It’s tempting to assume that an investment vehicle offering exposure to environmentally sustainable projects or companies will somehow lack some of capitalism’s razor-sharp drive for profit and returns. That would be a mistake, particularly when investors can pick and choose from an array of funds and trusts that purport to respond to their desire to place their money “ethically”.
Among the oldest of these is Impax Environmental Markets, an investment trust that has been going since 2002. It was set up and is managed by Impax Asset Management, a firm founded in 1998 with backing from the International Finance Corporation, part of the World Bank.
The trust’s brief is to give shareholders exposure to growth in the markets for cleaner and more efficient energy,