Talking Climate Tech 015 redux
Biodiversity AI startups, Trump Watch, Big Bananas, COP16 and Pylon of the Month
🌱 Biodiversity Startups | 💣 EPA | 💥 2 Crashes | 🍌 Bananas
Issued to subscribers 14th March 2025.
It's Friday, I am yet another year older as of Thursday 😮💨 No time to waste let's crack on!
After weather, water, methane, and wildfire startups in recent weeks, we are sticking with the nature theme this week. Also there is a COP Biodiversity update later on. ⬇️
💸 Startup News
🇬🇧 NatureMetrics - Series B raise for €24.3m to support their AI platform for geospatial and bioacoustic data processing
🇩🇪 Nala - Seed raise €3.8m for their AI platorm to report, monitor and manage biodiversity, helping business to better protect ecosystems and mitigate impact.
🇩🇪 Soilytix - Funding estimated >€10m to date for soil microbiome analytics for insights on soil biodiversity, bacteria, fungi and microfauna.
🔎 Deeper Dive
Trump Watch 💥
The Eye of Sauron fell back on climate this week after he turned the Whitehouse into a Tesla yard sale. More Heil Tesla demise here, -32% in the last month. 🤣
More importantly, the EPA was ripping up everything it could - 31 environmental regulations. Analysis here. Sounds bad, it is. The good news is legally the protection is robust, to overturn some of the protections, they have to overturn scientifically what has already been proven:
to undo the endangerment finding, the EPA would have to establish a factual record that climate change isn’t happening due to burning fossil fuels, and that even if it is, it doesn’t hurt anything.
Will have to see their way past this evidence from Exxon, 1979:
Oh, and there was also the Executive Order to start a hack-a-thon on US forests, more on that here. Slash and burn baby.
Bananas 🍌
The humble banana, I love them - the reliable fruit always on hand to fill you up and give you some energy. There is an athlete in all of us 😆
Globally it's a $25bn industry employing 1 million workers, with 80% of the world's exports coming from Latin America and the Caribbean. Some serious tonnage:
Climate challenges, just a few - forecasting 60% reduction in available land for banana crops by 2080. Further reading here.
Geothermal Colab 🌎
Good news as Google Cloud, SLB [Schlumberger] and Project Innerspace team up for a geothermal discovery project. What are they up to - big data, mapping, analytics and discovery to accelerate geothermal adoption. More here and from a Google Cloud Energy Sector lead; 👏
Project Innerspace’s GeoMap, built on Google Cloud’s AI and data technologies, and SLB’s expertise in geothermal energy, businesses will have access to the tools and experience needed to grow geothermal energy programs around the world
Iceberg Crash 🧊
Yes that big fella has run aground again 🙄 not sure who is navigating. It's still the size x2 Greater London 🤯 and has parked near South Georgia. You might recall it was spinning around on the spot towards the end of last year. Quite the journey, more in depth here...
Good news is that it will release lots of nutrients. Bad news - grinding everything on the sea floor, fishing vessel hazard as it breaks up, dilution and salt balance, impact on krill, and therefore penguin and whale feeding. 🐧
Another Crash ⛴️
Grimsby in NE Lincolnshire, UK doesn't see the news headlines often, trust me I know, it was my home town before I migrated South at 18. It's been global news this week - a tanker carrying US military aviation fuel was hit by a container ship. More on the environmental impact here.
🏡 Konfab News
A bit of admin on the konfab site. Getting organised and creating easier access points for our new subscribers.
Dedicated page for Guest Articles...
Simon Todd, Kane Watkinson
And for those past 'newsletter redux' issues - great to look up sector-specific startups for future reference...
Kane Watkinson
There will be a dedicated podcast area, but I felt one recording looked a bit sad and lonely on its own for now 🥺
On that note, we passed the 1,200 subscribers threshold this last week! That many people can't be wrong...right?
😃 Good Stuff
Hot Water 🔋
Good news for Mixergy here in the UK, they of the digital, machine-learning hot water tanks. Picked up a further £12m investment round. Now focused on scaling up further via licensing and strategic partnerships. Additionally, enhancing R&D capabilities to meet the evolving needs of social housing providers, property developers, energy utilities, and HVAC OEMs.
There is a future where every DHW tank is a time-shifting energy storage device and a lot cheaper than a Li-ion home battery. DHW is typically 20% of your energy bill costs - get that energy on an overnight EV tariff, fantastic, then plug your Solar PV and heat pump in as well for a fully integrated ML home hub system.
COP16 Biodiversity 🐛
The resumed session at the end of February after the hiatus from November 24 due to a lack of progress and alignment. A deeper dive into all the key elements agreed here.
Looks like they have found at least $200bn per year by 2030 to secure and protect biodiversity. Despite the USA bailing as usual, the major western economies cutting back, due to the threat of WWIII etc. Celebrate the wins. 👏
Pylon of the Month ⚡
Here we go, T-Style this month from way-back in November 2011. This tower of power was the winning pylon from the Royal Institute of British Architects competition.
Energy and Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne at the time:
This is an innovative design which is simple, classical and practical. Its ingenious structure also means that it will be much shorter and smaller than existing pylons and therefore less intrusive.
For the eagle-eyed, we saw the T-Pylon in action in 004 at Hinckley Point, nice to see it deployed from its competition origins.
There are a few beauties from this competition; I will bring you something inspirational and radical next week! ⚡
Thanks as always, let's keep pushing forward with all things climate tech and the real-world solutions that meet our climate challenges.
Remember, the momentum is unstoppable despite everything you might see and hear! 🌍
Stay warm, cool and safe wherever you are 🙏
Kane
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