Montréal-based climate impact fund Idealist Capital has secured $50 million from the federal government’s cleantech-focused Canada Growth Fund (CGF).
Idealist marks CGF’s first investment into a cleantech fund, and its third investment overall. Prior to this investment, CGF directly backed Calgary-based climate impact companies Eavor Technologies and Entropy Inc.
CGF’s investment allows Idealist to support larger capital rounds and bring capital into the energy transition ecosystem faster.
“By supporting growth-stage cleantech managers, CGF is expanding access to capital in the Canadian market and playing an important role in supporting partners positioned to provide strategic direction and capital markets expertise,” CGF investment management team president and CEO Patrick Charbonneau said in a statement.
Idealist is currently raising a targeted $500-million climate impact fund, for which it closed $250 million in September 2022. The fund is led by Québec businessmen Pierre Larochelle and Steeve Robitaille, and looks to invest in tech companies focused on the decarbonization of power systems, industries and the circular economy, as well as electric vehicles.
When Idealist announced its fund, it was set to make up to 10 investments with cheques between $25 million to $75 million. It made four last year, most recently leading Dcbel’s $50-million Series B round in August 2023. Dcbel’s product enables bidirectional electric vehicle (EV) charging, allowing customers to charge EVs using solar panels and stationary batteries and leverage EV-stored energy to power their homes.
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The $15-billion CGF was first introduced in the federal government’s 2022 budget with a goal of bridging the liquidity gap in the Canadian cleantech market and offer support to companies at the commercialization and scale-up stages
The CGF is intended to help Canada reduce emissions and achieve national economic and climate targets. It looks to scale-up companies that will create jobs and clean growth and accelerate the deployment of key technologies, such as carbon capture, utilization, and storage. In October 2023, CGF made its first investment in geothermal energy startup Eavor, topping up its Series B round with an additional $90 million.
With CGF’s investment, Robitaille said Idealist will be able to support much larger capital rounds and bring capital into the energy transition ecosystem faster.
Featured image credit Stacey Newman via Getty Images.