The IPO of Aquila Energy Efficiency Trust plc, which raised £100m last week, marks the third energy efficiency fund listed on the London Stock Exchange; the others being SDCL Energy Efficiency Income Trust and the Triple Point Energy Efficiency Infrastructure Company.

The arrival of Aquila’s fund is another sign that energy efficiency is becoming a recognised asset class amongst institutional investors, something that has to happen if we are to scale up investment to the levels we need to achieve climate goals. It is also a sign of the changing nature of the definition of energy efficiency.  The portfolios of these funds shows some ‘real energy efficiency’ i.e. end-user demand reduction, notably LED lighting portfolios, but they also include distributed or embedded generation assets, both solar and CHP.  This is not a criticism. The shift towards a decarbonised, decentralised and digitised energy system means an increased focus on the demand side of energy, rather than just on the supply side and the meaning of the term ‘energy efficiency’ is shifting to incorporate all demand side assets, rather than just referring to energy saving projects. The term is being used to cover the whole range of technologies and business models including: demand response, distributed generation, behind-the-meter energy storage, virtual power plants, micro-grids, building-to-grid, industry-to-grid, vehicle-to-grid, as well as local generation and utilisation of heat in efficient and flexible systems.

The emergence of these listed funds, which sit alongside a growing number of private and private-public funds around the world reflect the shift of investment occurring in the energy transition, from highly centralised infrastructure to highly decentralised infrastructure, and passive consumers becoming prosumers.

The amount of capital being allocated to energy efficiency is increasing. We need the capital to be there, but the capital needs good projects to invest in and as I have talked about and written about many times, the real shortage is not capital but rather a lack of well developed bankable projects. We need to build capacity in project development skills in both clients and the supply chain.

One of EnergyPro’s innovations, ESCO-in-a-box® is doing that here in the UK and now in Kenya and we are now working on taking it to new markets, working alongside dedicated funds. If you want to find out more about how ESCO-in-a-box® can help you develop and implement energy efficiency projects of all types get in touch.

Last year we decided to use the Covid crisis to fundamentally change our businesses, effectively to ‘build back better’. This led to a process of considering our collective ambition as a team, how we maximise our positive impact, how we are organised, and how we communicate. With the launch of our new website, our new brand, and our impact report you can now see the results of some of that work.

Accelerating the shift to a net zero carbon world is a critical challenge facing all of us in order to combat the urgent threat of climate change, but we also need to move beyond ‘sustainability’ towards a regenerative economy that addresses climate change and the many wider environmental problems, as well as the social problems of inequality in opportunity and wealth.  Doing so will create massive business opportunities and produce a better environment, a better economy and a better society.

To accelerate the shift we need to maximise both the quantity and quality of investment going into companies, projects and programmes that move society towards a net zero, regenerative and more equitable economy. This requires:

• building capacity amongst decision makers across business, finance, the public sector, governments and multi-lateral institutions
• shifting investment flows towards high-performance projects, programmes and companies that support the transition.

Our work across the ep group is in three areas that contribute directly to these needs:

• we build capacity by research, consultancy, training and advocacy
• we bring investment by originating opportunities, accessing capital, undertaking due diligence, and developing new business models
• we develop and deliver high performance projects.

The way we do those things is reflected in our new brand, the equals sign captures our commitment to finding equitable solutions that work for all stakeholders. More equitable collaboration is needed to solve the big problems we face.

Our organisational structure is also changing. As well as bringing our companies together into a formal group we are committed to transitioning to a steward-ownership structure that reflects two important principles: self-governance, and profits serve purpose. We believe that steward-ownership better supports the shift towards a net zero and regenerative economy. Our aim is to create a structure that combines entrepreneurial skills, steward-ownership, and patient capital to create and build successful impact driven businesses.

We are best known for our work in energy efficiency but the ep group has expanded our work into other key areas of sustainability and the regenerative economy, particularly resource efficiency, the built environment, the circular economy, and sustainable finance. Our latest offering, through ep projects, includes architecture and design, planning, and development services and we are already working on a number of exciting regenerative property developments.  As ep group, we are pioneering a new, more equitable ownership and funding model and we will be sharing our progress on that with you as it evolves.

If you are committed to accelerating the shift to a net zero, sustainable and regenerative economy but need help building capacity, bringing investment, or developing projects, please contact us. We would like to help enable you to turn that commitment into impact.

After the hugely exciting landing of Perseverance on Mars I had some Twitter exchanges which questioned why we would spend ‘huge resources’ landing a rover on Mars. My response to this is that humans are explorers, exploration is baked into our DNA. If it wasn’t we would still be living in the trees. When standing on the moon in 1971, Dave Scott, the Commander of Apollo 15, the first of the science focused Apollo missions, said “man must explore and this is exploration at its greatest” and Perseverance is the latest in the journey.  As to the huge resources spent, the cost to develop the rover and get to Mars was about $2.4 billion over nine years, about $300 million a year and it will cost the same to keep it operational on Mars. Compared to many other things that is tiny and well worth it.  In 2019 Americans spent $96 billion on their pets. The entire 2021 NASA budget is $23.2 billion, and that covers everything, robotic exploration and human spaceflight. The entire world’s governmental space budget is c.$75 billion. For comparison, the Tokyo Olympics are set to cost $15 billion, Hinkley Point C is expected to cost more than £20 billion, and the UK’s ‘test and trace’ system appears to have cost a staggering, and really hard to justify, £22 billion in a year.

