OpConnect is a Minority Owned Small Business taking on big names like ChargePoint, ABB, and Shell (which purchased Greenlots). The team has developed a lean model that has enabled EV service providers to quickly integrate their EV charging networks with advanced payment processing and customer care tools.

Mobility and energy are undergoing a massive transformation as transportation moves toward an electric future. The investment will enable expansion of OpConnect’s team and enhancement of its “real-time,” hardware agnostic EV management and billing platform to public and private fleet operators.

The company plans to expand its private-labeling offerings focusing on multi-family properties and communities. Headed by CEO Dexter Turner, OpConnect is leading innovation in the electric transportation, with seven EV charging and access control patents. “The Biden administration envisions an aggressive acceleration of the country’s move to vehicle electrification,” said Dexter Turner, which creates enormous opportunities for small business growth, EV owners and reduction of local and greenhouse gas pollution. Jessica Nigro,  OpConnect BoD and General Manager at Daimler North America, agreed, “Industry cannot underestimate the influence of immediate federal and state policy in fostering the EV ecosystem.”

“Smart EV charging networks are a critical element of ensuring grid resiliency as we progress to a micro-grid centric utility model where consumers and building owners play a strong market role,” said Alex Rozenfeld, the Founder of Climate Impact Capital, “and as we saw during the near-collapse of the Texas ERCOT grid early in 2021, microgrids with EVs as a core will increasingly provide resilience and backup power in the coming decades as we see more climate change driven mega weather events.”  With options like the Ford Lightning, Rivian R1S, and the VW ID.4, consumers may rapidly migrate to EVs.

About Climate Impact Capital

CIC invests in energy technology companies and supports global energy corporations through CIC’s Venture-as-a-Service program. CIC identifies resiliency opportunities to prepare our partners for a world challenged by climate change risk and resource scarcity. With a diverse team and a global partner network across oil and gas, power, and energy technology manufacturing, CIC is at the forefront of the energy transition.

The post EVs will be the Resilience and Disaster Recovery Solution of Choice for Intelligent Grids appeared first on Climate Impact Capital.

“Maintenance is a critical element of ensuring grid resiliency, as we saw during the near-collapse of the Texas ERCOT grid early in 2021,” said Alex Rozenfeld, the Founder of Climate Impact Capital. “Microgrids will become an increasingly important part of the mainstream grid in the coming decades as we see more climate change driven mega weather events and 60Hertz will be part of the suite of solutions needed in that future.”

The 60Hertz software and services already are actively deployed supporting remote and critical microgrids in seven countries. 60Hertz enables customers to improve the asset performance and overall lifespan of their existing power generation facilities and speeds their transition of microgrids to resilient and renewable power generation sources.   60Hertz facilitates maintenance on over $140M of microgrid assets with over 4,600 maintenance records filed per month through the platform. This financing will accelerate the company’s growth in North American and Sub-Saharan African markets.

60Hertz Energy is a Women-Owned Small Business. At a time when only 2.8% of venture capital goes to female-founded start-ups, 60Hertz is a success story. New 60Hertz Director, Susan Preston of SeaChange Fund, notes that “I am delighted to start working with 60Hertz on the strategic pathway to further growth and success. I am particularly pleased to be working with an excellent CEO, Piper Foster Wilder.”

Piper Foster Wilder launched the company in 2017. With co-founders Whitney Gantt and Tonya James, the team has created and deployed maintenance software designed for low- and intermittent bandwidth in off-grid locations in Alaskan villages and Sub-Saharan African countries and for users new to technology, maintenance, and energy assets.

The need for efficient, resilient, and sustainable microgrid infrastructure is critical to boosting economic growth. Microgrids are rapidly expanding from rural markets that 60Hertz Energy currently serves to become key elements of grid management worldwide.

“The clean energy revolution is happening everywhere, not just in the cities and suburbs,” said John Harper, a Partner at Clean Energy Venture Group. “Rural and remote power generation assets have a critical role in transitioning to a cleaner and more resilient future. 60Hertz’s CMMS is an essential tool in this effort. We’re eager to help 60Hertz Energy grow dramatically over the next several years.”

About 60Hertz

60Hertz Energy is the only offline-first Social Impact CMMS (Computerized Maintenance Management System) for remote assets and teams. 60Hertz is innovative because of[its focus on emerging markets, serving users without strong reading skills, and for use in rural/remote settings with limited bandwidth.

