Most recent 20 articles: Green Tech Media
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What the Frack Is Happening With Natural Gas Prices? - Green Tech Media (Oct 23, 2021) |
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Oct 23, 2021 · At the beginning of the pandemic, energy prices crashed. We did an episode of this show trying to figure out how oil prices fell to negative $40 per barrel.Times have changed. Oil is up over $100/barrel. But far more acute is what’s happening with natural gas, particularly in Europe and Asia. In the US, natural gas prices have doubled in the last year. But in parts of Europe, the price has risen more than 5 times.
The disruptions are clear. We're seeing stories of power shortages in China, fertilizer plants being shut down in the UK, and fears about home heating costs in the Northeast US as winter approaches.
So what the heck is going on? How long might it last? ... Read more ...
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Where Will DOE's Loan Program Make the Next Climate Tech Investments? - Green Tech Media (Oct 21, 2021) |
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Oct 21, 2021 · The U.S. Department of Energy is crucial for funding, researching, and testing emerging energy tech.Now, in the Biden era, the agency is orienting itself toward deployment. How difficult is that transition?
Our former co-host Jigar Shah joins Stephen, Katherine, and Ed to discuss his experience running the Energy Department’s loan programs office.
In March, Jigar left his position at Generate Capital (and this podcast) to head into government service and run the loan programs office. Jigar has $40 billion in authority to back a wide range of climate technologies -- and he’s been working on the first round of investments with those dollars.
In the second ... Read more ...
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With an Energy Crisis Brewing, No Peak in Sight for Emissions - Green Tech Media (Oct 14, 2021) |
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Oct 14, 2021 · EIA and IEA are out with projections for emissions and fossil fuel consumption. And they don’t look good. On our current policy trajectory, there is no peak in sight, according to EIA By 2050, we will likely see a 50% increase in energy consumption. And even though renewables will be the fastest-growing new source of energy, hydrocarbon liquid fuels will meet the majority of demand.
That means emissions could rise through 2050, absent massive changes to policy.
In July, the International Energy Agency issued a similar analysis showing that carbon emissions will hit record levels in the coming years. And that spending packages around the world — even at ... Read more ...
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Where Green Hydrogen Is Headed - Green Tech Media (Oct 14, 2021) |
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Oct 14, 2021 · Suddenly everyone is talking about green hydrogen. From South Africa to the United Arab Emirates. From China to Utah. Governments and developers are eyeing hydrogen as a decarbonization tool.
But the rush is also raising lots of questions: Where will hydrogen be most useful? How do you create a supply chain to support it? And how can we ensure it has climate integrity?
For answers, we turned to two experts who are obsessing over the future of hydrogen: Janice Lin and Stephen Lamm.
Janice Lin is the founder and CEO of Strategen. And she’s president of the green hydrogen coalition.
Stephen Lamm is the director of sustainability at Bloom Energy, a company ... Read more ...
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Why TransitTech Is So Vital to Struggling Public Transportation Systems - Green Tech Media (Oct 10, 2021) |
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Oct 10, 2021 · Ride sharing has swept transportation systems over the last decade -- bringing convenience, but also congestion, inequities, and political fights.Now a new category of transportation networking is emerging: TransitTech.
It makes up a class of companies that are using tech to help maximize public transit systems. So what does TransitTech look like post-pandemic?
Tiffany Chu joins Katherine and Stephen this week to discuss the path forward for transit. Tiffany is the co-founder and CEO of Remix, which was recently acquired by Via for $100 million.
We’ll also dig into a new study from Carnegie Mellon University that shows Uber and Lyft are increasing external ... Read more ...
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Carbon Recycling: Microbes, Jet Fuel and Leggings - Green Tech Media (Sep 30, 2021) |
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Sep 30, 2021 · Shayle has been brewing up an investment thesis around how decarbonization will create stratification in traditional commodity sectors, like chemicals and materials.If you can produce the same thing in the same cost range -- but you can do so in a CO2-free or carbon-negative -- you'll reap the rewards.
Lanzatech is a great test case for that thesis, as well as a great story to tell about the history of this sector. It was founded in 2005 as a biofuels company. Now, it captures industrial waste gasses, such as CO2 and CO, and recycles them into the chemicals used to make everything from plastics to medical supplies to fabric for Lululemon. It has even spun out an entire company ... Read more ...
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The Hidden Science Behind Decarbonizing Buildings - Green Tech Media (Sep 30, 2021) |
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Sep 30, 2021 · All around us, hidden inside our buildings, are a series of choices and tradeoffs -- choices with direct impacts on our health, our money, and our energy use. Our buildings are wasteful and are filled with a lot of “embodied” carbon. As a result, buildings directly and indirectly account for 40 percent of global emissions.
