Green Mission Money: How Foundations Can Position Endowments for Climate

The report argues that foundations must move beyond vague sustainability principles to adopt coherent, climate-aligned investment strategies. It emphasizes that reducing portfolio emissions alone is insufficient for real-world impact; instead, foundations should employ a mix of capital allocation and stewardship strategies to support the transformation of the broader economy, including maintaining investments in essential high-emissions sectors to facilitate their transition.

• Most foundations currently lack coherent, climate-aligned investment strategies, frequently relying on sustainability principles that are non-binding or vague.
• Reducing emissions within an investment portfolio does not necessarily result in real-world climate impact. Meaningful progress requires investment strategies that actively support the decarbonisation of the broader economy, which may involve remaining invested in high-emissions sectors that are essential but difficult to decarbonise to avoid slowing the transition.
• Public finance is necessary to attract private capital and bridge the investment gap in areas where climate-related investments are perceived as having low returns or high risk.

APA

NewClimate Institute (2025). Green Mission Money: How Foundations Can Position Endowments for Climate. http://www.newclimate.org/resources/publications/green-mission-money-how-foundations-can-position-endowments-for-climate

Chicago

NewClimate Institute. Green Mission Money: How Foundations Can Position Endowments for Climate. 2025. http://www.newclimate.org/resources/publications/green-mission-money-how-foundations-can-position-endowments-for-climate.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=NewClimate Institute |title=Green Mission Money: How Foundations Can Position Endowments for Climate |date=28 May 2025 |url=http://www.newclimate.org/resources/publications/green-mission-money-how-foundations-can-position-endowments-for-climate |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{newclimateinstitute2025green, author = {{NewClimate Institute}}, title = {{Green Mission Money: How Foundations Can Position Endowments for Climate}}, institution = {NewClimate Institute}, year = {2025}, month = may, url = {http://www.newclimate.org/resources/publications/green-mission-money-how-foundations-can-position-endowments-for-climate}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }