Over the course of 2023, ten Canadian municipalities worked in partnership with ICLEI Canada and Co-operators on the Financing Resilient Infrastructure Project (FRIP). Through FRIP, participating municipalities identified a suite of possible resilient infrastructure projects that private investors could help realize. A core component of FRIP was to connect municipal practitioners with financial experts from both the private and public sectors. The opportunity for project participants and financial experts to exchange insights on topics related to project feasibility and bankability (i.e., cash flows) and explore finance-related questions proved to be immensely valuable in identifying municipal resilient infrastructure projects that could be realized with the help of innovative financing.

FRIP was led by ICLEI Canada, Co-operators, and Co-operators’ asset management arm – Addenda Capital. Through this project, ICLEI Canada and Co-operators aimed to understand barriers to financing resilient infrastructure projects while also shifting the perspective around the role private capital can play in building community resilience. Outputs from the rich dialogues that occurred through this work will support municipalities as they consider innovative approaches involving private finance, as a complement to public funding, in the spirit of accelerating and scaling the mission-critical work of building communities that are resilient to climate change.