Montréal, Canada
The Sustainable Finance & Investing Forum, held alongside Greenbuild 2026 in New York under the theme Invest for Impact, brought LPs, GPs, institutional investors, lenders, insurers, and senior real estate leaders together to examine how climate risk is reshaping investment decisions. I attended the second day only, on October 21.
This was the second event I have attended on the subject in less than a month, and together they show clearly how the industry has evolved and continues to evolve. At New York Climate Week, the discussions were around the shifts the industry needs to make, from backward looking ESG reporting to green transformation as a value engine, from static reporting to decision grade data, and from financial leverage to operational alpha among them. At Climate Week, these were presented as an argument. This time, most investors appeared to be well underway to integrating them as best practice.
The keynote connected energy, urbanization, infrastructure, and climate risk to the future of buildings and cities. The panel that resonated with me the most, An Investor, Lender, Insurer, and Owner Walk into a Risk Profile, followed right after. It examined how each part of the capital stack assesses and prices climate and transition risk, and showed three ways practice is advancing. First, capital allocation is becoming more precise. Investors and owners are moving beyond portfolio level screening to asset specific analysis, which is where underwriting actually happens. Second, measurement is becoming practical. Putting a number on climate risk is still complex, but better data and technology are making it possible to quantify risk at the level of a single building, and a risk that can be quantified consistently can be priced consistently. Third, and most important, the industry is recognizing that resilience has to be proven in partnership. Real estate cannot demonstrate the return on resilience alone. It has to work with the insurance industry to show that resilience reduces losses and should be recognized in how assets are insured and valued.
Subsequent sessions examined the intersection of digital infrastructure and the energy transition, underscoring how power availability, grid resilience and long‑term utility strategy are becoming central to capital allocation in one of real estate’s most capital‑intensive sectors, and how data centers, once viewed primarily through a technology lens, are now deeply tied to regional energy planning and climate‑related constraints. They also explored how intelligence embedded throughout the asset and investment lifecycle, from acquisition screening to operational performance to exit, supports more resilient portfolios and stronger market positioning. The session Allocation of Capital, Hosted by the Pension Real Estate Association was equally compelling: it added the institutional investor view, showing how climate exposure, liquidity, regulation, and execution capability are shaping manager selection, and where misalignment between funds and GPs is emerging. It is the same misalignment our panel addressed at New York Climate Week, now visible in how investors choose their managers.
The key takeaway: it has been a very positive surprise to see how quickly the industry in North America is advancing. Best practice is deepening, bringing climate risk out of compliance and into underwriting, refining analysis from the portfolio to the individual asset, and replacing fragmented efforts with coordinated engagement across the capital stack.
Alexandra is President of Alexandra Capital, an advisory firm providing consulting services in asset and portfolio management for real assets across Canada, the US and the UK, and the Founder of SAM Curated. Alexandra and her practice combine practical experience with research‑based insights on sustainable investing, asset and portfolio management, valuation and next gen, drawing on current studies and on original research and content they publish regularly to deliver tailored advice to their clients. She is frequently invited to speak at industry conferences and sits on the RICS Governing Council.
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