About Factor[e] Ventures

Factor[e] is a global venture development firm dedicated to supporting the growth of early-stage, technology-enabled companies solving challenges in energy, agriculture, mobility, and waste in emerging markets.

About Climate Impact Capital

Climate Impact Capital, LLC invests in energy technology companies and supports global energy corporations through CIC’s Venture-as-a-Service program. Focusing on climate change risks, CIC identifies resiliency opportunities and prepares our partners, customers, and portfolio companies for a world challenged by climate variability and resource scarcity. With a diverse team and a global partner network across oil and gas, power, and energy technology manufacturing, CIC is at the forefront of the energy transition.

About SeaChange Fund

SeaChange Fund was founded in 2015 and has $47.5 million assets under management and a pooled average IRR of 55.6% across six funds. The Fund has made 46 investments in 33 early-stage Pacific Northwest startups in nine industry sectors. These investments help support nearly 610 jobs in the PNW region.

About Clean Energy Venture Group

Clean Energy Venture Group is an angel investment group providing seed capital and management expertise to early-stage climate tech and clean energy companies. The group is comprised of seasoned operating executives with strong capabilities in the energy and environmental sectors. With each investment, we bring not only capital but also the value of our experience and network to help companies achieve their financial and impact goals.

The post 60Hertz Energy Closes $1.3M Round to Improve Remote Microgrid Operations appeared first on Climate Impact Capital.

by Eugene Han and Alex Rozenfeld

Modernizing Texas’ power grid will stimulate jobs and resilience. The time is right to look at ways of cultivating robust power sources that can withstand both pandemics and climate events.

Throughout  history, civilizations have seen pandemics as mechanisms for innovation to support the future well-being of their people. In the 19th century, multiple cholera epidemics broke out in New York, causing traffic jams of horses and carriages as people fled for the perceived safety of the suburbs. These outbreaks resulted in the building of underground wastewater systems and green spaces like New York City’s Central Park to make the city more livable and healthy. Covid-19 may have similar effects in Texas and larger urban metropolitan areas around the world.

In Texas, we are now seeing the first glimpse of Covid-19’s impact on the state’s legendary sprawl. Early evidence shows that Covid-19 lifestyle changes may reverse the two-decade-long national trend of people moving back to cities. This would undermine efforts to increase urban energy efficiency and the implementation of so-called “smart” cities, that seamlessly integrate energy management, transportation and social services. It also highlights  the need to modernize already strained suburban power grids across Texas.

Texas is among the nation’s hottest and mostly energy deregulated states. Texas’ unwieldy urban sprawl is seen in some of America’s fastest-growing cities: Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio. The Texas Triangle, as it is known, is home to more than 18 million residents. From 2010 to 2018, the state’s metropolitan areas were the only places  in the U.S. to have added more than 1 million people.

This rapid growth, combined with record heat waves and droughts, has often strained Texas’ electrical power reserve, which faces even more demand if Texans shift in a permanent way to working from home and if the record summer heat waves intensify. With these changes may also come a future decrease in power reliability, impacting businesses and employees working from home.

These important changes in energy demand emphasize the need to modernize the aging networks of power grids across Texas. The good news is that Covid-19 offers the opportunity for a fresh look at how the state organizes its energy infrastructure. The hope would be that the future would bring greater focus on distributed energy resources, which can provide robust and resilient power capable of coping with both the pandemic and Hurricane Harvey-type climate events.

Modernizing Texas’ power grid will also help fill a growing employment void created by the depressed state of Texas’ fossil fuel industry, which has seen thousands of jobs lost since the pandemic began. Texas is already home to more than 263,000 power grid workers. Pandemic or no, jobs in the energy sector are expected to grow. Between 2015 and the end of 2019, electric power generation added 177,000 jobs, energy infrastructure created 156,000, and energy efficiency an impressive 400,000, according to a report by Steven Pedigo Director at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs LBJ Urban Lab.

In the short term, the health needs caused by the pandemic are paramount. But we must also look to the future and be sure to facilitate an economic recovery. By embarking on a smarter and less carbon-reliant energy future, Texas has the chance to serve as a future model for supporting the health and safety of its citizens and its economy.

Original post and comment on Climate & Capital Media

More:

• Op-Ed: How Texas can improve its chances for post-pandemic economic recovery (Dallas Morning News, May 18, 2020)
• Texas Policy Experts Offer Playbook for Post-Pandemic Recovery (UT News, May 13, 2020)

The post Texas’ Big Post-Covid Opportunity to Modernize Its Power Grid  appeared first on Climate Impact Capital.

