The Energy Mix

Top Menu

  • About
  • Latest Digest/Archive
  • Partners
  • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Contact

Main Menu

  • News Archive by Category
    • Climate & Society
      • Carbon Levels & Measurement
      • Carbon-Free Transition
      • Climate Action/”Blockadia”
      • Climate Denial & Greenwashing
      • Climate Policy/Meetings/Negotiations
      • Culture, Curiosities, & Humour
      • Demographics
      • Energy Politics
      • Energy Subsidies
      • Energy/Carbon Pricing & Economics
      • Finance & Investment
      • First Peoples
      • Insurance & Liability
      • International Agencies & Studies
      • Jobs & Training
      • Legal & Regulatory
      • Media, Messaging, & Public Opinion
      • Methane
      • Travel, Leisure & Recreation
    • Climate Impacts & Adaptation
      • Biodiversity & Habitat
      • Drought, Famine & Wildfires
      • Food Security
      • Forests & Deforestation
      • Health & Safety
      • Heat & Temperature
      • Human Rights & Migration
      • Ice Loss & Sea Level Rise
      • International Security & War
      • Severe Storms & Flooding
      • Soil & Natural Sequestration
      • Water
    • Demand & Distribution
      • Air & Marine
      • Auto & Alternative Vehicles
      • Batteries/Storage
      • Buildings
      • Cities
      • Electricity Grid
      • Energy Access & Equity
      • Off-Grid
      • Petrochemicals & Plastics
      • Supply Chains & Consumption
      • Transit
      • Walking & Biking
    • Jurisdictions
      • Africa
      • Arctic & Antarctica
      • Asia
      • Australia
      • Brazil
      • Canada
      • China
      • Europe
      • India
      • International
      • Mexico, Caribbean & Latin America
      • Middle East
      • Oceans
      • Small Island States
      • South & Central America
      • Sub-National Governments
      • United States
    • Non-Renewable Energy
      • CCS & Negative Emissions
      • Coal
      • Nuclear
      • Oil & Gas
      • Pipelines/Rail Transport
      • Shale & Fracking
      • Tar Sands/Oil Sands
    • Opinion & Analysis
    • Renewable Energy
      • Bioenergy
      • Demand & Efficiency
      • General Renewables
      • Geothermal
      • Hydrogen
      • Hydropower
      • Research & Development
      • Solar
      • Wave & Tidal
      • Wind
  • Special Reports
    • Alberta’s Bitumen Pipe Dream
    • Canada’s Drive to Net Zero
    • Carbon Farming
    • City and Sub-National Action
    • Drawdown
    • Drive to 1.5
    • 26-Week Climate Transition Program for Canada
    • America’s Electoral Climate 2020
    • Canada’s Climate Change Election 2019
    • The Energy Mix Yearbook 2018
      • Climate Extremes
      • Fossils Go For Broke
      • Renewables (R)Evolution
      • Electric Vehicles
      • Canada’s Contradiction
      • COP24
      • Pipeline Politics
      • Jobs and Just Transition
      • Cities and Sub-Nationals
      • Finance and Divestment
      • Climate Litigation
  • Webinars & Podcasts
  • About
  • Latest Digest/Archive
  • Partners
  • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Contact
  • Subscribe
  • Donate

logo

  • News Archive by Category
    • Climate & Society
      • Carbon Levels & Measurement
      • Carbon-Free Transition
      • Climate Action/”Blockadia”
      • Climate Denial & Greenwashing
      • Climate Policy/Meetings/Negotiations
      • Culture, Curiosities, & Humour
      • Demographics
      • Energy Politics
      • Energy Subsidies
      • Energy/Carbon Pricing & Economics
      • Finance & Investment
      • First Peoples
      • Insurance & Liability
      • International Agencies & Studies
      • Jobs & Training
      • Legal & Regulatory
      • Media, Messaging, & Public Opinion
      • Methane
      • Travel, Leisure & Recreation
    • Climate Impacts & Adaptation
      • Biodiversity & Habitat
      • Drought, Famine & Wildfires
      • Food Security
      • Forests & Deforestation
      • Health & Safety
      • Heat & Temperature
      • Human Rights & Migration
      • Ice Loss & Sea Level Rise
      • International Security & War
      • Severe Storms & Flooding
      • Soil & Natural Sequestration
      • Water
    • Demand & Distribution
      • Air & Marine
      • Auto & Alternative Vehicles
      • Batteries/Storage
      • Buildings
      • Cities
      • Electricity Grid
      • Energy Access & Equity
      • Off-Grid
      • Petrochemicals & Plastics
      • Supply Chains & Consumption
      • Transit
      • Walking & Biking
    • Jurisdictions
      • Africa
      • Arctic & Antarctica
      • Asia
      • Australia
      • Brazil
      • Canada
      • China
      • Europe
      • India
      • International
      • Mexico, Caribbean & Latin America
      • Middle East
      • Oceans
      • Small Island States
      • South & Central America
      • Sub-National Governments
      • United States
    • Non-Renewable Energy
      • CCS & Negative Emissions
      • Coal
      • Nuclear
      • Oil & Gas
      • Pipelines/Rail Transport
      • Shale & Fracking
      • Tar Sands/Oil Sands
    • Opinion & Analysis
    • Renewable Energy
      • Bioenergy
      • Demand & Efficiency
      • General Renewables
      • Geothermal
      • Hydrogen
      • Hydropower
      • Research & Development
      • Solar
      • Wave & Tidal
      • Wind
  • Special Reports
    • Alberta’s Bitumen Pipe Dream
    • Canada’s Drive to Net Zero
    • Carbon Farming
    • City and Sub-National Action
    • Drawdown
    • Drive to 1.5
    • 26-Week Climate Transition Program for Canada
    • America’s Electoral Climate 2020
    • Canada’s Climate Change Election 2019
    • The Energy Mix Yearbook 2018
      • Climate Extremes
      • Fossils Go For Broke
      • Renewables (R)Evolution
      • Electric Vehicles
      • Canada’s Contradiction
      • COP24
      • Pipeline Politics
      • Jobs and Just Transition
      • Cities and Sub-Nationals
      • Finance and Divestment
      • Climate Litigation
  • Webinars & Podcasts
Advanced Search
Batteries/StorageCanadaCitiesDemand & EfficiencyElectricity GridFinance & InvestmentOff-GridSolarWind
Home›Demand & Distribution›Batteries/Storage›Buyout by Vancity Brings New Financial Clout to Green Bond Provider CoPower

