E73: New venture capital for differentiated climate adaptation, with Darren Clifford, Founder and Managing Partner at Adapt[us] Capital

Listen in as Nick is joined by Darren Clifford, the Founder of Adapt [us] Capital, a new venture capital fund and venture builder focused on investing and building companies at the intersection of climate adaptation and scalable, profitable businesses.

In this episode, Nick and Darren discuss how the climate change, climate investment, and climate mitigation “moment” in 2025 requires new conversations, narratives, and solutions, including more focus on and concerted capital allocation to promoting adaptation-focused efforts alongside other mitigation strategies and innovation.

Nick and Darren also explore:

• Demand Adaptation vs. Resilience Adaptation: Drawing distinctions between "demand adaptation" (businesses and technologies that profitably fulfill emerging needs in a warming world, like air conditioning, cold supply chains, and climate-resilient vacation options) and "resilience adaptation" (efforts to avert loss, price risk, and enhance society’s coping mechanisms).
• Getting creative on narrative reframes: Darren and Nick reframe prevailing climate narratives, such as "net zero," advocating instead for optimizing humanity’s overall quality of life and letting go of concepts and targets that no longer serve. They also discuss the need to balance environmental priorities with social connectivity, economic opportunity, resilient infrastructure, and many other components that ladder up to well-being, recognizing that trade-offs between maximum sustainability and human quality of life are often unavoidable, if not necessary.
• Venture capital’s role in scaling adaptation: Nick prompts Darren to answer the “why venture” question, particularly with respect to how venture capital can support a more focused approach to, resource allocation for, and successful scaling of adaptation-focused businesses. This conversation also explores business model innovation, anticipated market sizes for climate adaptation solutions, and the evolving nature of deal flow in the digital and AI-powered world.

… and much more.

Timestamps:

00:01:37 - Introductions

00:05:41 – Distinguishing between demand adaptation and resilience adaptation

00:09:25 – Reframing outdated climate narratives like net zero

00:15:02 - Sustainability and human quality of life: intersections and trade offs

00:26:03 - Fund launch and investment strategy

00:28:12 - Market opportunities in demand-driven adaptation

00:36:05 - The future of demand-driven adaptation

Learn more about Darren’s work and keep up to date with Adapt [us] Capital on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/adapt-us-capital/

+ https://www.linkedin.com/in/djclif/

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