How do we make those choices with better building science?
And how do we use that science to design carbon out of our buildings?
This week, Katherine and Stephen are joined by Christine Williamson, the creator of Building Science Fight Club. She is a building scientist who teaches architects how to think more intelligently about ... Read more ...
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Microsoft’s $1B Climate Innovation Fund - Green Tech Media (Sep 24, 2021) |
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Sep 24, 2021 · In January 2020, Brad Smith, the President of Microsoft, announced that the company had set a target of becoming carbon negative by 2030.
How does the company plan to do it? What does going carbon negative actually entail?
Brandon Middaugh, the Director of Microsoft’s $1B Climate Innovation Fund, comes on the show to explain. The fund invests in various climate technologies as a part of the company’s overall climate efforts. Investments in its portfolio cover carbon removal, carbon marketplace innovation and the circular economy, among others.
(The fund’s first investment was in Energy Impact Partners, where Shayle is a partner).
Shayle and ... Read more ...
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Will Direct-Air Carbon Capture Be Viable? - Green Tech Media (Sep 20, 2021) |
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Sep 20, 2021 · Carbon capture has long been criticized as too nascent, too expensive, and too distracting. Is that changing?This month, the Swiss company Climeworks officially launched a direct-air capture plant in Iceland, called Orca.
The company has already signed deals with SwissRe, Bill Gates, Stripe, and Shopify to sell them credits from the plant. But the tech is still pretty expensive and relatively small scale.
Climeworks wants to build megaton-scale plants by the end of the decade. Lots of other plants are in the works. So what does this commercial launch signal for the carbon-capture industry?
Plus, new research shows just how drastically we need to slash fossil fuels ... Read more ...
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Will Hydrogen Look Like Solar? - Green Tech Media (Sep 16, 2021) |
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Sep 16, 2021 · The road to solar glory has been littered with failed companies -- the ones you may know (Solyndra) and hundreds you probably do not.
Will the burgeoning hydrogen space follow a similar bumpy road? Hydrogen is at a similar phase of market and technological maturity, with similar levels of hype.
In this episode, Shayle talks to Raffi Garabedian, the former CTO of pioneering solar manufacturer First Solar and now the co-founder and CEO of Electric Hydrogen Co. (Disclosure: Shayle just led Energy Impact Partners’ investment in the company).
First Solar was one of the very few Western companies that survived the price pressure, commoditization and trade dynamics ... Read more ...
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Power After Carbon - Green Tech Media (Sep 14, 2021) |
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Sep 14, 2021 · The electric grid is a central pillar of a zero-carbon economy. But in an era of unrelenting weather extremes, it’s also one of the most fragile.This week: what does power after carbon look like?
Katherine and Stephen are joined by Dr. Peter Fox-Penner, author of a new book called, “Power After Carbon.”
Peter is the founder of the Boston University Institute of Sustainable Energy. And he’s a partner and chief strategy officer at the VC firm Energy Impact Partners.
At the turn of the last decade, Peter wrote a book called “Smart Power” that looked at the new pressures that utilities were facing around climate policy, emerging ... Read more ...
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Climate Tech Brings in $16 Billion. Where’s It Going? - Green Tech Media (Sep 09, 2021) |
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Sep 09, 2021 · In the world of venture capital, climate tech is about as hot as it gets. In the first two quarters of 2021, climate tech companies raised $16B from VCs. New designated funds are announced regularly, startup valuations are sky high, and times are frothy. It's never been a better time to be a climate tech entrepreneur.
It's easy to get lost in the noise -- so what does the hard data say? How much investment are we talking about, really? Where is it coming from, and who is it going to? And what does that tell founders about how to operate and grow their businesses?
To answer these questions, Shayle turns to Climate Tech VC, the leading newsletter on climate and innovation. ... Read more ...
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The Climate Workhorse: Extremely Cheap, Clean Electricity - Green Tech Media (Sep 02, 2021) |
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Sep 02, 2021 · There is no path to deep decarbonization that doesn't involve a clean power sector. And there is no path to a clean power sector that doesn't involve deploying massive amounts of wind, solar, and lithium-ion batteries.Those three technologies don't solve the entire problem of climate change, but they are the workhorses that will power a broader, multi-sector decarbonization approach.
The power sector itself is around a quarter of all greenhouse gas emissions. And a net-zero electricity sector is the key that unlocks a host of other decarbonization pathways, from hydrogen to carbon removal to transportation.
So what exactly is happening in the utility-scale renewables ... Read more ...
