CoPower, an online platform for clean energy investing, announced the closing in early December of its first investment: an energy retrofit at Harbourfront Centre (HFC), an arts and culture non-profit in downtown Toronto. The project claims to be the first energy efficiency retrofit investment in Canada to be completed through crowd-financing. Investors using CoPower’s platform will receive “competitive financial returns paid out of the savings from Harbourfront Centre’s energy bills,” the group says.
The deal was undertaken in 2013 in partnership with Toronto Atmospheric Fund (TAF), which paid $95,000 for a series of energy-efficiency improvements at HFC, including LED lighting and upgraded boilers that have reduced HFC’s utility costs and lowered their greenhouse gas emissions. The initiative allowed HFC to make energy improvements to its buildings without having to tie up its own capital. As a result of the project, HFC’s utility bill, and overall operating costs, have been reduced, allowing HFC to allocate more of its funds to programming. Part of the energy savings is used to pay back the initial investment.
Now, private investors from across Canada have refinanced the project using CoPower’s platform.
“Canadian investors are excited by the opportunity to invest their money in projects that offer a solid return, while also making a positive environmental and community impact,” says David Berliner, CEO of CoPower. “CoPower makes it easy by vetting projects and helping individuals pool their money into larger investments.”
CoPower is now working on making its platform accessible to the general public. “What CoPower is doing,” explains Berliner, “is democratizing clean energy investments and realizing projects that might not otherwise be completed.”