Billionaire and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates is known for his special commitment to “green” innovations that help solve the problems caused by global climate change. Therefore, he is critical of US President Donald Trump’s policy aimed at supporting the fossil fuel industry.

But even though decarbonization is not currently among the White House’s priorities, this “does not cancel the commitment of the US and the whole world to the transition to clean energy.” “The current trend will not continue forever,” Bill Gates is sure.

His approach to the climate topic did not appear out of nowhere. In 2015, after the signing of the Paris Agreement, the businessman launched the Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV) fund, a large-scale initiative aimed at accelerating the development and implementation of innovations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The fund’s capital is more than $3.5 billion. This has turned Bill Gates into one of the most influential investors in the field of climate technologies. To date, BEV has supported more than 150 climate startups aimed at reducing carbon emissions.

Ukrainian Energy has figured out what the specifics of Bill Gates’ flagship fund are, and also collected information about the key projects that the businessman has bet on, supporting decarbonization and environmental protection.

Unique approach

In his book “How to Avert a Climate Catastrophe,” Bill Gates highlights two key figures: 51 billion tons of greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere annually, and zero, which the world must reach by 2050 in order to avoid irreversible climate change. He believes that although the task seems quite difficult, humanity can accomplish it without worsening the way of life in developed countries and continuing the fight against poverty.

The key concept introduced by Bill Gates is the green premium - the additional cost for a clean alternative. In some industries (solar and wind generation) it is already almost zero, in others (steel, cement, aviation) it is still too high. The task of business and politicians, as the businessman notes, is to join forces to reduce these premiums to a level acceptable even for developing countries.

“We need to increase both the “supply of innovation” and the “demand for innovation”. On the supply side, large research budgets are needed: scientists, universities, national laboratories should work on new ideas. Venture capitalists should also be ready to take risks, be patient, and invest a lot of money. And to stimulate demand, it is advisable to introduce large carbon taxes,” Bill Gates said.

The businessman himself chooses for financing “high-risk companies with strong potential” - that is, those that create fundamentally new solutions: from compact nuclear reactors and geothermal energy to the conversion of carbon into fuel or plastic.

According to the official BEV website, the fund provides financing in five critical sectors: electricity (new “green” sources and storage technologies), transport (alternative fuels), manufacturing (low-carbon materials), construction (energy efficiency), agriculture (reduction of emissions from soils, livestock, etc.). The fund’s feature is that it is able to support complex innovative startups for a period of up to 20 years instead of the traditional 5-7 years that are common in this area.

Breakthrough technologies

Despite the scale of the challenges associated with climate change and decarbonization, Bill Gates remains an optimist. “Yes, it is very difficult - all countries must participate. But I survived the digital revolution. “Everything we dreamed of has become a reality. I don’t have proof, but I believe we can achieve zero emissions by 2050 if we invest in innovation and implementation, create the right incentives,” he says.

The companies BEV is funding cover a wide range of technologies. But the vast majority of them are in nuclear power, long-term energy storage, critical materials mining and processing, and carbon capture and storage.

Here are the five projects that have received the most support from the Bill Gates Foundation over the past decade.

Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS)

Scope: Fusion

Investment: $1.8 billion (2021)

Stage: First prototype construction

CFS is working on a compact fusion reactor called SPARC, which uses high-temperature superconducting magnets. The project aims to achieve a positive energy balance (i.e., the reactor produces more energy than it consumes). One of the project’s co-investors is the Italian energy corporation Eni.

As of 2025: Test magnetic systems have been completed, the SPARC reactor is scheduled to be launched by 2028, with commercial operation by 2035.

TerraPower

Scope: Nuclear Energy

Investment: Over $1 billion

Stage: Demonstration Reactor Construction

The company is developing the Natrium project, an innovative nuclear reactor that uses liquid sodium as a coolant and has an energy storage system based on molten salt. The developers claim that their project allows them to flexibly respond to changing needs of the electricity grid and integrate with renewable energy sources. TerraPower aims to prove the effectiveness of the new technology and its safety as an alternative to coal-fired plants. Gates has invested more than $1 billion in this project, and another $2 billion has been provided by the US Department of Energy.

As of 2025: the reactor is being built in the city of Kemmerer, Wyoming, with all work expected to be completed in 2030. TerraPower is also working on training personnel and locating suppliers.

Redwood Materials

Scope: Battery Recycling

Investment: $700 million (2021)

Stage: Commercial Scaling/Supply to Large Customers

The company is building a fully closed-loop battery and electronics recycling chain to recover lithium, cobalt, and nickel, which are then reused in production based on the principle of a circular economy.

As of 2025: Two industrial sites in the US, in Nevada and South Carolina, have been launched; materials are being supplied to Tesla, Ford, Panasonic; work is underway to expand production capacity to serve more customers.

KoBold Metals

Scope: Mining / AI

Investment: $537 million (2023)

Stage: Active exploration and scale-up

KoBold uses AI algorithms to identify deposits of critical metals needed in battery production.

As of 2025: Mineral exploration continues in Zambia, Canada, Australia; agreements with government partners in place; preparation for mining at the first full-scale facility in Africa, scheduled to begin by 2027.

Boston Metal

Scope: Metallurgy (steelmaking)

Investment: $262 million (2023)

Stage: Pilot production / scale-up

Boston Metal is developing an electrolytic technology for CO₂-free steelmaking. In addition to Bill Gates, the project was invested by the metallurgical corporation ArcelorMittal.

As of 2025: a pilot plant for the production of ferroalloys is operating in Brazil; a demonstration plant for stainless steel is under construction in Massachusetts; production is expected to be scaled up after 2026.

Corporate Innovations

In addition to large-scale financing, which can reach several hundred million dollars, BEV also allocates smaller amounts of money to climate startups. For example, its sphere of interests includes Fervo Energy, which uses horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing technologies borrowed from the oil industry to extract geothermal energy. In 2023, it launched a pilot project in Nevada with a capacity of 3.5 MW, which became the first in the world to use horizontal wells in a geothermal system. BEV financing is $11 million.

Canadian startup Deep Sky has received $40 million from Breakthrough Energy to establish a direct carbon capture (DAC) technology testbed in Alberta, Canada. This should help develop technologies that remove CO₂ directly from the air, an important step in the fight against climate change.

Franco-American startup Dioxycle is developing an electrolyzer that converts carbon dioxide and water into ethylene, a key raw material for the production of plastics. This process allows to reduce dependence on fossil fuels and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. In 2023, the company raised $17 million from a group of investors, including BEV.

Bill Gates’ latest investment, which became widely known, concerns the American company Exowatt, founded in 2023 in Miami. It develops modular thermal energy storage systems that use concentrated solar energy to provide uninterrupted power to data centers and other energy-intensive facilities. In April 2025, Exowatt raised $70 million to commercialize the technology. In addition to BEV, the project has been backed by several venture capital funds, as well as Open AI founder Sam Altman and actor Leonardo DiCaprio.

But in addition to investing in climate innovation, radical changes in traditional corporate practices must also contribute to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. As Gordon Brown, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in 2007-2010, notes, governments in all countries need to introduce new reporting standards. “New laws should ensure that businesses, especially multinational corporations, disclose their carbon footprints, keep balanced accounting that reveals the full environmental cost of their activities, and publish plans for the transition to a clean economy with zero carbon emissions,” he concluded, commenting on Bill Gates’ ambitions to support climate technologies.

Svitlana Dolinchuk, specially for "Ukrainian Energy"