This Week in MCJ (11/7/20)
Hey everyone,
Obviously the big news today in the climate world was that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have been elected as President and Vice President of the United States. While this election may have felt like a stressful distraction for many of us from our day-to-day climate work (understatement!), it is hard to think of an event that could have had a bigger impact on that work, one way or another.
It was, of course, a massive relief to me that Biden won. I know we have a long road ahead of us, from a climate standpoint and as a nation. But at least now the healing can begin. I look forward to being able to put my head down and focus on climate work, knowing we will have a leader that will be giving us air cover as we go, instead of actively working against our interests at every turn. Doesn’t mean we can take our eye of the ball on protecting our democracy, getting the right leaders (and policies) in place, etc, but this feels like a big big first step towards stopping the bleeding and getting back to making progress again, at the Federal level. And it seems President-elect Biden won’t be wasting any time!
I watched the speeches tonight, and in addition to a huge sense of relief, I felt fired up, inspired, and proud to be an American.
Let’s do this!
Jason
📼Episodes
Here’s this week’s episode, in case you missed it.
Episode 129: Rodrigo Prudencio, Worldwide Corporate Development at Amazon’s Climate Pledge Fund
This week’s guest was Rodrigo Prudencio, who works in Worldwide Corporate Development at Amazon’s Climate Pledge Fund.
Amazon started the Climate Pledge Fund with the goal of getting to carbon net neutral by 2040. Amazon is using the fund to invest in companies that will help them meet this goal, across transportation, sustainable products and practices, and other key areas of decarbonization.
Rodrigo has lots of experience in cleantech well before his time at Amazon, including 12 years as a cleantech VC, and as CEO of a cleantech software company during the last cleantech wave. Earlier in his career, he focused on policy at the National Wildlife Federation and later at the State Department, where he was part of the negotiating team during the Kyoto Climate Change Convention.
We discuss a lot in this episode, including what got Rodrigo initially passionate about climate change, the lessons he learned from the last cleantech wave, what led him back into cleantech and his role at Amazon, and a deep dive into the Climate Pledge Fund, its focus areas, and how Amazon will measure its success.
📼Climate Tech Startup Series (CTSS)
CTSS is a series for members, where we feature founders of early-stage companies, sharing their startup’s business and mission. Members can check out our recent episode below and find an updated list here.
CTSS Episode 16: Frost Methane Labs with CEO & Co-Founder Olya Irzak
Frost Methane Labs’ technology is used to identify and neutralize concentrated and continuous sources of methane. Methane accounts for 16% of global warming and is 28x more potent than CO2. The team has designed, built and deployed a remote monitoring system on a permafrost methane vent. Frost Methane Labs also focuses on the larger methane source of abandoned and active coal mines, and have identified 1.1 Gt of CO2e from only 3000 unaddressed methane sources. Their revenue comes from selling the warming reduction into the compliance carbon offset markets, which compensate highly for methane flaring.
CEO & Founder, Olya Irzak, walks me through a Frost Methane Labs overview, including the problem they are solving, how it works, where they are on their path to take it to market, and what’s coming next!
👋 Welcome New MCJers!
Below are new members who joined the community and introduced themselves in the past week. You can learn more about them on #introductions, where you can welcome them to the community.
A warm welcome to the MCJ Community!
Viraf Souroushian: A Denver based Engagement and Project Manager at McKinsey & Co, focusing on energy and sustainability practices. Viraf is looking forward to expanding his knowledge and network within the climate space.
Annalee Bloomfield: Previously a Product Manager with an innovation group at Walmart, Annalee is now focusing on sustainability and advising early stage start-ups on product discovery. She is looking for opportunities in that space.
Thiago Figueiredo: Currently, a partner and Chief Business Officer at 1s1 Energy working on the production of green hydrogen. Thiago is excited to be part of the MCJ community and meet fellow members.
Silvan Aeschlimann: Currently a Project Manager at The Climate Map. Silvan is an economist and political scientist and has spent time working in investigative journalism. He is looking forward to learning more about climate change and the possible solutions.
Lubomila Jordanova: CEO and Co-Founder of PlanA.Earth, a Berlin based company dedicated to creating sustainable action plans for companies to monitor and reduce their emissions. She is excited to be part of MCJ and connect with people interesting in corporate social responsibility as it applies to climate change.
Jake Assael: Co-Founder of Vote Climate U.S. PAC, Jake creates Congressional and POTUS voter guides to help people confidently go to the polls. Additionally, he is an Associate at the Environmental Protection Network. Jake is looking for opportunities in the climate adaptive space with an emphasis on coastal resilience and urban sustainability.
