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How The UAE Is Trying To Turn $30 Billion Into $250 Billion For Climate
How The UAE Is Trying To Turn $30 Billion Into $250 Billion For Climate
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0:00
At COP 28, the UAE placed a $30 billion bet on the future of climate investing.
0:06
The vision was there and the ambition was there,
0:08
but that wasn't being reflected in real-world solutions.
0:12
Altérra was born, a climate investment fund built to test a highly debated proposition, that
0:18
commercial returns and climate impact can go hand in hand. Its target mobilized $250 billion dollars
0:27
by 2030. Nearly three years on, we're finding out how much of that ambition has become reality.
0:33
Today, I can tell you I'm extremely confident that we'll hit that target.
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Nearly three years after launch, Altérra says its portfolio now spans more than
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thirty investments across more than forty countries and five continents.
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The Abu Dhabi base fund is now one of the world's largest private climate
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investment vehicles, investing through and alongside global asset managers.
1:05
Its mandate spans four areas: energy transition,
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industrial decarbonization, climate technology, and sustainable living.
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That's everything from renewable power in India to aviation software in the US.
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But for all of that breadth, energy is the story.
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The fund's latest impact report puts the energy transition at 80%
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of its exposure. I met CEO Majid al Suwaidi at Altérra's headquarters.
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Majid, what makes Altérra different to your typical private equity firm?
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The key difference is that we're a blended vehicle in the sense that we
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bring the private sector and government together.
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When we were at COP 28, we felt that it was very important to bring different actors to
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the climate finance discussion and each of them have different objectives or goals,
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but what we're trying to show is that we can align those objectives and we can make money doing it.
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How are people thinking about Abu Dhabi taking the lead in climate investing?
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I think it's been embraced by everyone that I've met. I think that for a long time people have
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really wanted to see a leader take that step and that's what Altérra in essence does. It
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takes that first step and then that begets more capital and that confidence begets more capital
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and that first mover effect is what Abu Dhabi what the UAE and what Altérra is achieving today.
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At launch, Altérra committed $6.5 billion dollars
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across six fund strategies with Brookfield, Black Rock, and TPG.
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It has since added new partners and begun making direct co-investments in companies and projects.
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How much of that 30 billion has been deployed into
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live deals and how much is left waiting in the wings?
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We have invested about 6.5 committed today of that 30 billion. We started
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out with three of the largest institutional investors in Brookfield, TPG, and Black Rock.
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We've added KKR, CIP, to that roster of partners. So, as you can see,
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the largest players in the world, and that was really key to what we wanted to do. Actually,
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when we started we were told that we wouldn't be able to mobilize capital in a big way
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particularly to the Global South, but we've seen that we've been able to do that and we've
3:29
shown by taking that leadership that we can do it. Our fund is broken down into acceleration,
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transformation and now we recently launched our own fund opportunity.
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Acceleration is our global fund that can invest anywhere in the world,
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and Transformation is our Global South commitment.
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With our Acceleration fund, we've mobilized about nine times our capital,
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and with our Transformation fund,
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we've mobilized almost five times and we continue to raise. So, as you can tell,
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we've been phenomenally successful so far, way outstripping our expectations in the beginning.
4:04
Wow. So, take a step back for me because the north star here, as I understand it,
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is 250 billion by 2030. How close are you?
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That estimate was something we estimated in the beginning, and it was a sort of
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moderate target that we felt it was a stretch but that we could achieve it,
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and today I can tell you I'm extremely confident that we'll hit that target by 2030.
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We've been really pleasantly surprised with our mobilization ability. Why is
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it important? It was important as a a measure because what we wanted to
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prove was that we could be commercial, that we could drive the private sector
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to invest in these spaces and that's what so far, we've been able to do.
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So, let's talk about the strategy then. How are you sourcing and evaluating opportunities today?
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We're lucky that we're almost like a hub in a giant wheel and all of the
5:00
climate relevant investments that are happening today tend to end up
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on our doorstep which means that we can cherry-pick from the best of the deals.
5:10
It's a good problem to have.
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It really is. And we knew that there was this mismatch going on,
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and what we do is we kind of fit in that middle matching the capital with the deal
5:19
flow and really picking out quality deals because it's very important to
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us that credibility is what we will deliver over time, that people will feel confident
5:29
that they can invest generate good returns and that they will then come back and invest again.
5:35
Abu Dhabi's Altérra is one of the world's largest climate investment
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funds and its deal making has accelerated.
5:42
Alongside General Atlantic, it backed Wireless Logic,
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a connectivity company linking EV chargers, smart meters, and industrial equipment.
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It has also committed to KKR's climate strategy,
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spanning renewables, battery storage, and electrification.
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And with I squared Capital, it invested in Inkia Energy, Peru's largest independent
6:05
power producer, and Altérra's first direct investment in Latin America.
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But investing at that scale means deciding which deals make the cut.
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Walk me through how a deal actually happens here.
6:17
For us, it's particularly unique because of course
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we have an investment team and a climate impact team that have to work together,
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and we spend a lot of time trying to integrate these two processes.
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So, when a deal first comes in, we do a very quick first pass. How is this clearly a climate
6:34
impactful deal? And then we take it through a more detailed process where we apply our
6:41
climate impact framework. So we'll look at every aspect of the project, understanding what would
6:48
be the emissions impact, what would be the mobilization factor that we would achieve,
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what would be the impact on the community or the country's economy itself, and then we have
6:59
these great partners who help us to ensure that we're making really sound financial decisions.
7:04
And so, it's very unique how we meld these two things together, we have a very talented
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team of people who specialize in these types of investments, and that's what makes Altérra unique.
7:16
That's our secret sauce.
7:18
That link between development and the energy transition is
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central to Altérra's push into the Global South.
