Climate tech investment is finding its footing in 2026. After worldwide funding reached $40.5 billion in 2025, an 8 percent increase, the market is maturing and investors are writing bigger checks to fewer companies with proven technologies. Many new ventures are focused on AI’s voracious appetite for power.
The annual Trellis list of Climate Tech Startups to Watch recognizes the most promising early-stage ventures solving our planet’s biggest challenges at the leading edge of innovation. This year, we’ll recognize five start-ups in each of three rising categories (see below) that reflect where interest is heading, in terms of both investor appetite and technology adoption.
To apply, scroll down this page or click here.
Data center solutions
AI’s explosive growth is reshaping the energy landscape, with clean energy investment growing 31 percent to $14.4 billion in 2025, according to Sightline Climate’s 2025 Investment Trends Report. This category includes low-carbon data center infrastructure (energy optimization, advanced cooling systems, clean backup power), grid infrastructure and management platforms, advanced energy storage and battery systems, nuclear and fusion technologies, hydrogen and other low-carbon fuels, and distributed energy resources that provide fast, firm, clean power to meet AI-driven electricity demand.
Material innovation
Industrial decarbonization and circular economy solutions attracted significant investor attention in 2025, with “smart” manufacturing investment surging nearly 200 percent year-over-year, according to Net Zero Insights. This category features AI-enabled materials discovery, low-carbon industrial materials (cement, chemicals, steel, plastics), sustainable manufacturing processes, circular economy and waste reduction technologies, sustainable textiles and packaging, advanced recycling systems, and innovations in extraction and mining that reduce industrial emissions.
Climate adaptation
As climate impacts intensify, adaptation technologies are emerging as one of climate tech’s fastest-growing segments — up 64 percent to $5.5 billion in 2025, according to Net Zero Insights. This category spans climate risk assessment and intelligence platforms, extreme weather forecasting (wildfires, floods) and early-warning systems, water management and conservation technologies, nature-based solutions, satellite and sensor-based environmental monitoring, and tools helping communities and businesses build resilience to climate change.
The 2026 application
Apply by Friday, March 27 to be one of the 15 startups showcased — including a video of your “elevator pitch” — on the 2026 Climate Tech Startups to Watch list, based on a review by Trellis editors and analysts of the following criteria: solution, traction, team strength and impact. You’ll also get complimentary tickets to Trellis Impact 26, our leading event for sustainability professionals developing innovative solutions to the planet’s biggest challenges, June 23-25 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, Calif.
The five start-ups in each of the three categories will be invited to pitch their innovations to a live webinar audience of sustainability and climate executives, investors and ecosystem professionals. Audience votes will determine one winner from each of the three categories who will advance to pitch in person at Trellis Impact 26.
At Trellis Impact 26, those three category winners will compete, for a live audience vote, to become the 2026 Trellis Startup of the Year, and get profiled in an article on Trellis.net.
The Climate Tech Startup of 2025 was Dexmat, which produces a conductive nanomaterial that has the potential to store carbon and replace steel, aluminum and cooper.
If you don’t see the application just below this line, click here.