Helping cities turn climate plans into fundable projects

I designed a platform that translated climate planning into investor-ready financial cases. The solution enabled 4 cities to secure funding within six months, reached 50% adoption across ClimateView’s user base, and contributed to the company’s €14 million funding round.

Year

2022 (9 months)

Role

Product Designer

THE CHALLENGE

Cities have climate plans but struggle to turn them into investable projects

Cities produce most global emissions and need major investment to transition their infrastructure.

While funding exists through public programs and financial institutions, many cities struggle to present climate initiatives in ways investors can evaluate and support.

City planners often work well with environmental strategy and policy, but translating those plans into financial structures, cost models and investment documentation is much harder.

THE SOLUTION

Connecting climate planning with financial decision-making

I designed a platform that helps cities turn climate initiatives into structured investment proposals.

The system connected climate actions, emissions impact, costs and stakeholder responsibilities into a shared workflow that city planners could use to build investment-ready plans.

For example, a city could define an initiative like incentivizing electric vehicles, connect it to climate targets, estimate implementation costs and generate documentation for funding discussions.

How it works

  • Browse climate actions
    Explore initiatives connected to sector-specific climate goals

  • Connect actions to targets
    Link initiatives to emissions reductions and policy objectives

  • Model costs and responsibilities
    Estimate costs and distribute ownership across stakeholders

  • Generate investment documentation
    Create structured material for funding and decision-making

Climate actions library
City planners browse available climate initiatives and select actions to include in their investment plan.

Connecting actions to climate goals
Each action is linked to broader climate targets, helping planners understand how individual initiatives contribute to larger transition goals.

Cost allocation across stakeholders
Planners distribute costs between public and private stakeholders to define funding responsibilities and ownership.

Validation and quality control
The system helps users validate allocations and identify incomplete or inconsistent cost distributions before finalizing a plan.

Investment overview
A consolidated view showing climate goals, connected actions and total funding requirements across the investment plan.

Multi-year financial timeline
A timeline view showing when costs occur over time, helping stakeholders understand long-term funding and implementation needs.

THE IMPACT

Early adoption across municipalities and financial stakeholders

Within the first six months after launch, several municipalities began using the platform to support climate investment planning and funding discussions.

Outcomes

  • 4 municipalities secured climate-related funding using the platform

  • 50% adoption across existing ClimateView cities within 3 months

  • The feature became a key part of ClimateView’s €14 million funding round

  • Featured by Forbes in coverage of climate infrastructure financing

  • Municipal financial controllers validated the platform’s role in improving funding and decision-making workflows

"The calculation and visualization of both the sustainable and the economic case that ClimateOS provides us for our Climate Investment Plan will surely facilitate both decision-making and future funding."

Financial Controller, City of Helsingborg

THE RESEARCH

Mapping why climate initiatives struggle to secure funding

I interviewed municipal planners, sustainability directors and financial stakeholders across multiple European cities to understand where the funding process was breaking down.

The research focused on the gap between climate planning, financial modeling and investment decision-making.

Key findings

  • Climate initiatives lacked clear financial structures and cost models

  • Sustainability and finance teams worked in disconnected systems and workflows

  • Investment material often missed the level of detail required for funding evaluation

  • Environmental impact and financial outcomes were rarely connected

  • Cost assumptions and calculations lacked transparency

Research methods

Semi-structured interviews, workflow mapping sessions and analysis of investment and funding documentation.

THE MAIN INSIGHT

Climate plans only become investable when they are financially structured

Cities already had ambitious climate plans, but lacked a practical way to connect them to funding and investment processes.

Financial stakeholders needed clear cost breakdowns, ownership models and transparent assumptions before projects could move forward.

What changed

Instead of treating climate actions as isolated initiatives, I designed a system where each action could be connected to costs, stakeholders, timelines and expected outcomes.

This created a clearer financial structure that cities could use in funding discussions and investment planning.