7:25
Research published by the fund says those markets attract just 20% of global climate finance,
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leaving a $2 trillion dollar annual climate investment gap.
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But it argues roughly a third of that,
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or about $700 billion dollars a year, is already investable or close to it.
7:43
The challenge - convincing institutional investors to look past risks like currency volatility,
7:49
political uncertainty and limited market data.
7:53
We believe that there is a perception issue around investing in the Global South that it's
7:59
riskier or that it's more challenging. But you know the UAE is a Global South country. We're
8:06
a country that's been investing in our part of the world for decades since we started.
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We've had lots of experience in investing in Asia, in India, in Africa and we'd like
8:17
to do more in Latam. What we see is that if you're investing in these markets, you can
8:22
generate fantastic return if you make the smart choices, but you can achieve great impact as well.
8:29
Let's talk about AI. We're seeing this unprecedented surge in global power demand
8:34
driven by AI and data centers. Big tech clearly scrambling right now for clean base load power.
8:42
So, as a climate investor, how are you viewing the AI boom?
8:46
That energy demand should be and can be as clean as possible. And so that story
8:54
is going to be that energy transition. What are the things that they think a lot about?
8:58
They think a lot about cooling. They think about efficiency. They think about how they
9:02
can do more for less power. These are all great stories for a climate fund, right?
9:08
But you know, Dan, we've turned down a lot of deals. I've had many, many data center
9:12
deals sent to me and I have said, well what's the addition that we bring, and it can't just
9:18
be that it's a clean data center, there needs to be something more to the story.
9:22
And so, we're really looking very hard at that, but then there's also how to invest
9:26
in the technology itself, what can that do in terms of improving energy efficiency,
9:31
developing these new materials, so we think about it from that perspective.
9:34
It's been a challenging year for the Middle East and 2026 has brought a whole variety of
9:40
challenges, in particular the war with Iran. How do you think that is shaping investment decisions
9:46
from the Middle East and the appetite to do business in this part of the world?
9:50
I think that what has really struck me has been how partners have doubled down on the UAE.
9:57
I think that this really shows how the UAE has moved from where we were in the past,
10:04
where we were sort of subject to macro or regional effects. And I think that that
10:10
reflects my experience growing up here in the UAE is that every crisis that we've gone through,
10:17
the UAE has always come out stronger, faster, better, and more efficient.
10:23
I have not seen any difference in the partners, the investors,
10:30
they're all here today, they're all working, business as usual,
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and that's really a testament to how well our government has prepared and is moving forward.
10:40
I see that continuing to grow. You know at Altérra, because we are this largest climate
10:47
fund investor, we've seen many, many GPs, fund managers in our space come and set up here at
10:54
ADGM because they want to support us, they want to work with us. So, I feel optimistic about the UAE,
11:02
I think we're going to go from strength to strength because that has been our track record.
11:06
On that note, then, what would you say is the
11:08
biggest challenge that Altérra will face in the coming years?
11:11
We're still a young organization. We still have a lot of room to grow. As you know,
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every organization has to develop its strategy and has to grow. So,
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I think our biggest challenge is going to see how do we take our strategy,
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our climate impact framework and how do we evolve that and grow that into something that is global.
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I would love in 2030 for us to do this again and for me to say that the way we invest today
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is not seen as something that is different but that it is the approach to investing,
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that we are taking decisions about companies, about projects,
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that make sense for the investor and that they're part of this journey with us.
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And there's no doubt that that will be a challenge and that we'll learn lessons along the way, but I
12:02
feel very fortunate that we have a really smart team and that we have a lot of great partners
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here in the system in the UAE and that we're going to be able to do that and tackle those challenges.
12:12
Walk me through how your diplomatic experience also helps what you do
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today as well. You've been Ambassador, you've been a Consul General in New York,
12:20
you led COP 28 here in the UAE. So, how does that background in high level diplomacy help
12:26
you when you're in the boardrooms, or meeting with executives from these big Wall Street firms?
12:32
You know, I have to say when I started it was a bit intimidating, right? You know,
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you walk in and you see these leaders like, you know, the partners we work
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with are some of the biggest institutions in the world. We work with Larry Fink,
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we work with Bruce Flatt, you have Jim over at TPG. These are really inspiring,
12:50
great people to be able to learn from, to work alongside, to see how they work.
12:55
And every day is like school for me. I love it. I love every day when I come to work and I learn
13:00
something new. And there's no school like the UN, and there's definitely no school like the UNFCCC,
13:07
like the climate change negotiations, which are so complicated and so challenging,
13:11
but what they teach you is that to be able to deliver successful solutions, you have to bring
13:18
people together and you have to be able to have a broad knowledge of a lot of complicated issues.
13:24
And trying to solve for those complicated issues means that you need to look at both
13:29
sides of the story. You need to have empathy. You need to be able to learn from others,
13:34
hear what are their concerns and their challenges, and try to address them.
13:38
And I think that those skills are transferable to the space that I'm
13:42
in today. At the end of the day, Dan, you know, I have a background as a geologist.
13:46
I started out my career in oil and gas. I'm fundamentally driven as a geologist,
13:52
as an engineer. I didn't come to diplomacy in a traditional way either and I've always taken
13:58
a scientific approach to the challenges that I face. How can I create good processes? How can I
14:06
create an understanding of risk and opportunity? And then how can I address those risks and take
14:14
advantage of those opportunities? And those are transferable skills I think in any workspace.
14:20
When we sit down in the next 10 years, what do you hope Altérra becomes?
14:25
I would really like to see Altérra be one of the largest asset managers in the world,
14:31
that people continue to look at as the gold standard when it comes to asset management,
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responsible, impactful asset management.
14:40
And I believe we can get there.
