The infrastructure investor universe is expanding. U.S. pension funds looking to gain entry to the asset class recently have added new allocations or bumped up their targets as of late in search of higher returns and better inflation protection.

Pension funds in North America, in particular, are spearheading the move into alternative assets, according to a recent report from IMD, an independent academic institute. As one example, the Los Angeles Fire and Police Pensions (LAFPP) recently approved a restructuring that would eliminate the 2 percent target allocation to commodities and reallocate it to infrastructure.

The board’s general investment consultant, RVK, suggested the current commodities stock exposure did not align with the initial investment thesis of commodities being an inflation hedge, and that investing in infrastructure could provide the plan higher expected returns in periods of stable and falling inflation, with a lower correlation to public equities.