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Environment & Conservation

Environment & Conservation companies protect ecosystems, biodiversity, and natural resources through products, markets, and stewardship models. This Causeartist archive lists conservation tech, nature-based solutions, and environmental services with mission narratives and investor ties. Use it to map practitioners, compare impact claims, and connect to funders active in nature and climate.

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Grantham Foundation logo
Grantham Foundation
Foundation
The Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment operates through both philanthropic grants and strategic investments to address climate change and environmental degradation. They focus on protecting and improving the health of the global environment through a dual approach of funding environmental advocacy, applied research into climate solutions, and investing in entrepreneurs building green industries and technologies. Their mission is to protect and conserve the natural environment, with communication and collaboration as top priorities to build widespread public support for preventing catastrophic climate change. The Foundation operates as a 501(c)(3) private foundation with five Grantham family trustees, while also working through The Jeremy and Hannelore Grantham Environmental Trust, a public charity with independent trustees from major environmental organizations including Rare, The Nature Conservancy, World Wildlife Fund US, and Rocky Mountain Institute. Established by Jeremy and Hannelore Grantham, the Foundation plays a significant role in the environmental ecosystem by addressing what they identify as humanity's greatest challenge - climate change and the race against time to avoid existential threats. Their impact matters because they recognize that environmental philanthropic resources are immense compared to available funding, making strategic alliances and targeted investments in both advocacy and technological innovation crucial for preventing catastrophic environmental change.
Clean EnergyClimate TechEnvironment & Conservation
Icehouse Ventures logo
Icehouse Ventures
Venture Capital
Icehouse Ventures is a New Zealand venture capital firm backing Kiwi founded companies with the potential to scale into global markets. The platform traces its roots to Ice Angels, launched in 2003 as New Zealand’s first angel investment network. It raised its first fund in 2013 and formally became Icehouse Ventures in 2019, when Simplicity KiwiSaver, Jarden, and Sir Stephen Tindall’s K1W1 joined as shareholders. Today, Icehouse Ventures manages a range of investment vehicles spanning pre seed through pre IPO, supported by a co investor network of more than 3,000 investors. The firm says it has invested more than $800 million across more than 390 Kiwi founded companies. Its portfolio includes some of New Zealand’s better known technology companies, including Halter, Crimson Education, Sharesies, Partly, Hnry, Dawn Aerospace, Tracksuit, Tradify, Ethique, Basis, Fuel50, and Spalk, alongside international investments such as Wayve, Substack, and Nuro. Growth Fund III is currently being marketed as an open investment vehicle. Icehouse Ventures is a generalist technology investor rather than a dedicated climate fund, but sustainability is part of its broader investment framework. The firm publishes a Responsible Investment Policy aligned with the UN Principles for Responsible Investment, and Principal Bex Gidall leads both the Arc Fund and Sustainable Technologies Fund. Its climate and impact related portfolio includes companies such as Neocrete, which develops additives designed to reduce cement use in concrete, and Ethique, a solid personal care brand focused on reducing packaging waste.
Built EnvironmentEnvironment & ConservationImpact Finance
NorthX Climate Tech logo
NorthX Climate Tech
Accelerator, Impact Fund
NorthX Climate Tech is an independent Canadian nonprofit investor and commercialization catalyst for climate hard tech. Founded in October 2021 as the BC Centre for Innovation and Clean Energy (CICE), it launched with $105 million in commitments from the Government of British Columbia, Shell Canada, and the Government of Canada through Natural Resources Canada’s Energy Innovation Program. NorthX is based at Suite 1210, 1066 West Hastings Street in Vancouver and is led by President and CEO Sarah Goodman. NorthX backs physical technologies that can reduce or remove greenhouse gas emissions while producing economic benefits for British Columbia and Canada. Its focus includes energy storage and grid capacity, industrial decarbonization, clean fuels, wildfire prevention and response, carbon management, climate adaptation, and other hardware- and materials-led solutions. The organization targets the commercialization gap between technical promise and market deployment, especially projects at technology readiness levels 4–9. Funding is non-dilutive and tailored by opportunity: NorthX says investments may be repayable or non-repayable, with approved Open Intake projects receiving milestone-based reimbursement funding. Support extends beyond capital to technical validation, lifecycle assessment, investor and industry introductions, market readiness, and follow-on funding. NorthX reports that, by May 2026, it had backed more than 74 projects with over $57 million and helped catalyze more than $600 million in follow-on investment. Those figures are reported by NorthX and are not presented as independently audited outcomes. The Women in Climate Tech initiative adds a gender-lens pathway for capital-intensive climate ventures. In September 2026, NorthX reported that more than $36 million had been committed across 45 projects at companies with women in leadership—over 58% of its total capital commitments—and that those investments had unlocked more than $430 million in additional capital.
Built EnvironmentCircular EconomyClean Energy
Planetary Impact Ventures logo
Planetary Impact Ventures
Impact Fund, Venture Capital
Planetary Impact Ventures is a Danish investment manager providing patient capital to companies and land projects working to regenerate food systems, farmland, and biodiversity. Planetary operates two evergreen funds. Its Venture Fund invests in companies developing long term solutions for an organic and regenerative food system operating within planetary boundaries. Its Soil Fund acquires degraded farmland in Denmark and partners with farmers and entrepreneurs who want to restore the land through regenerative agriculture, rewilding, and nature restoration. The firm was founded in 2019 and made its first portfolio investment in 2020. Its portfolio includes businesses working across food production, agricultural technology, soil health, biological inputs, circular packaging, alternative ingredients, and ecosystem restoration. Planetary takes a long term approach designed around the time required to build resilient businesses and restore natural systems. Its evergreen funds do not follow the traditional venture capital cycle of raising a fund, pursuing rapid exits, and returning capital within a fixed period. Planetary also operates without carried interest, which it believes reduces pressure to prioritize short term financial gains over lasting environmental value. The firm is commercially oriented and expects its investments to be financially sound. However, it defines value more broadly than financial return alone, considering environmental health, human wellbeing, biodiversity, resilient communities, and the needs of future generations.
Environment & ConservationSustainable Food & Agriculture
Prime Coalition logo
Prime Coalition
Impact Fund, Grantmaker
Prime Coalition is a Cambridge, Massachusetts nonprofit that helps philanthropists deploy catalytic capital into climate solutions that conventional investors often skip. Since 2014, Prime has focused on additionality: filling gaps where technology risk, long timelines, or first-of-a-kind infrastructure make ordinary venture or project finance a poor fit. The organization stewards impact-first programs rather than acting as a classic closed-end VC. That includes earlier vehicles such as Prime Impact Fund and Azolla Fund I (managed with Azolla Ventures), plus Trellis Climate for first-of-a-kind climate infrastructure projects that need risk-tolerant capital to reach commercial scale. Public materials cite on the order of $108M in catalytic capital into Prime programs and about $2.8B in external capital crowded in, with dozens of companies supported through impact-first funds. Prime's role in the ecosystem is bridge and standard-setter. It evaluates impact and additionality, helps philanthropists make their first catalytic investments, and publishes tools and field-building resources (including work around Project Frame). For founders, Prime is less a cold outbound check source and more a signal that your solution needs catalytic capital and can prove climate impact that markets alone will not fund yet. If you are building a breakthrough climate company or FOAK project that stalls in the valley between philanthropy and commercial capital, Prime is the kind of steward that exists to close that gap.
Built EnvironmentClean EnergyClimate Tech