Author: Robert Rubinstein

The Global Voice of ESG & Impact Investing

The Carbon Vacuum That Couldn't: How the World's Smartest Banks Paid to Watch a Machine Sneeze

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George Carlin once said the planet doesn't need saving; the planet is fine. It's the people who are fucked. He was talking about a different kind of delusion, but he might as well have been watching a Climeworks investor deck.

I've spent thirty years in the impact space. Thirty years of watching money that was supposed to change the world get dressed up in language that would make a marketing professor weep with joy. I've seen greenwashing dressed as strategy, incrementalism sold as transformation, and now, in what may be the purest expression of wishful thinking the financial sector has ever produced, I am watching the world's largest banks write checks to a machine in Switzerland and Iceland that is, by its own operational math, a net carbon emitter.

Let me say that again. A company whose entire business model is removing carbon from the atmosphere has been, in documented periods, adding more carbon to the sky through its corporate operations than its machines are taking out. And the response from the financial establishment? More agreements. More press releases provide "the illusion of choice dressed up as progress."

The Guest List at the World's Most Expensive Dinner Party

Let's give credit where it's due. The agreement roster is extraordinary in its ambition and its scope. These are not small actors.

JPMorgan Chase signed a nine-year, $20 million purchase agreement for 25,000 metric tons of carbon removal. Morgan Stanley committed to 40,000 tons stretching out to 2037, their first direct air capture deal, which was celebrated as a landmark. TD Bank signed a 10-year agreement announced in June 2026. UBS is locked in a 10-year removal deal. Swiss Re signed what was breathlessly promoted as the world's first long-term direct air capture purchase agreement. Boston Consulting Group went further than any of them, a 15-year strategic partnership for 80,000 metric tons, the largest corporate buyer commitment in Climeworks' history. NTT DATA Group came aboard in April 2026.

And the corporate world didn't stop at finance and consulting. Stripe signed up. Microsoft. Shopify. H&M Group. SAP is committed to 33,500 tons. Schneider Electric pledged 31,000 tons.

This is, on paper, an impressive coalition of institutional credibility. In practice, it is the most expensive proof of concept ever assembled for a technology that is currently operating at 0.3% of its claimed capacity.

These agreements reveal everything you need to know, not about the climate, but about how elite institutions manage their reputations.

What the Journalists in Iceland Found Out

Here is what the press conferences did not cover. Investigative reporters at Heimildin, the Icelandic news outlet that actually bothered to audit what was happening on the ground rather than in the boardrooms, dug into Climeworks' own carbon accounting and found something remarkable in its ugliness.

In 2023, Climeworks' global corporate operations, the flights to climate summits, the infrastructure, the expansion activity, and the administrative machinery of a company that had raised hundreds of millions of dollars produced approximately 1,700 metric tons of CO₂. Meanwhile, the lifetime atmospheric capture of Climeworks' Orca plant at that point sat at roughly 2,400 metric tons. Total. In its entire operational life.

The company's own internal corporate footprint was rapidly approaching, and in some accounting periods, surpassing its total atmospheric removal output. Heimildin didn't editorialize. They simply did the arithmetic that the corporate communications teams had conspicuously avoided. The machines weren't keeping up with the company's own travel schedule.

CleanTechnica then took the Heimildin data global. Their piece, "Climeworks' DAC & Fiscal Collapse & The Brutal Reality Of Pulling Carbon From The Sky", was the kind of thorough, engineering-grounded autopsy the financial press should have been writing for years. Their finding on Mammoth, Climeworks' flagship plant, marketed at 36,000 tons per year capacity: 105 tons captured in its first year of operation. Not 3,600. Not 360. One hundred and five.

That is not a teething problem. That is not a commissioning delay. That is a 99.7% gap between marketing and reality. CleanTechnica called it what it was: "corporate theater wrapped in a green ribbon." And they were being polite.

The Orca That Couldn't Sing

Climeworks' first major plant was Orca. Its promotional capacity: 4,000 metric tons per year. Between 2021 and late 2024, across its entire operational lifespan, independent verification data showed it captured just over 2,400 tons in total. Not per year. Ever. That's roughly 60% of what was promised in a single year, delivered across three-plus years of operation.

I've spent decades telling people in the impact space that measurement matters. That if you can't measure it, you can't manage it, and you certainly can't be honest about it. Orca's numbers were measured. The people doing the measuring were not impressed.

