Research
Discover our catalytic capital and climate finance research, case studies, white papers, and reports.
Charting the FOAK Gap in a Shifting Landscape
Climate tech companies face a well-documented, persistent financing gap as they scale from technical demonstration to commercial scale. While the exact size of this gap is difficult to quantify, several analyses point toward global FOAK financing needs north of $125B. This funding gap consists of distinct FOAK and demonstration projects that will cost tens to hundreds of millions of dollars each. The report revisits the FOAK gap, including key literature to date — both our own and that of other thought leaders — and assesses proprietary data on project-level capital requirements. Despite headwinds, the climate ecosystem has the tools to fill the climate commercialization gap: catalytic philanthropic and government capital, in particular, can ensure critical climate solutions advance.
Barriers and Levers for Catalytic Capital in India
The report "Regulatory Barriers and Levers for Deploying Foreign Catalytic Capital in Impact-Focused Enterprises, Funds, & Facilities in India" is a collaborative effort led by Desai & Associates in partnership with Prime Coalition, with support from The Lemelson Foundation. It explores pathways, both direct and indirect, for channeling US and European catalytic capital into Indian social enterprises.
Additionality in Theory and Practice
For over a decade, Prime has led the way in catalyzing climate solutions that can mitigate or remove gigaton-scale emissions. Our latest white paper, “Additionality in Theory and Practice,” explores this core value that has shaped our work since 2014.
Climate Adaptation Funding in Africa
As Prime's Impact Fellow for Spring 2023, Chidalu Onyenso led a research paper on the funding challenges and opportunities for climate adaptation efforts in Africa. The research builds upon Prime's ongoing capacity-building efforts to address critical climate adaptation goals.
Resources for FOAK Project Preparation & Development
A guide on non-financial resources for first-of-a-kind (FOAK) project preparation & development, featuring readiness checklists, accelerators, workshops, project databases, and more.
Catalyzing Development of First-of-a-Kind Climate Projects
Prime Coalition's 2022 report highlighted the scaling issues climate startups face, especially in obtaining infrastructure finance. It pointed out the lack of capital to commercialize climate technologies, including development capital for pre-construction activities. In 2023, Trellis Climate examined this capital gap further, deploying philanthropic catalytic capital as a solution. This note summarizes the insights from Trellis' work.
Pre-Investment Considerations: Diving Deeper into Assessing Future Greenhouse Gas Impact
Project Frame released the latest methodology guidance for assessing forward-looking emissions impact.
Barriers to the Timely Deployment of Climate Infrastructure
To understand what exactly is needed for climate technologies to move beyond their hatchling stages into large-scale deployment, Prime Coalition, Schmidt Futures, and Blue Haven Initiative came together to launch a research project at Prime: Barriers to the Timely Deployment of Climate Infrastructure.
CRANE 2021 User Report
This report captures data and insights from interactions with users since CRANE’s release in April 2020.
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