It's our last business episode of 2022. It's been a newsworthy year for startups, corporate commitments, and investing in carbon removal, and December has been no different.
This week we'll talk about a grab-bag of headlines:
Prince William came to the U.S. to give a promising carbon storage startup $1 million (among other things).
A major investor doubled down on their climate fund at a time when general VC funding is drying up.
An on-the-ground look at one DAC company's foray into bringing CDR to Wyoming's oil and gas country.
Ben Rubin joins Radhika and Susan as a guest business panelist. Ben is the Executive Director of the Carbon Business Council, a trade group for CDR companies.
On This Episode
Susan Su
Radhika Moolgavkar
Ben Rubin
Resources
Union Square Ventures announcement
Inside Climate News article on CarbonCapture in Wyoming
Vox coverage of nuclear fusion announcement
Subscribe to Climate Workers Anonymous
My other show, Reversing Climate Change
Books referenced in the podcasts, at Bookshop
Full Transcript
Announcer: You’re listening to Carbon Removal Newsroom, a weekly show about current events in the world of carbon removal, from technology and innovation to policymaking and job growth. Brought to you by Nori, the carbon removal marketplace.
Radhika Moolgavkar: Hello, everybody, and welcome to our December 15th edition of the Carbon Removal Newsroom, the last of the year and the last of the business episodes this year. With me, as always, is Susan Su, who is a partner focused on climate investing at Toba Capital. She also serves as a board member at the Carbon Business Council and a board advisor to the Environmental Voter Project. Hi, Susan.
Susan Su: Hello.
Radhika Moolgavkar: And then fortunately, we have Ben Rubin, who is the Executive Director of the Carbon Business Council, which has a member-driven nonprofit coalition of more than 75 companies, which has grown since the last time we’ve had him on. And they are unified to restore the climate and serves as the industry voice for carbon management innovators. So Ben, welcome again. Thanks for coming.
Ben Rubin: Yeah, thanks so much for having me on.
Radhika Moolgavkar: And then, as always, I’m Radhika Moolgavkar, Head of Supply and Methodology at NORI. So it has been quite a whirlwind year for startups, corporate commitments, and investing in carbon removal. This week, we’ll kind of talk about a grab bag of headlines. For those of you who follow the royal family, Prince William came to the U. S. to give a promising carbon storage startup $1 million, among other things. A major investor doubled down on their climate fund at a time when general VC funding is drying up. And we’re going to talk a little bit about a DAC project that is happening out in Wyoming.
So let’s begin with the Earthshot Prize. The prize started last year and is scheduled to be given annually until 2030. Each year, five teams are awarded a $1 million prize. This year, XPRIZE finalist and former CRN guest 4401 took home the prize, and they are building a facility in Oman to mineralize CO2 capture by DAC. So, Ben, I don’t know, is 4401 is part of the Carbon Business Council? Can you tell us a little bit about them? Am I right about that?
Ben Rubin: Yeah, we were very excited to see them win the prize, and I think it’s a testament to the growing recognition and prominence of carbon removal that I think we had both 44. 01 win it and also Landed Tech as a carbon management company, also as a semi-finalist in the near running. We’re in touch with 44. 01. We’re supportive of what they do. They’re not a member of the Carbon Business Council, but they are working on a really promising process with Robby [inaudible] Can winning a prize like this be helpful when they are thinking about fundraising?
Radhika Moolgavkar: And is it a message to the VC community to take something more seriously?
Susan Su: Yeah, I mean, absolutely. And I think it’s really exciting that they’re, first of all, just to call out something from Ben’s intro on Carbon Business Council that we’re all surprised that there are now 75 member companies. Up from zero at the beginning of this year. And I think it’s really a testament to the growth of this sector. And so relating that to the Earthshot Prize and XPRIZE, I mean, it just really creates headlines around carbon removal. And I think as we see a more diverse array of companies starting to get anointed with these prizes, it really starts to paint a more I think nuanced picture of what carbon removal really is.