Then came Mammoth, unveiled with the self-assurance of a TED Talk. Its design capacity: 36,000 tons annually. Its actual first-year performance: somewhere between 105 and 130 tons. They called it Mammoth. And it delivered like a mouse with a head cold.

In May 2025, Climeworks cut 22% of its workforce. The CEO called it "right-sizing." I call it what happens when the engineering report finally catches up to the fundraising deck.

The Physics Lesson Nobody Wanted to Take

The problem isn't execution. It isn't management. It isn't political will or regulatory frameworks or the right CEO incentive structure. The problem is physics, and physics doesn't negotiate.

CO₂ in the atmosphere sits at around 420 parts per million. That's 0.042% of every breath of air. Extracting a molecule that is diluted requires moving vast quantities of air, regenerating sorbent materials with heat at an industrial scale, and compressing the captured gas. The energy bill is ferocious. Current efficiency hovers around 8%. Costs per ton of removal, originally promised to hit $100 by 2030, have been revised to $300/ton, with actual operational costs tracking between $500 and $1,000 per ton. That figure includes what Climeworks recently described as a "halving" of costs, to $500, as a milestone worth celebrating.

The voluntary carbon market prices most nature-based solutions at $10 to $50 per ton. Protecting a hectare of primary forest sequesters carbon at costs measured in single digits. Soil carbon restoration. Regenerative agriculture. Coastal wetland recovery. These systems have been running for hundreds of millions of years without a Series C funding round or a press conference.

To scale DAC to one billion metric tons per year, a fraction of what is needed for atmospheric impact, would require approximately 100 gigawatts of dedicated clean energy capacity. That's roughly the entire current renewable energy output of the European Union. Redirected entirely to running CO₂ vacuums at 0.3% efficiency.

The thermodynamics are not a barrier to innovating around. They are a wall.

The License to Continue Problem

Here's what I've learned after thirty years of watching capital flow through the impact space: the most dangerous lie is not the outright fraud. The most dangerous lie is the one that lets you feel like you're solving the problem while continuing to create it.

JPMorgan committed $20 million to remove 25,000 tons over nine years. JPMorgan's financed emissions, the carbon embedded in its global lending and investment portfolio, run into hundreds of millions of tons annually. The Climeworks deal covers an amount that the bank likely finances in carbon in a matter of hours. Morgan Stanley's 40,000-ton commitment represents a rounding error against the emissions embedded in its own institutional activity.

BCG, which advises the corporations responsible for a vast share of global emissions, signed a 15-year partnership for 80,000 tons. BCG's consulting work generates far more than 80,000 tons of economic activity that emits carbon every single year.

I am not calling these actors villains. I am calling them human. Humans, especially those in boardrooms, are remarkably adept at devising mechanisms that enable them to continue their current behavior while believing they've addressed the criticism. Climeworks, whatever the intentions of its engineers and founders, has become the world's most expensive and sophisticated mechanism for exactly that.

They give you the illusion that you're doing something. It's like putting a bumper sticker on a gas guzzler that says 'I care about the environment.' Makes you feel great. Changes absolutely nothing.

What Integrity Actually Looks Like

The impact investment community built itself on the premise that you can align capital with outcomes. That you can measure what matters, hold institutions accountable, and redirect money toward the future rather than toward protecting the present.

I believe that premise. I have believed it for thirty years. But it requires us to be brutal about measurement. It requires us to say, out loud, in public, in front of the people signing the checks, that 105 tons is not 36,000 tons, and a company that flies its executives to Davos to talk about carbon removal while its own footprint outpaces its machines is not a climate solution. It is a very expensive conversation. However, no one likes to hear that their children are ugly. We need to speak the Radical Truth. ALWAYS.

The real solutions are not glamorous. Stopping deforestation. Protecting existing carbon sinks. Accelerating genuine emissions reductions at the source. Funding the nature-based systems that already know how to handle carbon, have been doing it for geological time, and can be supported at scale for a fraction of what we've spent on machines in Iceland that are , by the arithmetic of Heimildin's investigators, struggling to outperform the company's own travel budget.

The reason for the lack of massive money flows is very simple. It’s about the fees that the financial sector earns on Climate Tech transactions. It’s not about climate or carbon drawdown. I wish everyone involved would just say. I am a unicorn chaser, not a climate savior.