BY ALEXANDER ROZENFELD

Texas oil and gas companies are experiencing their most dire crisis ever. As countries have shuttered and industries slow from COVID-19, demand for oil and gas has plunged while supply from OPEC, Russia, and the United States continues to rise. Oil usually hovers around $40-$60 a barrel, but during this pandemic, prices are struggling to stay above $20. For some, the crash of the fossil fuel energy industry is a reason to celebrate. Such celebrations by the “oil is our enemy” crowd are premature. In fact, this crisis may become a huge setback for renewables and the energy transition for four important reasons.

1. Low oil prices will lead to bankruptcies and a lack of transparency

Oil companies going bankrupt does not mean they disappear, magically replaced by carbon-free alternatives. Quite the opposite: Bankrupt energy companies will drop from public markets, and the transparency that comes with public listings, undoing years of effort to make oil companies more publicly accountable about their activities. If sold to private equity firms, there is minimal environmental oversight, with no need (or interest) to maintain transparency and environmental risk management. In the unlikely case that companies shut down altogether, any future supply will come from countries with questionable accountability and transparency processes. This is important because much of the ESG (environmental, social, governance) progress, thus far, is due to shareholder resolutions requiring transparency for public companies, including the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures. Since 2015, the TCFD has created a framework for companies to signal changes, to report impact, and to publicize their plans to reduce GHGs. The gains from forced transparency have been substantial. Bankruptcies would destroy these initiatives.

2. Low oil prices mean low natural gas prices

Natural gas prices have been this low only twice in 20 years, in 1999 and 2016. Low natural gas prices make power cheaper to generate, helping many gas-to-power producers in the short-term and increasing the likelihood of new natural gas plant development. Now, we prefer gas to coal, and the good news is the pandemic has also seen a significant reduction in coal use globally. However, the more use of natural gas, the less incentive to transition to alternative forms of energy.

3. Low oil prices lead to cuts in renewable initiatives

Investment in novel carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) could be drastically reduced. CCUS investment was already low within the oil and gas industry. Now it’s taking a back burner to survival. We already see significantly less interest in, and ability by the industry, to invest in these areas from their innovation and R&D budgets. Even if bankruptcy is avoided, capital budgets will continue to be reduced, impacting any renewable initiatives and low-carbon programs planned for the next few years.

4. Low oil prices change our mobility choices

Shifting the focus to the consumer, prices at the pump are at record lows. This does not bode well for electric vehicles. When we all start driving again, there will be far more incentives to both drive more and to buy low fuel efficiency trucks, rather than fuel-efficient EVs or hybrids.

Ironically, stability is key

The collapse of fossil energy prices highlights a key paradox that threatens the movement to renewable energy. Swings in commodity prices and fossil fuel bankruptcies hinder the path to an energy transition. If we want to maintain our low-carbon energy targets and a successful energy transition, the global economy and domestic oil (especially gas) must recover. For this to happen and for renewables to win long-term, oil has to survive first.

The post Why the Texas oil crash is terrible for renewables appeared first on Climate Impact Capital.

Combating and adapting to climate change is a lofty goal and though the global track record on positive impact is all over the map (literally), we see collaboration as the key to meaningful progress. Recognizing that proactive organizations will survive and thrive, many of you are already on your journey and some of you will embark in this new decade. In either case, we hope to join you and to collaborate with you in 2020! Below, we highlight some of the major climate & energy trends of the last 10 years and share our outlook for the new decade. We hope you will engage with us as we work together to create the bridge to the low-carbon future.

2010s: The Decade of Disjointed Acceptance
In the 2010s, most of us agreed on climate change science and accepted that action is necessary. Globally, we witnessed emerging nationalistic sentiments, putting self-interest above the greater good. Climate consensus led to only fragmented actions toward (somewhat) mutual climate goals. In the midst of geopolitical turmoil, protesting (climate) inaction, greenwashing empty action, and public rioting against expensive action confused us, scared us, but most of all, pushed us to expect more. What happened in the 2010s:

• Fracking: The shale boom boosted the role of gas in the global economy, made the USA into a net energy exporter, and caused coal to downturn domestically.
• Energy access: Developing nations vowed to increase energy access, and major health concerns from urban air pollution directed this push largely toward clean energy.
• EVs: Hybrids and all-electric vehicles emerged and became a must-have sales item for all car manufacturers. We think this trend will continue, with all sectors moving towards EVs and abandoning ICEs altogether by 2030.
• Renewables: Technological advancements in renewable power lead to the dropping cost of wind and solar, making clean energy portfolios (and the obsolescence of coal in the short term and natural gas thereafter) a solid bet for the future.
• Big data: Data became a valuable currency with IoT allowing data aggregation, analysis, and insights on a monumental scale. Its unregulated distribution, though, left consumers feeling a loss of privacy.
• Extreme weather: The world faced 100-yr and 500-yr weather events on a scale never-before-seen. The increased prevalence of mega-storms tested infrastructure and readiness, which in most cases, did not hold up.

2020s: The Decade of the Climate Emergency
In a true prediction of the next decade, Oxford Dictionary declared ‘climate emergency’ the word of 2019. We expect that there will finally be a worldwide declaration of a “climate emergency,” and public and private organizations will commit to climate action plans, incentives/regulations, and other substantive change. With the passing of some major scientific milestones (we say goodbye to 1.5*C and recognize that 2*C is a bullish goal), adaptation will become an equal focus with mitigation. What we expect in the 2020s:

• Resiliency: There will continue to be an increase in mega-disasters, creating climate refugees across the globe. The new conversation will focus on resilient and robust strategies against these weather extremes. We anticipate that the decentralization of energy will help to avoid another PG&E 2019. Renewables and storage-based microgrids with demand-side management will become prevalent around the country, particularly in areas that are vulnerable to extreme weather, and a standard in developing countries, bringing reliability and lower costs
• Asia: Developing countries will see the most growth in the next decade and face some of the most significant impacts of climate change. We expect that Asian countries will emerge as leaders in green technology, creating technological advancements and opportunities for implementation at scale.
• Sensing: Data went largely unchecked in the last decade, and we expect that in the next 10 years, consumers recover control of their data through sensors to track their usage, efficiency, and information in real-time. C&I customers also embrace this trend more widely to extract more useful insights from smart devices across operations and supply chains.
• Advanced chemistry: The waste crisis created an awareness of materials, their origin, and their lifecycle. In the 2020s, we expect that advanced materials will be critical with the growth of new technologies for the low-carbon economy. We anticipate an intersection with the carbon story to push CO2 utilization and overall carbon value creation to new levels.
• Accountability: Governments and individuals will continue to blame large corporations for the climate emergency. There will be an uptick in climate-related company bankruptcies and moves to become public benefit companies. The opportunity for proactive companies in the new energy economy is significant; action can help to avoid litigation and to create new business opportunities.

The post 2020 Impact Investing Insights appeared first on Climate Impact Capital.

Let me start 2020 with a confession: I’m not a Texan, but I got here as fast as I could. Why, though? What’s so special about this state? Historically, people flocked to Texas to take advantage of its resources, which spurred three big Texas industries: ranching, oil, and real estate. More recently, it has become known for its affordable cost-of-living, business-friendly policies, and of course, as the epicenter of the shale oil & gas revolution.

Texas is the self-proclaimed oil & gas capital of the United States, producing more than a third of the nation’s crude oil, a quarter of its natural gas, and a significant fraction of its liquified natural gas (LNG) export capacity.

However, with the energy transition underway, we now also believe we can become the low-carbon energy capital, with an emerging landscape that both decarbonizes and goes beyond fossil fuels. Given Texas’s 25,000 megawatts (MW) installed wind capacity (nearly 5x that of California), and its 3,400 MW installed solar capacity (still behind California’s 26,000 MW, but getting closer each year), Texas is well-poised to be the frontline of all things energy for the foreseeable future.

And in case you forgot, Texas is a historically red (purple, at best) political state. Combining the very conservative rural areas, which embrace both wind farms and fracking, and liberal urban cities with ambitious climate action and renewable energy targets, we have very diverse viewpoints.

To me, that means this state has the potential to make the largest impact on the future of energy and climate change in the USA, and the world. Whether through reducing emissions from big oil, developing clean energy projects, or growing an energy startup, Texas is THE place to be.

Each month, we will explore a business climate change topic in Texas, looking at views from all perspectives. We’ll let you know how what’s going on in the Lone Star State is relevant to you and to the global energy community.

Original post and comment on Climate + Capital Media

The post The World’s Climate Solution Capital May Be Texas appeared first on Climate Impact Capital.