It’s not just the machines with the fans. It’s not just soil carbon. It’s not just rocks. It’s all of the above. And I think that really helps to show that there is a lot of kind of meat here for investors as well as the public, as well as policymakers to dig into. So absolutely. I mean, first of all, these prize teams that do the evaluations, they usually have some folks that are looking at feasibility, engineering, as well as the scientific components. So it always helps to send those signals that they’ve been through a round of diligence in order to be Sort of validated the for the solution to be validated.
The fact that this particular organization has been final became a finalist for XPRIZE and then also was awarded the Earthshot prize, I think speaks doubly to their legitimacy, which is really, really important when you’re a pre-pilot company. It’s really not in this is reminds me of You know, kind of like the DOE or the DOD awards that companies can go for. It’s really not about that million dollars. It’s a tiny drop in the bucket of what they’re going to need. It’s really the signal that it sends not only to investors, but to all of the partners that they’re going to need throughout their, you know, basically operational process to scale up what they’re going to do.
And so I think it’s very, very important for those reasons. Of course, if your investment partner can go out to the public and say, well, my company won the Earthshot Prize and was finalized for XPRIZE, you’re doing them a huge favor. So I’d say the best way for a company to capitalize on things like that is to really Develop a, and I don’t see these deep tech companies doing quite enough of this, but really develop a smart communication strategy that bundles things together. I always think about Google as your storefront.
You know, your Google search results are your front page of your store. Basically, they represent you to the world. And if you have something prestigious like XPRIZE or the Earthshot prize on there, when somebody types in 44. 01 into the search bar, You want to make sure that the other entries that populate also support the story that you’re telling there, that you are a leading company, that you have been validated through multiple steps by world-class organizations, and that you are a safe place to put capital. Oh, and an exciting place, not only safe, but a very exciting place to put some capital.
So I think there’s lots that companies can do when they get a PR spike like this, but the best thing to do is to really keep the ball rolling and be prepared for the success of it and have things ready to go, ready to deploy in terms of communications at the same time.
Radhika Moolgavkar: So the prize is awarded based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals and is funded by some large big green philanthropies like Bloomberg, Beninoff, Greenpeace, and the Bezos Earth Fund. So I’m curious if, and this question is to both of you, are you surprised that a more mainstream environmental coalition recognized a technical CDR solution? To me, it seems like a shift in where some of these more mainstream Environmental advocacy groups and funders are going. Susan, I’ll start with you and Ben, I’ll go then end with you.
Susan Su: I personally, not surprised at all. I think it’s the evolution of the space. And I think Ben is going to have some really good stuff to say on this. But I think we are really kind of coming out of 90s environmentalism. And I don’t mean that in a disparaging way. It’s That was the right thing for the right time. We continue to get new information about how everything interacts. And we continue to really have this dawning realization that it’s going to require a multi-pronged approach in order to solve the problem at hand and that the problem really belies all of our individual problems, the bigger problem of climate change.
And so I think it completely makes sense that Bloomberg and Benioff have been I a little bit surprised that Greenpeace is in there, and I think it’s awesome, and it shows the evolution of thinking around what we need to on climate solutions. I think it completely makes sense, and I think it’s very heartening.
Ben Rubin: Yeah, all really great points from Susan. I agreed on the evolution and that makes a lot of sense. I think one thing that’s also been exciting to see about the way that the Earthshot has structured their prizes is that they have five distinct and select categories and 44, they won under the fix our climate category. And as we’re looking at different climate I think it’s really exciting to see a competition set up that’s recognizing the full breadth What it’s going to take to stabilize the climate and reverse the impacts of climate change.
So, um, and, and I think it’s, it’s, it’s good. It was exciting to see two finalists who had a carbon management elements want to call out to that. Take a char a member of the carbon business council won the award last year for the work that they’re doing in carbon removal. And so it’s been good to just see or shots commitment, conviction behind the need for removals. And just also to quickly return to one point that Susan was making about the power of prizes and what it does for companies. It’s been an exciting week for prizes overall in that the Energy Department announced $150 million for the direct air capture prize this week.
And so we’re seeing the power of what prizes can do to really spur innovation.
