Environmental Technology & Greentech

Electrified transportation and renewable energy are by far the largest areas of investment in the global energy transition, with each receiving more than 600 billion U.S. dollars in 2023. Together, these two sectors accounted for almost three-quarters of total energy transition investment that year. Nevertheless, electrified transportation investment has been growing at a faster rate than renewable energy, owing to the surge in global EV adoption.

Cleantech, or climate tech, is a very dynamic industry, with new findings and discoveries shaping focus areas. One of the hottest topics in the field today is carbon removal (CDR) technologies, which refers to the process of removing CO₂ from the atmosphere and durably storing it away for decades, centuries, or millennia. The IPCC has recently stated that CDR will be critical to achieve net-negative CO₂ emissions and addressing climate change.

China is currently leading the global cleantech race, having outspent its competition and dominating the world’s manufacturing capacity for key transition technologies like wind systems and solar PV. China was by far the largest market for energy transition investment in 2023, accounting for almost 40 percent of the global total. There is expected to be fierce competition in the cleantech sector between China, the U.S., and the EU over the coming years as the race to net-zero intensifies.