I know some people say we should not be spending money on space while we are combatting climate change and other environmental problems but I don’t see it that way. Exploring is a basic human need, it is in our spirit as well as our DNA. Space gives us new perspectives, the Apollo 8 photo of earth rising over the moon, and the Apollo 17 ‘blue marble’ photo have been highly influential in raising environmental consciousness. Although not as important as the positive effect it can have on our spirits, space also brings new science and technology – although ‘spin off’ alone is not a necessary reason to justify the expense. We just can’t stop exploring while we solve the big problems, just like we can’t stop making music or art, or having competitive sports – it is part of what makes us human.  Of course we need to spend more on solving the problems and moving towards net zero and a regenerative economy. We can and must do that, but we also need to keep doing the other things that make us human.

Perseverance was named in a school student competition that attracted more than 28,000 proposals. A seventh-grade student, Alexander Mather, from Virginia submitted the winning entry. In his winning essay he wrote:

Curiosity. InSight. Spirit. Opportunity. If you think about it, all of these names of past Mars rovers are qualities we possess as humans. We are always curious, and seek opportunity. We have the spirit and insight to explore the Moon, Mars, and beyond. But, if rovers are to be the qualities of us as a race, we missed the most important thing. Perseverance. We as humans evolved as creatures who could learn to adapt to any situation, no matter how harsh. We are a species of explorers, and we will meet many setbacks on the way to Mars. However, we can persevere. We, not as a nation but as humans, will not give up. The human race will always persevere into the future.

Wise words indeed.

Perseverance’s first full-colour view of Mars

Over the last few years, the idea of energy efficiency as infrastructure has gained traction, and it is good to see the continued emphasis on improving the efficiency of the building stock in the work of the National Infrastructure Commission. Its recent Annual Monitoring Report 2021 noted:

‘Across all its policies and programmes, government must now ensure action is being delivered on the ground and the energy efficiency of the building stock is increasing at the necessary rate.’  We seem a long way from reaching that necessary rate.

The government is establishing a National Infrastructure Bank ‘to catalyse private sector investment’ into infrastructure with three priorities: net zero; levelling up; and covid recovery. It seems to be on-track for having it launched by the summer. This is a positive development as long as it focuses on the real problem around energy efficiency – the development gap between what we know is huge potential and bankable projects. We know that institutional investors would like to invest in more energy efficiency and net zero projects, the problem is finding bankable projects at scale and that comes down to a lack of capacity to develop projects, a lack of capacity in the demand side, the supply side and in the financial industry.

In energy efficiency at least the National Infrastructure Bank need to focus attention on bridging that development gap, and that means taking equity type risk and/or using some kind of guaranteed debt to fund development work. It also means actively building development capacity and not just being passive and awaiting projects to appear.  In related work we are doing around the world we talk about ‘transaction enablers’ – ways of increasing the flow of project development – and ‘risk mitigators’, ways of reducing the risks at least in the early stages. Both are needed. When the Green Investment Bank was established it promised a lot on energy efficiency but a failure to address the development gap meant much of the effort labelled as energy efficiency ended up not really being efficiency. It took a passive approach to the development gap, hoping that demand would appear.

The National Infrastructure Bank needs to be much more active, and focused on bridging the development gap with specially designed financial instruments and capacity building programmes. If it can do that it will catalyse private sector investment from the institutional funds looking to invest in energy efficiency at scale.

2020 was of course dominated by Covid but looking beyond that what else can we learn from the events of the year?

One lesson from 2020 is that taking personal responsibility is critical and that in many areas, particularly in large parts of the corporate world, the ‘stock’ of personal responsibility seems to be declining. This decline is the root cause of many of our problems around technology, the economy and sustainable development.

There were two high profile examples, among many, that were highlighted during 2020. The actions of Boeing that led to the 737 Max crashes and the actions of the companies behind the cladding on the Grenfell tower once again showed how pursuit of profit above integrity, quality and even life itself, driven by a culture set at the top, can over-ride individuals’ personal responsibility and integrity.

These cases, as with many others, were examples where people knew the truth and did not take action to prevent the organisation doing something very wrong. In the case of Boeing there was a clear cultural shift that started following the merger with McDonnel Douglas in 1997. The collective sense of what the company was meant to do shifted to increasing shareholder value and away from engineering great aeroplanes. When this kind of shift happens it creates a dissonance in the company and within individuals who either know about specific compromises, errors or lies, or at the very least sense the tension. It is of course hard for individuals to take effective action when their livelihood depends on keeping their job. Senior management have no excuse. They often take the rewards without taking the responsibility. Failures to act in the cases like the Boeing 737 Max and Grenfell show that the people in charge of the organisations concerned were leaders in name only, and certainly not real leaders.

There is a lot of talk about Corporate Social Responsibility, but talk is cheap. The examples of Boeing and the Grenfell disaster illustrate the fact that there can be no CSR without personal responsibility.

During a visit to the Holocaust Museum in Dallas in November 2019 I was struck by the categorisation of people during the holocaust as; perpetrators; bystanders; upstanders and of course victims. Although it may seem an extreme comparison there is a real parallel here. We need more upstanders and fewer bystanders.

The challenge for all of us as individuals is to have the courage to take responsibility and stand up when they see bad stuff happening, whether it be at individual, corporate, social or political levels, and that isn’t easy when your job is likely to be at risk. The challenge for organisational leaders is to create an environment where the purpose of the organisation is above profit, where personal responsibility is aligned with corporate and social responsibility, where people can genuinely achieve good work, and where upstanding is the norm as opposed to bystanding.

Be an upstander and not a bystander.