This $25 million fund is supercharging clean energy projects in the developing world

The Climate Innovation and Development Fund is one of the winners of Fast Company’s 2023 World Changing Ideas Awards. Explore the full list of projects we’re honoring for making the world more equitable, accessible, and sustainable.



As the climate crisis looms, rich countries have been pouring money into decarbonization initiatives. But countries with developing and emerging economies, home to two-thirds of the world’s population, haven’t kept pace. The problem: money, or lack of it.



A new $25 million joint effort by Goldman Sachs and Bloomberg Philanthropies, known as the Climate Innovation and Development Fund, aims to change that by backing proof-of-concept clean energy projects. It’s the winner of Fast Company’s World Changing Ideas Award in the Impact Investing category.



First on the fund’s agenda: launching electric bus fleets, one in India and one in Vietnam. Managed in coordination with the Asian Development Bank, these e-buses have the potential to attract $500 million in follow-on capital—and reduce CO2 emissions by tens of thousands of tons per year.



“The word that we all kept using around the Zoom screen was ‘catalytic,’” says Kara Succoso Mangone, global head of climate strategy at Goldman Sachs, of the thinking behind the fund’s strategy. “How do we make sure that these investments help to advance the commercial case for investment, which is ultimately where you get scale?”



In India, the fund’s investment is enabling the purchase of 255 electric buses that will travel between cities and serve 5 million people per year, with safety features for women travelers. In Vietnam, fund capital is going toward 140 electric buses. Both initiatives also include the installation of solar-plus-battery infrastructure at bus depots and service stations—a vast improvement over the coal-fired power common in the region. If the projects can demonstrate to investors that sustainable transport in the developing world offers an attractive return, the impact could be transformative.



“We’re creating small examples, but these examples really give the market confidence,” says Ailun Yang, who leads global energy transition programs at Bloomberg Philanthropies. “When we work on blended finance vehicles like this, it’s very important for us to constantly try to work ourselves out of a job quickly, and move on to the next thing.”



So far, the fund has spent half of its $25 million arsenal.