DESIGN EXPLORATION

Structuring climate planning and financial workflows into one system

The main challenge was turning complex climate planning data into something cities could actually use in funding and investment discussions.

This required designing both the information structure and the workflow connecting climate actions, costs, ownership and long-term impact.

My approach

  1. Mapped how information moved through the system
    I defined how climate actions, financial calculations and investment documentation connected across the workflow.

  2. Explored different ways to structure the data
    I compared multiple models for organizing actions, costs and climate impact to find an approach that felt understandable and scalable.

  3. Tested different levels of detail in the interface
    I explored how planners, financial stakeholders and decision-makers could move between high-level overviews and detailed calculations without losing context.

  4. Made assumptions and calculations visible
    The system exposed how costs, allocations and projections were generated so users could understand and trust the underlying data.

Connecting climate planning with investment workflows

This systems map helped define how climate actions, financial calculations and investment documentation connected across the platform.

It became the foundation for structuring both the workflow and the information architecture.

Exploring different ways to structure the data

I compared multiple approaches for organizing climate actions, costs and financial relationships.

Structure B was selected because it created clearer connections between actions, impact and investment data while remaining understandable for users.

Early interface exploration

I explored different ways to present financial and climate data across workflows, dashboards and detailed analysis views.

These iterations helped shape the information hierarchy and determine how users could move between overview and detail without losing context.

Climate Investment Plan overview

The final interface brought climate impact, economic value and long-term projections into a single workflow.

The structure helped city planners move between high-level outcomes, detailed calculations and underlying assumptions without losing context.

TESTING & ITERATION

Testing with municipalities and financial stakeholders

I tested the platform with city planners, sustainability teams and financial stakeholders to understand how different roles interpreted investment data, assumptions and long-term projections.

The feedback shaped both the structure of the system and how information was presented across workflows.

Key iterations

  • Transparent assumptions
    Users needed visibility into how calculations were generated, not just the final outputs. I introduced expandable assumption layers and supporting methodology.

  • Flexible financial structures
    Cities organize budgets and responsibilities differently. The system was adapted to support multiple funding and stakeholder models.

  • Long-term financial timelines
    Users needed to understand when costs and benefits occur over time, not only total investment size. Timeline views were introduced to support long-term planning discussions.

  • Investor-ready exports
    Structured export formats were added to support institutional review and funding processes.

THE FINAL RESULT

A platform that translates climate plans into investment decisions

The Climate Investment Plan gives municipalities a structured way to turn climate strategies into investor-ready proposals.

By connecting climate actions, financial modeling, stakeholder funding and long-term projections in one system, cities could move from high-level planning to concrete investment discussions.

What the platform enabled

  • Connected climate and financial planning
    Individual climate actions were tied to costs, funding structures and measurable economic impact.

  • Transparent investment logic
    Assumptions, calculations and financial models were visible and traceable throughout the workflow.

  • Cross-stakeholder cost allocation
    Cities could distribute investments across public, private and industry stakeholders using flexible financial structures.

  • Investor-ready documentation
    The platform generated structured outputs aligned with institutional funding and due diligence requirements.

  • Clear end-to-end workflows
    Complex planning processes were transformed into a guided system with clear progression from action selection to investment proposal.

Workflow structure showing how individual climate actions move through cost allocation, validation and publishing into investment-ready documentation.

Exploring the Climate Investment Plan prototype.

LEARNINGS

Designing systems across domains and stakeholders

This project changed how I think about complex product design.

The challenge wasn’t only designing interfaces, it was creating shared structures between climate planning, financial modeling and institutional decision-making.

Key learnings

Cross-domain systems create new opportunities
The real value came from connecting environmental planning with financial workflows in one coherent system.

Institutional users need transparency
Financial stakeholders needed visibility into assumptions, calculations and methodology, not only outcomes.

Information architecture shapes product capability
The underlying data structure became the foundation for workflows, documentation and investment outputs.

Multi-stakeholder systems require balance
Municipal planners, financial controllers and investors needed different perspectives on the same information.

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