Radhika Moolgavkar: All right. Well, now we’re going to pivot to more, well, VC type news with Union Square Ventures, which is one of the country’s largest and most successful VC firms. In 2020, they launched their $162 million climate tech fund and have been investing in a wide range of decarbonization companies since then. Last week, they announced the closing of their second climate fund, this time with $200 million. They’ve already invested in startups like algae-based CDR company Brilliant Planet, Remora, a carbon capture solution for trucks, and forest carbon offset platform NCX. Susan, maybe you can give us a little bit of an overview of Union Square Ventures and kind of the progress that their companies and they’ve made since 2020 and what you think of their current approach.
Susan Su: Well, Union Square Ventures is really a legendary venture capital fund. I would definitely put them in tier one. Anybody would love and be very fortunate to have USB on their cap table or as a co-investor. And they’ve been at it for a really long time. So I think they’re definitely the type of fund that has the brand equity and the trust in the ecosystem to be able to launch a climate fund every single year if they wish to. Just off the back of the success of their kind of general standard software funds, which they do tend to roll one out.
I think in the last five or so years, they’ve kind of rolled out a new vintage every year. Their first climate tech fund, or climate fund, I don’t know if they call it climate tech or climate fund, but that was actually, looked like it closed at the end of 2020. So it was almost like a 2021 vintage. And now this one’s Coming right out at the end of 2022. So they’re pretty much right on the heel of their first fund. It’s only a year apart. And I think it shows a lot of momentum around the space, of course, which is unsurprising.
We talk about that every single month here, but also around there’s a lot of appetite, there being a lot of appetite To pair a really like sort of blue chip name like Union Square Ventures with the hot category of climate tech investing. So, I mean, they’re clearly in the sweet spot. They are not at a lack for deal flow. They’re really the darling here. And I think it completely makes sense. One thing I’ll call out that I think is really interesting is their discipline in maintaining a $200 million fund as opposed to going much bigger, which they easily I’m sure could have.
We’ve seen a lot of fund announcements in the past months of, I think, was it Fifth Wall? Fifth Wall’s climate fund was like 500 million. There have been some growth funds out there approaching a billion or more. And so I think it’s a very specific strategy on the part of USV to stick a disciplined, tight, kind of sub 200 million fund amount. And to me, it says we’re going to be seeing a lot of seed and early Series A deals coming from them. And that’s what they think that they’re going to be able to really make an impact on, which is exciting.
And then if we, you know, I read into so many things, but if we read And if you’re going to get even more into that, then that means in the next couple of years, a great investor like USB thinks that there are going to be a lot of seeded Series A companies coming onto the stage. So it really shows that we’re just at the beginning. They’re not raising a growth or opportunity fund to invest in all of these mature climate companies. The best is yet to come. So that’s probably the most exciting thing about this particular fund is it’s actually conservative size relative to, I’m sure, whatever they could have done had they wanted to.
Radhika Moolgavkar: Well, Susan, you teed up my next question to Ben perfectly, which is, Ben, you are sort of, you know, got your ear to the ground. You know all about the different CDR companies out there and the early stage ones. If you were a partner at this... V. C. , where would you be focusing, and are there some quote unquote unicorns that they should be thinking about?
Ben Rubin: Yeah, yeah, that’s a great question, Radhika, and good insights from Susan on the fundraising round. One thing that I would highlight is just the supportive policy environment we have right now for carbon removal to scale up and understanding where there’s business models aligned and startups aligned with where policy movement is going and all of the different opportunities and how those private sector dollars are able to go further with So I think one thing that I would call out that we’re excited to see as we look ahead to 2023 and different startups and innovations happening the space is that we’re not necessarily limited to any one promising technology.
There’s a multitude of promising carbon removal approaches out there. I think as we saw with the And so I think, you know, I think it’s really important to think about that. And I think it’s really important to think about that. As funds are doing their diligence, looking at different companies, just really understanding the promise of the multitude of approaches and that we don’t necessarily have to choose from a narrow list of how we’re going to reach gigatonne scale CDR, but there’s a lot to choose from. Helps show that there’s unicorns hiding out there in a lot of different ways and a lot of different approaches to taking CO2 out of the atmosphere.
