Happy Tuesday,

This week we take a look at Canada's new sovereign wealth fund. With no explicit climate mandate, it could finance critical infrastructure for the energy transition - or more fossil fuel projects. We unpack what funds in Singapore and Norway tell us about where the money could actually go.

Elsewhere in climate tech:

Plus: What we’re watching at Toronto Climate Week in June.

What happened: Canada launched the Canada Strong Fund - its first sovereign wealth fund (SWF) - to invest in Canadian projects and companies.

The details: Unlike other SWFs that reinvest royalties from natural resources, the Carney government will seed the fund with $25 billion, growing it over time with returns and other contributions from the government.

"Conventional" energy is explicitly in scope, but the Fund's mandate also includes clean energy, critical minerals, infrastructure and agriculture.

The context: SWFs from other countries have played major roles in climate funding.

Norway's Norges Bank integrates ESG and climate risk into its investment decisions and explicitly excludes polluting assets (e.g. Canadian oil sands producers like Cenovus and Suncor for "unacceptable greenhouse gas emissions").

Singapore's Temasek took another path, launching Decarbonization Partners, a $1.4B VC fund, with BlackRock to invest in climate technologies.

Why it matters: Canada's fund introduces a new institutional backer for large-scale projects like clean energy, grid infrastructure and critical minerals. By co-investing with private capital, a SWF can crowd in private investment - particularly for assets with long time horizons.

The fund adds to an existing stack of federal financing tools including the $30B Canada Infrastructure Bank (concessional loans) and the $15B Canada Growth Fund (debt, equity, guarantees).

Not so simple: Globally, SWFs have a mixed track record on climate, holding $11.6T in assets but committing ~$10B to climate.

While Canada's fund has no explicit climate mandate, it could follow the Norges Bank model: integrating climate risk and even pushing portfolio companies to reduce emissions.

The bottom line: The Canada Strong Fund won't fund climate solutions the same way BDC or the Canada Growth Fund do - but a $25B equity investor that treats climate as financial risk can still move significant capital toward the transition.

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Rockit Motors (Pointe-Claire, Quebec) secured $64 million in equity and debt financing to expand its electric motor manufacturing across North America, serving power generation, rail, EVs and industrial applications.

Carbonyx (Vancouver, BC) raised a $1.2 million pre-seed round for its carbon capture platform led by local angel group WUTIF Capital. Carbonyx wants to make carbon capture economically viable beyond carbon credits by producing valuable materials at the same time.

Serenity Power (Calgary, AB) closed a $1.16 million pre-seed round led by Avatar Innovations for its solid oxide fuel cell power systems.

Rock Tech Lithium (Toronto, ON) filed to go public on NASDAQ with a dual listing to access US markets.

Moltex Energy, the British parent company of Canadian nuclear developer Moltex Energy Canada, is in talks with a Canadian buyer. A sale would bring all Moltex assets under Canadian ownership.

Siemens will receive $23 million from Canada’s Strategic Response Fund to support its battery production R&D facility.

H55 delivered its first battery modules to Swiss electric aircraft company Smartflyer for its SFX1 aircraft.

Elemental Trucks launched a prototype 63.5-tonne hydrogen fuel cell Class 8 truck.

Climative partnered with Scotiabank to help homeowners understand and improve their home's energy efficiency and manage renovation costs.

Halifax-based smart building startup B-Line is winding down operations, citing delays in enterprise contracts and private sector revenues.

Relocalize opened its autonomous ice micro-factory at a Winn-Dixie distribution centre in Florida, cutting transportation emissions by up to 90% while using plastic-negative packaging.

EverWind's 224 MW wind farm in Nova Scotia received environmental approval from the province. The wind farm will power EverWind's green hydrogen plant.

The Transition Accelerator relaunched the Centre for Industrial Policy to help create a strategic vision for Canada's industrial policy across defence, critical miners, and energy.

Toronto Climate Week is coming up June 1-7th and we're supporting again as a media partner! Nine flagship sessions anchor a week with more than 200 events, and more than 10,000 people joining across the city. Here’s what we're watching across the flagship events:

Natural Resources, Infrastructure & Energy: Conversations around nation-building, economic sovereignty, and climate have converged. This session looks at how we drive sustainability and prosperity together.

Carbon Solutions: Canada has depth in carbon solutions - not just for oil and gas, but across forestry, oceans, and mining. How do we turn potential into demand and accelerate deployment?

Food, Nature & Water: The underdogs of climate action - under-invested relative to their climate footprint. These sessions bring the full system together: from farmers to investors; insurance companies to Indigenous guardians. 

The Climate Tech Journey: The path from university lab to Series A is a challenging gauntlet. This session covers the full arc and how we close the gap.

With 200+ events, these are just the beginning. Want to get involved? Host an event or check out the full calendar of events →

p.s. We’ll be running another event on clean compute at TOCW. More details soon!

Carbon price negotiations: Alberta and the federal government are actively negotiating how quickly the province’s industrial carbon price will increase. Meanwhile, the oil sector is now pushing for it to be scrapped altogether.

Force of nature: Canada launched a new $3.8B nature plan aimed at balancing infrastructure projects with environmental protection. The plan includes conserving land, funding conservation, and helping project proponents minimize impacts.

Lagging on electricity: Clean power sources grew fast enough to meet all new electricity demand last year, according to Ember. But Canada lags well below the G7 average on solar and wind, making up just 9% of electricity generation.

Green hushing: Businesses across the G7 are maintaining climate commitments despite political pushback. Almost 70% says they've increased their action in the last 12 months - but are shifting messaging away from net zero to resilience and risk mitigation.

Nuclear partnership: Ontario and Yukon signed a new partnership to work on deploying small modular reactors to the Yukon's grid, led by OPG and Yukon Energy.

Grounded: Air Transat is the latest Canadian airline to cut flights due to high jet fuel costs and supply constraints. WestJet and Air Canada also cut less profitable routes.

Northern hydro: Ontario is expanding energy infrastructure in the province's north, fast-tracking a 162 km transmission line to mining regions near Red Lake and launching a Northern Hydro Program to secure over 1 GW of hydro capacity.

QUICK HITS

🏅 Foresight 50: Foresight Canada is looking for Canada’s most investment-ready cleantech ventures. Apply by June 30th.

🚀 Future Fuels Challenge: Emissions Reduction Alberta’s $50 million funding initiative to accelerate technologies that reduce the carbon intensity of transportation fuels across Canada. Apply by June 10th.

💻 Growcer is hiring a Research and Development Director to better food systems.

💻 pH7 Technologies is hiring a Senior Project Manager to scale R&D findings into operations.

💻 dcbel is hiring a Lead UX/UI Designer to make clean, efficient, and sustainable energy accessible to all.

More: Funding Opportunities | Job Board | Events

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