The atmosphere does not read press releases. It processes molecules. And every molecule we allow ourselves to believe is being removed while it isn't is a molecule we've written off, comfortably, in the knowledge that somebody somewhere has an agreement in place.

They don't. Not really. Not yet.

Robert Rubinstein is the founder of TBLI Group, one of the world's leading advocates for impact investing and the integration of ESG principles into mainstream capital allocation.

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Sources: Heimildin (Iceland) investigative reporting on Climeworks operational carbon accounting; CleanTechnica, "Climeworks' DAC & Fiscal Collapse & The Brutal Reality Of Pulling Carbon From The Sky" (May 2025); third-party carbon verification data, 2021–2024; Climeworks corporate press releases and partnership announcements.

#ForestConservation#AvoidedDeforestation#Afforestation#Reforestation#NaturalForestRegeneration#RegenerativeAgriculture#SoilCarbonSequestration#Agroforestry#Silvopasture#SustainableLandManagement#PeatlandRestoration#WetlandRestoration#CoastalWetlandRecovery#MangroveRestoration#BlueCarbon#SeagrassRestoration#WatershedRestoration#BiodiversityConservation#EcosystemRestoration#CarbonSinkProtection#ClimateAdaptationThroughNature#SustainableForestry#LandscapeRestoration#NatureBasedCarbonRemoval#NaturalClimateSolutions

B Corp Asia Summit 2026-June 22-23, 2026

I'm excited to share that I'll be chairing this session-Where Capital Is Moving Now — Impact Investment & Finance Forum— and I can’t wait to be in the room with leaders from across Asia who are pushing this conversation forward.  B Corp Asia Summit 2026, taking place in Kuala Lumpur on 22–23 June! 

If you’re attending, come say hi. If you’re not yet registered, click the link below. Seats are limited.
https://bcorp-asia2026.bcorpsea.org/ 

Use this promo code: TBLI during registration and enjoy a special discount.

#BCorpAsiaSummit2026  #BusinessAsAForceForGood #Genashtim #BCorp

Aviation Clean-Tech Coalition Urges EU to Back Zero-Emission Flights in New Aviation Strategy

by ESG News Editorial Team 

• European clean aviation companies are calling for EU funding, regulation, and market incentives to support zero-emission and hybrid-powered aircraft.
• The coalition wants dedicated R&D support under FP10, industrialisation funding through the European Competitiveness Fund, and faster EASA certification capacity.
• Proposed reforms include greener airport slots, environmental charges, electric and hydrogen airport infrastructure, and stronger carbon pricing for fossil jet fuel.

Clean Aviation Push Lands in Brussels

Brussels is facing a direct call from Europe’s aviation clean-tech sector: make the EU the global base for zero-emission flight.

A coalition of European companies developing zero-emission and hybrid-powered aircraft, known as ZEHA, is urging the European Commission to place disruptive aircraft technologies at the centre of its upcoming Aviation Strategy. Many of these firms are new entrants trying to bring electric, hydrogen, and hybrid aircraft into commercial service.

Their argument is not only about climate. It is also about industrial policy, energy security, and Europe’s place in the next era of aviation.

The companies say zero-emission and hybrid aircraft can reduce aviation emissions, use domestic renewable electricity and green hydrogen, and help secure European technological leadership. They also warn that without a coordinated EU framework, promising technologies may struggle to move from labs and prototypes into commercial fleets.

Funding Must Target Breakthrough Technologies

The coalition is calling for public aviation R&D support to focus on high-risk, high-reward propulsion systems and aircraft designs. It argues that these technologies can deliver larger efficiency gains than incremental improvements to existing aircraft platforms.

A core proposal is to ringfence part of R&D funding under the EU’s next Multiannual Financial Framework. The coalition specifically points to the 10th Framework Programme, known as FP10, as a vehicle for backing new entrants.

These companies often depend on bringing breakthrough technologies to market. Yet they face high upfront costs, long certification timelines, and limited access to traditional aviation finance.

The coalition also wants stronger partnerships between smaller clean-tech companies and large incumbent aerospace groups. That could help scale new propulsion systems, aircraft components, and supply chains across Europe.

Industrialisation is another priority. The group says the European Competitiveness Fund should use instruments that attract private investment into clean aviation manufacturing. Support should cover both aircraft makers and European suppliers of components, systems, and sub-systems.

Certification capacity is also central. The coalition says the European Union Aviation Safety Agency must have enough resources to certify new propulsion technologies safely and on time. For investors, certification delays can become a material deployment risk.

