill the LPO gap.
Think Like a Real Estate Developer
Cleantech needs development capital like real estate: risky early bets, then stable returns once built. It's not “risk-free,” just “risk-you-can-understand.”
Deep Tech’s Fatal Flaw
Too many founders chase giant, low-margin markets. He says to start with high-margin niches (like InventWood selling to data centers) and then scale.
Listen here to learn more.
2. CLIMATE NUMBERS
6x gap in global climate finance needs through 2030.
This sucks.
But it gets worse.
This gap varies by sector.
5x — energy, transportation, built environment
16x — industry
29x — hydrogen
32x — agriculture, food, land use
64x — nature and conservation
How might this influence where you work, invest, or build?
Dig deeper in this Invested in Climate podcast with our friends at CREO and Spring Lane.
3. READER POLL
Are you going overseas for more climate-friendly partners?
4. AI INSIGHT
Avoid career suicide. Don’t be part of this 50% statistic.
The CEO of AI firm Anthropic suggests that AI could eliminate up to 50% of entry-level white-collar jobs in the U.S. by 2030.
So…
The CEO of media company Axios says, "You are committing career suicide if you're not aggressively experimenting with AI."
I want to stay alive.
So…
I spend hours each week using and learning about AI.
What’s your plan?
5. MINDFUL MOMENT
Taoist wisdom from 2,400 years ago.
“When you open your heart, you get life's ten thousand sorrows and ten thousand joys.”
— Taoist sage Chuang Tzu
Given today’s headlines and humanity’s negativity bias, it’s easy to over-index on the sorrows (or stressors).
But if we don’t also remember the joys, we’re walking around with one eye closed.
Don’t be a cyclops.
That’s all, y’all.
Make it a great week. It’s usually a choice.
~ Chris
Learn more about Entrepreneurs for Impact (EFI):
Climate CEO Peer Groups - 100 members (cap), $40B of value, invite only
Podcast - 220+ interviews with climate CEOs and investors
LinkedIn - daily posts on climate startups, finance, and more
—
P.S. Join 20,000+ folks and get free access to 190+ prior issues of my newsletter from Entrepreneurs for Impact (EFI). I share lessons learned from working with 400 climate tech CEOs and investors (plus 25 years of meditation practice) to help people tackle climate change profitably and maybe even lead a happier life.