Investors are chasing returns over ESG
What a fickle lot we are. New data to hand reveals that individual Australian investors are chasing investment returns from sectors such as US technology, cryptocurrency, uranium, nuclear energy and defence rather than investing in ESG. According to online portfolio tracker Sharesight, ESG-labelled funds have dropped 60 to 70 per cent in ranking on the platform’s top 250 investments between December 2021 and December 2025.
The platform says its users are being “measurably less ethical”, even though four years ago, ethical conscious funds were one of the most traded items. No ESG or ethical funds have appeared in the top traded holdings for the past 12 months to April 2026.
Morningstar Sustainalytics data found that the ESG risk score has risen from 21.2 to 24.8, meaning the instruments Australian investors are trading are carrying more environmental, social and governance risk in 2025 than they did in 2021.
EV chargers continue to dominate the market
This might be something the world’s newly discovered love affair with all things electric and renewable just might change that narrative.
EV charging company ReadySteadyPlug is the latest to receive funding from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA)’s Driving the Nation Fund – with $1.51 million to roll out 428 EV charge points in its charging as a service model. The charge points will be installed in apartment and strata buildings across Australia.
The platform will offer smartphone control, metering and automated billing for apartment residents as well as load management to manage the building’s electricity supply. Chief executive Jukka Sintonen said access to EV infrastructure has been a barrier to EV uptake, which is why it is offering a “pay as you go” affordable charging model to lower the cost and complexity of installing EV chargers.
EV could save drivers $2500 to $3000 dollars
There’s a good hip pocket reason for more interest in EVs. Recent data from Transport for NSW found that the big growth in EV uptake isn’t in the wealthy east but in outer suburbs such as Marden Park, Kellyville and Baulkham Hills.
That’s because these smart folks could save between $2500 and $3000 a year in running costs by making the switch to EV, according to Chau Le, general manager for e-mobility at Origin Energy and head of the EV Council. In the inner city, they’re seen more as a luxury, she said.
She added that “range anxiety” is now replaced by “petrol anxiety”, and the average Australian only drives 33 km a day, meaning conversation is now moving away from the distance an EV can go in a single charge towards money that can be saved.
This all adds up to the need for more stable policies on EVs, right? And more charging points in the burbs. You’d certainly think so.
From coconuts to cleaner air
A Swedish-based research startup, Adsorbi, is moving to commercialise its research with a new product, Arbomax, a bio-based filter media that lasts longer and has a lower carbon footprint than its competitors on the molecular air filtration market.
Market Intelo says the market is currently dominated by activated carbon filters, which capture gaseous contaminants in air purifiers and HVAC systems. There are also chemisorption filters, which rely on chemical reactions to neutralise pollutants and hybrid filters that use both.
The startup said its cellulose is made from coconut shell and coconut-derived carbon harvested from sustainably managed Nordic forests.
Football clubs are joining the sustainability train
NSW’s Liverpool Football Club reckons it’s now aligned with all 17 of the UN Sustainable Development Goals and has been focusing on education around the “life below water” goal by raising awareness of ocean health and sustainability for young people.
In its annual report, the club said it has achieved a 13 per cent reduction in overall carbon emissions compared to the 2019-20 baseline, and 96 per cent of operations are now powered by renewable energy. It is also fully offsetting travel impacts and investing in sustainable aviation fuel. Amongst other things, it has avoided 310,000 single use items by expanding its reusable scheme, introducing reusable cups and food containers. Well done, champs!
What we’re reading
Snowy 2.0 is a bust, but is it too late to turn back?
Economist Bruce Mountain and former energy executive Ted Woodley have poked a huge hole in the rosy expectations around Snowy Hydro 2.0.
Costs have ballooned 2000 per cent to $42 billion, they told The Australian on Monday, which includes $20 billion on direct construction costs, $8 billion in interest charges over its 15-year build time, and $12 billion in Snowy’s use of transmission infrastructure, including HumeLink and VNI West.
Interest costs were a big factor, and now global ratings agency S&P warned it would downgrade some of Snowy Hydro’s debt.
Spokespeople for the project said these figures were estimated by “individuals not involved in the project” who had no idea of the cost reassessment underway.
Nexa Advisory chief executive Stephanie Bashir, however, said these figures don’t account for the benefits of the new wind generation into the grid. Despite being a longtime critic of the project, she said it’s too late to dump the project, and it should be a lesson for other major energy transition projects – that the nation’s energy transition can’t depend on random political decisions.
Tariffs are killing our housing goals
As construction costs continue to balloon for Australia, Crikey has taken aim at the Labor government’s continual increase of tariffs for imported steel, despite building costs projected to grow by another 10 per cent in the coming 12 months due to shortages in crucial products.
Given that a blast furnace at Whyalla Steelworks is out of action for several weeks, and InfraBuild uses semi-finished products from Whyalla, customers were warned of supply disruptions. But instead of procuring more supply, the government’s Anti-Dumping Commission (ADC) lifted tariffs on Chinese rebar imports to 23.7 per cent, Chinese steel bolts up to 35 per cent, along with a series of other tariffs in February.
Meanwhile, Australian businesses have been abusing the anti-dumping system, the publication said. More here.
Fiji: waste opportunity or dumping ground?
Wealthy Australians Ian Malouf and Robert Cromb want to build a waste-to-energy incinerator in Fiji, which would process 900,000 tonnes of non-recyclable garbage every year from Fiji, Australia, and other Pacific island nations at a new deepwater port. The two said it would meet a third of Fiji’s energy demands and create 1000 jobs in construction and generate enough power for a new industrial park, while reducing its reliance on diesel imports.
Locals and the government are vehemently opposed to the idea, including the nearby village of Lauwaki, which has custodial responsibility for the area’s coast and waters, where opposition at a community meeting was universal.
The Herald points to waste-to-energy incinerators in Helsinki, Finland, and in Copenhagen, where these plants have “no obvious pollution from their chimneys and no odour”. It said burning waste solves land use and produces less greenhouse gas than when rubbish decays in a landfill. More here.
Jobs
Hickory ups the ante with a top appointment
Hickory has appointed former Melbourne Lord Mayor Sally Capp, as its chief strategy officer. Capp was previously on the company’s advisory board and is currently a non-executive director at Cool.org and the faculty of business and economics at the University of Melbourne.