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Why Partner with Us? 

• Capital: We offer flexible and risk-tolerant capital through a number of different funding vehicles and capital structures, taking a long-term perspective on building resilient circular supply chains.
• Expertise: We leverage our team’s industry knowledge and combine that with our research and solutions practice through the firm’s Center for the Circular Economy to accelerate the flow of capital from co-investors, which in turn helps our borrowers diversify their funding sources and supports their growth.
• Network: We have built an ecosystem that connects entrepreneurs, industry experts, global consumer goods and technology companies, retailers, foundations, financial institutions and municipalities. Our borrowers get exposure to this network, cultivating synergies and facilitating potential partnerships that can help scale businesses, for example through feedstock or offtake relationships, among other things.

What We Do

We finance replicable, scalable, and financially sustainable recycling infrastructure and innovation projects in the U.S. across five primary categories:

• Collection: New or expanded collection systems for household recyclables
• Sortation: New or expanded material recovery facilities that capture household recyclables
• Processing or Reclamation: New or expanded facilities that intake separated materials and use mechanical, chemical, thermal or biological means to prepare the recycled materials into raw materials
• End Product Manufacturing: The production of products or packaging that use recycled materials
• Enabling Technologies: Innovations that link nodes of the circular economy supply chain together, enhance the capability of processes to accept or incorporate recycled materials

How We Do It

• We provide zero interest loans to municipalities and below market rate loans to private companies.
• Typical loan size is $3-$5M over a 3-10 year term, with each loan secured by collateral.
• We invest in best-in-class operators who are leaders in their industry in the United States.

Our Investment Criteria

Applications are evaluated based on the following criteria:

• Project must be based in the U.S.
• Greenhouse gas emissions reduced/avoided
• Materials diversion from disposal
• Applicant’s ability to repay
• Replicability and scalability of the project or model
• Amount of increase in access to or participation in recycling
• Amount of increase in the recovery and/or reuse of post-consumer commodities (i.e., plastics, paper, glass, or metal)
• Economic benefit(s) to the community(ies) served by the project or company
• Ability for the applicant and/or project to leverage additional sources of capital

How Our Evaluation Process Works

• Applicant completes our online application form
• Our team evaluates the application against our criteria to determine potential fit
• We further evaluate the operational and financial details of the project and decide whether to proceed with funding
• If we decide to proceed with funding, we develop deal terms and present the deal to our advisory board and investment committee
• If approved, we proceed to close the deal and fund the project

What You Get, If Approved

Loan capital (with potential for follow-on investment), technical support and advice, access to our industry expertise and network, and promotion of your project as a case study example through our various communication channels.