MASCO Update June 2017
Dear Penguins
What a month! President Donald Trump has cemented his legacy with the announcement to pull his country out of the Paris Agreement and millions of negotiation hours flushed down the drain in a matter of minutes. Can we still find something positive about this unbelievable decision? Yes we can, and I personally think Trump could well emerge as our secret Climate Hero.
Our teams will, regardless of Trump, continue to be inspired about a more prosperous, low-carbon future. We’ve taken another big leap towards this vision and have very exciting news to share from within our very own penguin flock:
As announced, South Pole Group has entered into an agreement with US-based Institutional Shareholder Services (‘ISS’) to sell them the Climate Neutral Investments (CNI) business of South Pole Group. CNI will soon be rebranded into ISS Ethix Climate Change Advisors. This exciting journey started with incubating this new idea in 2010, to growing the market, to finally selling the successful business to a large financial industry player. This is an incredible milestone for South Pole Group – a milestone few companies ever reach – reconfirming our ability to continuously innovate in the dynamic sustainability solutions space. I’m very excited about the potential this unlocks for us in the space of sustainability data and advisory.
But there is more: This month also saw our Colombia-based team – supported by colleagues around the world and around the clock – make a fascinating move to capitalise on the short window of opportunity and capture part of the brand new Colombian carbon market. Until the end of June, airline operators were still able to buy international offsets for compliance. In the words of Christian Dannecker, “today, you will have a hard time finding a domestic flight in Colombia that is not offset by us.”
Last – but certainly not least: We are one step closer to launching our Asia Energy Transition Fund (AETF) – another monumental achievement for South Pole Group. The AETF will be our first renewable energy infrastructure fund, which will be able to invest equity in renewable energy, energy efficiency, and energy storage projects across Southeast Asia. South Pole Group will co-manage this fund along with SUSI Partners, a very experienced asset manager in Switzerland. We were also successful in finding a great professional to head the fund: Edgare Kerkwijk, AETF’s Managing Director, is based in Singapore and is one of Southeast Asia’s leading renewable energy investors. Among other achievements, he has developed Indonesia’s first wind park in South Sulawesi. You will hear more news about AETF very soon but until then, please keep this information confidential!
If nothing else, Mr. Trump seems to have sparked the Climate Hero in all of us!
Kind regards,
Renat Heuberger, CEO South Pole Group