Packing more energy into smaller batteries is one crucial technological development to help achieving the energy transition within the necessary timeframes, the Fiduciary Investors Symposium has heard, and there are enormous economic opportunities ahead as industry races to unlock solutions.
When it comes to figuring out how a company will get to net zero and how their transition will be financed, more investors are making a distinction between emissions that are hard to abate, and emissions that are expensive to abate.
Commodities are at the heart of the energy transition, impacting both the coming structural decline of fossil fuels and the demand for the new economy critical materials. But the reality is that many investors are reluctant to talk openly about commodities because of the negative perceptions of the sector.
The $171 billion (A$260 billion) Australian Retirement Trust, which sets itself apart from its Australian peers with the identifying investment features of lower infrastructure allocations and less internal management, is looking to opportunities in digital infrastructure and the energy transition.
The world is shifting from having very few centralised power stations feeding electricity into the grid, to a more dynamic market with abundant opportunities for investors, according to Alex Brierley, co-head, Octopus Energy Generation.
More than $4 trillion a year in investment is needed over the next 30 years to meet the goal of net zero by 2050, asset owners have been told. Arun Majumdar, dean of Stanford University’s school of sustainability describes it as the “defining challenge and opportunity of the 21st century”
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FIS Stanford 2024