Frank Buncom IV: Currently, the head of AIRx Health, a start-up focused on increasing access to world-class physicians using remote patient monitoring. Frank is passionate about the climate crisis as well as providing quality healthcare to underserved communities. He is looking to meet other members who are interested in starting a sustainable focused side project.
Maire Callanan: A first year MBA student at Harvard Business School, Maire previously worked in hard tech and climate policy. She is seeking part-time volunteer opportunities at a climate tech VC or start-up.
Aaron Moser: Currently a MBA student at Yale focusing on business and the environment, Aaron is interested in building a career in climate tech and decarbonization. He is looking forward to connecting with the community.
Bim Adisa: Currently the Founder and CEO of Beacon Power Services, a company dedicated to improving energy availability in densely populated urban African cities where most people currently rely on generators for their power supply. Bim is excited to be part of MCJ and is looking to connect with people interested in Africa and/or grid management particularly for developing countries.
Wayne Van Dyck: Currently toe CEO of Climatewaz, a fintech company based in San Francisco. Wayne is looking to meet seed investors in investment banking and project financing in the climate space.
Julia Bunte-Mein: Currently, interning at Powerhouse Fund, Julia is a recent graduate of Harvard where she focused on Environmental Science and Public Policy. In the fall she will be an incoming RPM at Facebook. She’s excited about impact-focused technology. She also has a podcast called The Seeds.
💼Climate Jobs
Here are some jobs shared by members of the MCJ community that we think might be of interest to you. Many of these opportunities and the MCJers who shared them can be found in #climatejobs in the MCJ Slack.
Data Scientist at CarbonPlan (Remote, US) (careers page)
Investment & Deal Executive at Green Angel Syndicate (Remote, UK) (careers page)
📰🎧Recommended Reading/Listening
Below are recently published articles and content that we find interesting and/or that were shared by fellow MCJers.
Pew Research Center: “How Important is Climate Change to Voters in the 2020 Election?”
Tech Crunch: “VC Seth Bannon on How a Biden Administration Could Best Support Climate Startups”
Principles for Responsible Investment: “New Investor Guide to Negative Emissions Technologies and Land Use”
The New York Times: “See How the World’s Most Polluted Air Compares to Your City”
The Wall Street Journal: “How AI Can Help Save Forests” (PDF)
The New York Times: “How Decades of Racist Housing Policy Left Neighborhoods Sweltering”
🎟Climate Events
As a reminder, we have a MCJ Events Calendar, where you can view and post events for the rest of the MCJ community to attend. When posting an event, please refer to this checklist.
*We’re highlighting a few upcoming events below; please refer to the events calendar for a complete list.*
Previous
MCJ Town Hall (10/30/20)
Thank you to those who attended Friday's monthly MCJ Town Hall. For those that were not able to attend, you can view a recording here. During the town hall, we discussed a number of topics including what folks are building, how to foster engagement in sub-communities and questions about MCJ Collective.
Upcoming
MCJ Ideas Jam and My Climate Journey (Wednesday, November 11th, 8-9pm EST)
Join MCJ Ideas Jam to pitch your climate startup idea, provide your feedback on the ideas pitched, and/or spark your own ideas in the process. The guest experts will be first to give you feedback and helpful direction, and space will be opened for the general MCJ community to provide their feedback and collaborative ideas, both during the event and after. Join to pitch or watch! RSVP here.
MCJ Hackathon Planning Meeting (Friday, November 13th, 4pm EST)
MCJ invites those interested in participating and organizing our first community hackathon to attend a planning call. We’ve already received a lot of interest and feedback and look forward to discussing it further with fellow MCJers. If you’re interested in attending this planning meeting, please DM Thai on Slack or drop us a note; and be sure to join the #hackathon channel to participate in the ongoing discussion.
Terra.do Presents: World's First Online Climate Jobs Fair (Wednesday, November 18th)
Terra.do is excited to invite you to the world’s first virtual climate jobs fair on Nov 18th! Terra.do is bringing together hundreds of mission-driven individuals and dozens of climate organizations under the same “virtual” roof so that they can find each other. As an individual, you will be able to expand your job search universe. Meet hiring managers from dozens of top climate organizations that have diverse roles to offer in a speed-dating format (learn more here). As a climate organization, connect with hundreds of individuals from across the world who are passionate about moving into climate work. If you would like to join as an employer, submit your information here (or contact saurabh@terra.do).
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