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New Forests Launches A$1 Billion Global Natural Capital Fund

 Kenny Fisher June 15, 2026

Nature-based real assets-focused investment manager New Forests announced today the launch of its Global Landscape Opportunities (GLO) strategy, the firm’s first global natural capital fund, aimed at investing across forestry, agriculture, and complementary markets such as carbon and biodiversity.

The firm is seeking to raise A$1 billion (USD$707 million) for the new fund, according to media reports.

Founded in 2005, Sydney-based New Forests manages institutional investment funds in natural capital and nature-based real assets such as forests, agricultural land, carbon projects, conservation areas, and related infrastructure.

According to the company, the new fund is designed to provide institutional investors with access to a globally diversified portfolio of natural capital assets, reflecting growing demand for investment strategies that can deliver long-term returns alongside environmental benefits.

Mark Rogers, Chief Executive Officer at New Forests, said:

“We are seeing strong investor demand for scalable, institutional strategies that provide diversified exposure to natural capital… Natural capital is increasingly recognised as a core component of resilient portfolios, offering the potential for long-term returns while supporting critical outcomes such as climate stability, biodiversity and sustainable land use.”

According to New Forests, the fund will provide investors with exposure to a single, globally integrated portfolio targeting natural capital investment opportunities. Under the proposed asset allocation, 60% to 80% of the portfolio will be invested in developed markets including the U.S., Canada, Europe, the UK, Australia and New Zealand; up to 30% in developed Latin American markets such as Brazil, Uruguay and Chile; and, a maximum of 20% in Southeast Asia, other Latin American regions and Africa.

The company said that the GLO strategy will invest across a broad spectrum of natural capital assets, including sustainable forestry assets, agricultural land and food production systems, carbon and climate-related investments, and biodiversity and ecosystem markets.

The company said that the fund, which is open for institutional investment only, is targeted at pension funds, insurance companies, family offices, endowments and foundations.

David Shelton, Global Head of Investments at New Forests, said:

“Natural capital offers a compelling investment proposition, with characteristics such as attractive long duration return profiles, inflation hedging, and low correlation to traditional asset classes. It also provides exposure to fundamental global demand for food, fibre, renewable energy and ecosystem services.”

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Chris Wright, the US energy secretary attends the 2026 infrastructure summit of government officials, corporate executives and labor leaders in Washington DC on 11 March 2026. Composite: Reuters

The rightwing campaign to control how US judges view the climate crisis

As cities and states sue big oil for billions in damages over allegations that it covered up the dangers of its products, rightwing organizations are attempting to discredit the wave of litigation. They claim the lawyers behind it are teaming up with an environmentally focused legal education non-profit to bias federal judges against oil companies.

But it is actually fossil fuel-backed organizations that are attempting to sway the judiciary in their favor, one of those law firms is countering. Evidence of this includes judicial seminars hosted by one such group featuring pro-industry speakers such as the current energy secretary, Chris Wright, in his former occupation as a fracking executive.

The stakes of this rightwing influence campaign could not be higher, said Kert Davies, director of special investigations at the Center for Climate Integrity. “The goal is to create an atmosphere around climate litigation that makes the issue seem politicized, or like something that judges should rule on cautiously,” he said. “If judges are led to believe that the cases are somehow too political, or that climate science is sketchy … they’re less likely to rule against defendants in climate lawsuits.”

For three years, Republican lawmakers have gone after the Washington DC-based non-profit Environmental Law Institute (ELI) and its Climate Judiciary Project, which holds seminars for lawyers and judges about the climate crisis. The project aims to provide “evidence-based judicial education about climate science and how it arises in the law”, according to ELI’s website.

But the Republican-led House judiciary committee claims that ELI has conducted “improper attempts … to influence federal judges”. The House judiciary chair, Jim Jordan of Ohio, and House judiciary subcommittee on courts chair, Darrell Issa of California, requested documents and information regarding the allegations in August, and formally launched an investigation into the group this year.

Among the groups being investigated for alleged links to ELI is Sher Edling, a law firm that has filed more than two dozen climate deception lawsuits on behalf of states and municipalities against major fossil fuel companies. In a letter to the committee late last month which was provided to the Guardian, William Pittard, an attorney representing the firm, said: “There is nothing extraordinary, and certainly nothing nefarious, about Sher Edling’s touchpoints with ELI, which are minimal.”

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