New York City Comptroller Mark Levine unveiled a plan to steer billions of dollars into private markets, characterizing the move as a shift designed to help the investor meet its climate-related goals while safeguarding returns.

The Comptroller’s Office’s Bureau of Asset Management said the proposal targets three of the City’s public pension funds: New York City Teachers’ Retirement System (TRS), Employees’ Retirement System (NYCERS) and Board of Education Retirement System (BERS), according to a statement on Wednesday. In all, the plan is to allocate $5 billion to private markets.

“There’s a pretty compelling case that the most important projects are now being funded in the private markets,” Levine said in an interview. There’s “also a strong case that this is a good investment on financial merits. And because of all that, this is the right move right now.”

The move would represent a departure from the pension investor’s focus to date, with returns on climate-related investments so far mostly coming from gains in technology stocks held in passively run portfolios. It also follows criticism by Levine earlier this year of Space Exploration Technologies Corp. for its governance model. At the same time, he noted it would be hard to avoid holding SpaceX via passive exposures.

The five New York City public pension funds that Levine oversees collectively manage close to $330 billion. Like his predecessor Brad Lander, Levine has been outspoken in his support of environmental, social and governance investing goals. The pensions manager is in the process of rebidding passive equity mandates currently overseen by BlackRock Inc., which Lander had said fell short on portfolio decarbonization and stewardship.

At the time, BlackRock characterized Lander’s move as a “politicization of public pension funds.”

Levine’s plan to steer green capital into private markets coincides with climate week in New York, where more than 100,000 people are expected to gather over the coming days in order to discuss investments, policies and civil society measures that can help address global warming. For many, the event also represents an opportunity to highlight the affordability and security benefits of clean energy solutions.

“Americans are facing high energy costs, while extreme weather is putting growing strain on infrastructure that wasn’t built for the climate challenges we face today,” Levine said in the statement.

“Our pension systems have an opportunity to put substantial capital to work in a growing sector,” he said. The goal is “seeking the strong returns our pensioners depend on while investing in cleaner, more reliable and resilient energy that can lower costs and reduce emissions at the same time.”

Levine said the plan is to invest in everything from solar generation to battery transmission, electric vehicles and building modernization, as well as in areas that aid resilience to the fallout from rising temperatures, which includes access to water.

“These are projects which are built on proven technology and they just need financing,” he said. “And we wouldn’t be doing it if we didn’t think it was a good investment for our pension funds, but this is increasingly the future of energy and infrastructure in the world, and we want to make sure that we also get the financial upside that we expect is coming.”

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