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Why This IPCC Climate Report Is Different - Green Tech Media (Aug 30, 2021) |
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Aug 30, 2021 · The world’s most scrutinized and peer-reviewed document is out: the IPCC report on climate change. Thousands of scientists have spent decades pouring over every measurement and research report known. The findings are clearer than ever: It is “virtually certain” that the increases in extreme temperatures and droughts are caused by human activity.
The economic and human toll from climate change is here. So how is this report different from previous IPCC reports?
Plus, is the push for hydrogen a real pathway, or a clever way to lock in more emissions? We’ll look at the debate over “blue” hydrogen emissions.
And, how far have the ... Read more ...
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Why Fertilizer Is Such a Big Climate Problem - Green Tech Media (Aug 26, 2021) |
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Aug 26, 2021 · The Nobel prize in chemistry in 1918 was awarded to a German man named Fritz Haber for a process to fix nitrogen from the air. The technique, which later became known as the Haber-bosch process, is probably one of the four or five most important inventions of the last century.
Because nitrogen feeds crops. And as our population boomed during the 20th century, nitrogen fertilizer became the core fuel of our food system. It is estimated to have fed about half of the world's population.
Nitrogen fertilizer is incredibly important, and we still produce the vast majority of our fertilizer using this same process. This has all sorts of ramifications that are less than ideal ... Read more ...
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As Profits Rise, Oil Majors Face New Pressures - Green Tech Media (Aug 13, 2021) |
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Aug 13, 2021 · We started the Covid pandemic at negative oil prices. Today, benchmark prices are above $70. And top oil companies are reporting billions of dollars in profits.And now there is more scrutiny than ever on how they’re going to spend that money.
Activist shareholders are starting to get climate champions on oil major board seats -- most notably, climate tech investor and former wind executive Andy Karsner on Exxon Mobil’s board.
A dutch court is now forcing Shell to reduce the emissions from its products by 45%, after a successful lawsuit from environmental groups. Oil executives now have their lawyers on speed dial.
And big asset managers, like BlackRock, ... Read more ...
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The Big Moment for Carbon Accounting - Green Tech Media (Aug 13, 2021) |
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Aug 13, 2021 · Carbon accounting and disclosure is getting attention at the highest levels.Gary Gensler, the chairman of the SEC, said in July: "I think updates to public company disclosures and to fund disclosures [on climate] could bring needed transparency to our capital markets. When it comes to disclosure, investors have told us what they want. It’s now time for the Commission to take the baton."
Gensler directed SEC staff to pull together a rulemaking proposal on mandatory corporate climate risk disclosure by the end of this year. It could be a watershed action, so to speak.
The world of enterprise carbon accounting, management and disclosure has been garnering a lot of ... Read more ...
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A New Inflection Point for Clean Energy - Green Tech Media (Aug 10, 2021) |
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Aug 10, 2021 · We're at a new phase of the clean energy transition. Extreme heat, drought and floods are increasing in frequency. Public attention on clean energy is stronger than ever. The Biden Administration is putting zero-carbon energy at the core of its policies.And there's another powerful force: making sure the energy transition is as racially and economically just as possible.
Anton Cohen is a partner at CohnReznick LLP, and national leader of the firm’s Renewable Energy Industry Practice. He's been advising companies across a wide range of industries: tech, manufacturing, public tax credits, and energy.
Today, he focuses exclusively on renewables: “All we do is ... Read more ...
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The Crypto vs Climate Showdown - Green Tech Media (Aug 06, 2021) |
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Aug 06, 2021 · In the great debate over crypto mining vs. climate, there are two camps.First, the crypto enthusiasts, like Square, say things like, "Bitcoin is key to an abundant, clean energy future".
And then there are the energy wonks, who point out that, if bitcoin mining were a country, it would already be in the top 30 for total energy consumption, rivaling Ukraine.
The energy camp tends to dismiss the crypto enthusiasts’ thinking. They’re skeptical of how crypto mines could be assets to a decarbonizing grid, rather than a strain on it.
So to cut through the noise, Shayle spoke to Nick Grossman, a partner at the respected venture capital firm Union Square ... Read more ...
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What Emerging Climate Tech Sectors Are Ready for Growth? - Green Tech Media (Aug 03, 2021) |
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Aug 03, 2021 · After 30 years of R&D and commercial proof, hundreds of billions in institutional dollars are pouring into now-conventional tech like wind, solar and batteries.
But there’s a whole class of technologies that are ready to scale. And investors who are increasingly ready to back them.
As we heard in our previous show, there was a record $17 billion in venture capital going into climate tech in 2020.
With all this money dropping into the space, where can it have the highest impact? What are the areas where we have commercial viability, but still need significant breakthroughs?
Our guest co-host this week is Nneka Uzoh Kibuule, a senior vice president at ... Read more ...
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