The Palisades Fire tore through 23,000 acres of forests I grew up exploring - leveled most of my hometown - and stopped just 100 yards short of my house.
Over the weekend, a flash flood in Texas killed dozens and swamped entire towns with a 20-foot surge. These “once-in-a-generation” events now show up like quarterly reports.
We’re not forecasting climate risk anymore. We’re living in it.
The Next Subprime Is Made of Fire
You remember 2008. If you were above the age of 20, it’s seared in. Mortgage defaults, credit freezes, cascading panic. But this time is different: it’s not the math that’s breaking - it’s the physics.
Insurance markets are beginning to fail.
Carriers are pulling out of entire zip codes - not just in California and Florida, but across the country. Without insurance, you can’t get a mortgage. Without mortgages, home values collapse. And when that happens at scale, it doesn’t just hit real estate - it hits household wealth, credit markets, municipal budgets, and portfolio stability.
This isn’t a theory. It’s a slow-moving financial landslide.
Climate Risk Is Now a Core Financial Risk
For years, economists warned about transition risk - that fossil fuel assets would become stranded as policy shifted. But the financial system is waking up to something more urgent: physical risk.
Real estate, the largest global asset class, is starting to show cracks. And as the frequency of catastrophic weather increases, those cracks become fault lines.
This isn’t about what happens if the climate crisis unfolds. It’s about how finance behaves when it already has.
Since We Can’t Stop the Carbon - Can We Innovate Our Way Out?
Let’s be honest: we’re not stopping emissions fast enough. Even the best-case scenarios put us well above 1.5°C - and the disasters are already here.
So the question now is: How do we adapt fast enough to survive it?
This is where climate innovation shifts from moral cause to strategic imperative. And while our fund may not be sized to lead deep-tech energy moonshots, there’s an incredible amount of frontier thinking happening in categories that matter.
What does “adaptation tech” look like?
The founders building in these arenas aren’t just investing in what’s next.
They’re working to preserve what’s left.
Climate VC Is Withering - But Not Dead
A lot of investors haven’t lost interest in climate tech. They’ve lost conviction - and often, permission.
The current U.S. administration’s rollback of climate regulations, data collection, and emissions policy has created a chilling effect. Agencies are defunded. Reports are buried. And companies that used to proudly wear the “climate” badge are now scrubbing it from their decks.
But under the surface, the work continues. Startups are still deploying product. Founders are still raising quiet rounds. And infrastructure still needs to be rebuilt.
The demand hasn’t gone anywhere. The noise just got quieter.
Final Thought: Climate Isn’t a Category - It’s the Terrain
Too many investors still treat climate like a vertical. It’s not. It’s a horizontal force reshaping every asset class.
If you’re exposed to real estate, banking, insurance, supply chains, food systems - you’re already in the climate game, whether you admit it or not.
Now is not the time to minimize exposure.
This is the moment to hunt - for the founders rebuilding the power grid, reinventing coverage models, and hardening supply chains. Not because it’s trending. Because it’s required.
So, when will climate tech make a comeback?
