This summary was prepared by Hamed Kioumarsi, EBM at Springer Nature, in collaboration with Kambis Kohansal Vajargah (Austrian Federal Economic Chamber, Vienna, Austria) and Tetyana Kohansal (Austrian Federal Economic Chamber, Vienna, Austria).
Citation: Kioumarsi, H., Kohansal Vajargah, K., & Kohansal, T. (2026). Startups for a Sustainable Future: Entrepreneurship in the Age of Climate Change. Springer Nature Communities. https://go.nature.com/4fJUv5R
Climate change affects virtually every aspect of our lives and the planet, including wildlife, biodiversity, agriculture, human health, and businesses. As a multifaceted global challenge, it requires a multidisciplinary approach that brings together diverse expertise, innovative solutions, and collaborative efforts across scientific disciplines and sectors. Climate change has turned out to be an important economic, technological and social problem of the modern era. Increasing temperatures, extinction of species, scarcity of resources, and regularity of weather extremities affect food security, energy sectors, processes of urbanization, and industrial production around the world. At the same time, all these aspects become the source of innovation and development of new technologies. But it is also necessary to pay attention to the role played by entrepreneurs in this process, since startups dealing with climate change are very flexible and adaptive to the new challenges.
Green entrepreneurship is a type of economic activities which provides value generation while counterbalancing the ecological price via sustainable practices, innovations and innovations in goods and services. The idea of green entrepreneurship goes beyond profit maximization and encompasses the broader societal contribution of entrepreneurial activity. Startups pursue green entrepreneurship to satisfy increasing demands for low-carbon products.
Climate change along with its economic and social implications and the trends in regulation and consumers' behavior is among the reasons why there is an increase in green entrepreneurship. Policy measures, changes in capital flow and the consumer behavior create a perfect environment for emergence and growth of climate-oriented businesses both startups and corporations in various industries such as renewable energy, sustainable food system and transportation. These companies are flexible and they apply disruptive technology to create revolutionary products in order to change the industry and create a low-carbon economy.
In particular, the area of renewable energy experiences a significant increase in startups which attempt to solve the problem of carbon neutrality and climate resilience. The number of startups that develop innovative technologies such as AI and IoT to solve the problem of power generation, distribution and consumption has dramatically increased. The innovations help to improve the process of energy production and make it more sustainable and distributed.
Another industry with numerous possibilities for environmentally-minded entrepreneurs is agriculture. The emergence of precision farming through the application of new technologies helped promote more sustainable and efficient farming while keeping the environmental footprint of this industry at a minimum level. Climate-smart technologies and services allow to tackle such issues as climate-caused failures of crops, lack of water resources, and other severe weather conditions. At the same time, various startup projects allow to diversify the agricultural industry and provide food security with the use of modern technologies like cellular agriculture and precision livestock farming. All those innovations allow for climate change mitigation by decreasing greenhouse gas emissions.
Yet another business sphere with many possibilities for eco-entrepreneurs is a circular economy. Unlike linear economy where people buy, use, and dispose of goods, circular economy allows for reusing and recycling of those to decrease the amount of waste produced and decrease the use of resources. Many startups provide the necessary infrastructure for circular economy by creating digital platforms that sell reclaimed materials and machinery, as well as repairing goods.
Investment attraction is the most important feature of a startup business. Sustainable innovation is becoming more popular within different industries because of venture capitalists, impact investors, institutional investors, and governments interested in investing money into environmentally friendly projects. The Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) standards are becoming more popular in general due to the benefits that investors receive from sustainable investments. Furthermore, accelerators, incubators, government programs, and grants allow for the creation of innovative companies by offering management and technical skills as well as new markets.
In spite of the opportunities mentioned above, many green startups face some challenges that influence negatively their ability to expand and attract financing. First of all, getting venture capital in the initial stages is challenging for green businesses, especially in emerging markets. Secondly, any climate technology usually needs a lot of research. Finally, the policy uncertainty can be a problem for entrepreneurship in the future. However, collaboration with policymakers, large corporations, investors, and other stakeholders is vital for commercialization and risk reduction.
In most cases, these startups collaborate with major corporations, governments, academic institutions, and international organizations in order to scale their solution, reach new customers and markets, lower costs, and improve their operations. Governments and academia support these ventures by creating favorable regulatory framework and assisting in technology transfers from one economic agent to another. Furthermore, international organizations assist local startups in combating climate change problems through sharing knowledge.
The other very important aspect which affects the ability of these firms to prosper and scale their solutions is the application of digital technologies. Artificial intelligence is a very important part of climate innovation ecosystems as it assists in automating processes and making informed decisions. Additionally, a lot of startups use the power of big data to control climate risks and operate in a more efficient way. Blockchain-based registries can improve traceability in carbon offsetting and reduce the scope for double-counting. Digitalization of the entire economy makes these innovations very important in terms of combating climate change.
Ultimately, the future of these startups will depend on the degree to which these companies use digital technology and cooperate with various stakeholders in order to make their innovations viable. Nevertheless, it is only possible if the society and policymakers pay attention to fostering sustainable innovation and the importance of science, technology, and economy development. These elements will become crucial in terms of adapting to climate change and fighting it. In general, green entrepreneurship reflects the spirit of our era as startups deal with climate change and at the same time make innovations and foster sustainable economic development. Despite numerous difficulties, it still makes sense to have hope for humanity due to the continuous discoveries in science and technologies as well as initiatives of entrepreneurs.
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