Institutional investors were warming up to renewable energy investments when the financial crisis scattered the pieces of what was already a challenging puzzle in the good times. Many still see solid opportunities, and capital has begun to flow again to certain projects. But most investors are in the process of re-evaluating these opportunities as the “new normal” for the financial markets coalesces, and as the relevant regulatory frameworks related to the sector develop and are better understood.

It has been observed that physical infrastructure provides society a way to “manage chaos” by channeling people’s movements, eliminating the daily search for drinking water, facilitating the movement and delivery of food and supplies, facilitating communications, and generally structuring people’s lives so that they can be economically productive and live comfortably, even when in close quarters in cities.

To invest or not to invest — that is the question with which most pension plans in North America that are interested in the infrastructure sector are contemplating. More specifically, plan sponsors big and small are wondering whether the offerings of a variety of infrastructure funds — private or listed, bank-sponsored or independent — are really the best vehicles to get their infrastructure asset class exposure.