Buyout by Vancity Brings New Financial Clout to Green Bond Provider CoPower

November 11, 2019
November 11, 2019
 
132
0
Share:
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  Print This Story
hpgruesen/ Pixabay

Vancity Community Investment Bank has announced plans to acquire CoPower Inc., a Toronto-based green financing platform that offers green bonds to investors with as little as C$5,000 to spend.

The deal gives CoPower access to a pool of a half-million potential customers through one of the country’s biggest credit unions, National Observer reports, while helping Vancity expand its sustainable financing operations.

Like this story? Subscribe to The Energy Mix and never miss an edition of our free e-digest.

SUBSCRIBE

“When the opportunity came up to acquire (CoPower), we thought, ‘Wow, we get the instant team, we get the brand recognition, we get the great work they’ve done on the bond platform.’ It fits within the sphere of the things that we are looking to do in the bank,” VCIB CEO Jay-Ann Gilfoy told Observer. “It just seemed like a natural sort of extension of what we were already doing.”

“Vancity is similarly focused on using finance to solve big problems,” said CoPower co-founder David Berliner. “We’ll be able to do a lot more, faster.”

While CoPower has raised and invested about $30 million across more than 1,100 projects, Observer notes that Vancity has $27.4 billion in total assets or assets under management.

In its five years of operation, Observer says CoPower has focused its retail green bonds on “community-scale projects” involving solar panels, heat pumps, energy-efficient retrofits to residential and commercial properties, and energy storage, helping project developers to “ offset significant upfront equipment, installation, and other costs. The company’s investment is paid off over time as it pockets some or all of the initial cost savings.”

That kind of decentralized project “is increasingly the best bang for our buck,” Berliner said. “Instead of having one big power plant far away, sending electrons to a city, having solar and wind and geothermal and batteries integrated into the fabric of our community is where more investment dollars are going.”

The announcement “comes at a pivotal time, with proven technologies to help buildings and communities reduce their energy consumption or generate their own feed power in the market—but with limited financing to accelerate their deployment,” Observer adds. “Gilfoy said part of the problem is that banks are almost exclusively geared to use money to create more money.”

“Our goal is actually to make sure that things are starting to shift and change in the world that make it a better place to live,” she said. “Our goal, clear and simple, is to get money that doesn’t normally flow into where it’s needed.”

Observer goes into detail on the projects CoPower has funded to date and the new investments it may now be able to undertake.

Share:
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  Print This Story

Find more stories about
Batteries/StorageCanadaCitiesDemand & EfficiencyElectricity GridFinance & InvestmentOff-GridSolarWind

    Leave a reply Cancel reply

    Recent Posts

    • Shareholders Squirm, Climate Analysts Pounce as Shell Releases ‘Grotesque’, ‘Delusional’ Climate Plan
      Shareholders Squirm, Climate Analysts Pounce as Shell Releases ‘Grotesque’, ‘Delusional’ Climate Plan
      February 15, 2021
    • Wilkinson, McCarthy Hold First Talks on Cross-Border Climate Action
      Wilkinson, McCarthy Hold First Talks on Cross-Border Climate Action
      February 15, 2021
    • Valentine’s Day Campaign, New Research Highlight B.C. Subsidies to Top Fracking Companies
      Valentine’s Day Campaign, New Research Highlight B.C. Subsidies to Top Fracking Companies
      February 15, 2021
    • Appalachia Counties Lose Jobs, Population Despite Massive Fracking Boom
      Appalachia Counties Lose Jobs, Population Despite Massive Fracking Boom
      February 15, 2021
    • 1930s Jobs Program Holds Mixed Lessons for Biden’s U.S. Climate Corps
      1930s Jobs Program Holds Mixed Lessons for Biden’s U.S. Climate Corps
      February 15, 2021

    News Feed

    Top News

    • Trudeau Rejects NAFTA Challenge Over Keystone Cancellation
      February 14, 2021
    • Court Agrees to Delay Decision on Dakota Access Pipeline Shutdown
      February 14, 2021

    Read More

    Carbon-Free Transition

    • Southern Australia Averages 60% Renewable Grid Over 12 Months
      February 14, 2021
    • SolarAid Delivers Radios for Vulnerable Students in Malawi
      February 14, 2021

    Read More

    Canada

    • Trudeau Rejects NAFTA Challenge Over Keystone Cancellation
      February 14, 2021
    • Squamish Nation Plans Sustainable Community for 9,000
      February 14, 2021

    Read More

    U.S.

    • Court Agrees to Delay Decision on Dakota Access Pipeline Shutdown
      February 14, 2021
    • Chevron’s Richmond Oil Refinery Spills 600 Gallons into San Francisco Bay
      February 14, 2021

    Read More

    International

    • South Korea Lays Out $43B Plan for World’s Biggest Offshore Wind Farm
      February 14, 2021
    • Australia Amps Up Collections for Solar Panel Recycling Project
      February 14, 2021

    Read More

    • About the Energy Mix
    • Contact
    • Privacy Policy and Copyright
    Copyright 2020 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.