Radhika Moolgavkar: Oh, Ben, spoken like a true big tent advocate. I am impressed. So, you know, obviously, Aside from the environmental space right now, there are a lot of economic headwinds. Maybe inflation is going down. Who knows? We’ve got the whole FTX nightmare happening right now on the crypto side and just all the other political and economic negative things out there. I’m wondering how you both feel about the impact to climate tech funding in 2023. Do you see these economic headwinds having an impact, or do we think it’ll continue to be this amazing trajectory that we’ve seen in 2022?
So Ben, I’ll start with you, and Susan, I’ll jump to you.
Ben Rubin: Yeah, it’s a great question. I think we’re fortunate to be underpinned by a supportive policy environment as we go into the new year, which my hope is we’ll keep private sector investment also keeping track and recognizing the promise and potential that we’ve seen. There’s been a flurry of good news articles coming out too about how some climate tech companies have been fortunate to benefit from talent that might be getting laid off or losing their jobs in other sectors of the economy wanting to come around and join climate tech. So my hope is that we’ll continue to benefit from that new talent coming in and that Growth will stay strong in the new year, but curious what Susan thinks on that as well.
Susan Su: Yeah, you know, it’s very easy to confuse some things happening with the economy, with everything’s happening with the economy and to over extrapolate. And really, it’s more useful to be a little bit more precise in what we’re talking about. You know, you mentioned FTX, Radhika, and we talked about that last month. It doesn’t feel like FTX is, you know, crypto is still really tiny, actually, amidst the broader economy and even within tech. And it doesn’t really feel like that’s going to cause any cross-contamination, particularly with climate tech. I mean, there’s very little overlap there.
But even with, let’s talk about inflation or interest rates, that I think is definitely taking its toll, as is quite evident, on public market SaaS. But what does public market SaaS have to do with really kind of long timeline climate tech that is buoyed by policy tailwinds that are like really just written into law or these very, very long cycle funds that have money that’s kind of pouring in from the sidelines that’s been going for quite some time and is not something that really can turn on a dime, even if it wanted to, even if its LPs wanted to.
So I am personally not too concerned. The word on the street that I’ve seen is that it’s just full speed ahead in terms of deploying in early stage private equity and venture capital for climate tech. And I think once the VCs do their job, there’s definitely somebody to pick up the baton on the other side in terms of a lot of growth capital coming in and then grants and government supporting. I hesitate to read too much into any sort of recessionary type of predictions here because I just don’t think that we are, when we’re talking about climate tech, things are going to take a really long time.
And so I don’t think a blip or two that lasts a few quarters or even a year or two years is really ultimately going to make that big of a difference in terms of how these companies and these projects are supported over the long run.
Radhika Moolgavkar: Well, that’s good news as being somebody who’s in climate tech. So we’re going to pivot to Wyoming, which we don’t talk about a ton, but last week, Inside Climate News published a piece that was titled, Carbon Removal is Coming to Fossil Country, and the author looked at the early stages of Carbon Capture’s Project Bison in Wyoming. So Ben, amongst us CDR folks, you know, the Project Bison announcement was met with a lot of enthusiasm, but It was actually really interesting to read the journalists on the ground interviews and how the people within the state and within the community of Wyoming looked at Project Bison.
So what did you think of that perspective and how do we change it maybe?
Ben Rubin: Yeah, yeah. Thanks for that question. Well, I think one thing that I want to acknowledge and to Carbon Capture’s credit with the project Is the level of community engagement and outreach that they’ve been doing proactively holding town halls in the community where the project will be located, hearing what the community concerns might be so that there’s plenty of runway to incorporate and address them. And I think that level of outreach and engagement so that community members are hearing of the project is commendable. And there’s time to think through how will the project evolve as the community continues to engage?
What are the ways that it can really That the project can maximize community benefits. And so I think just certainly that blueprint for what town halls look like, what community engagement looks like, how to address and incorporate those concerns, it’s going to, I think, ultimately strengthen Project Bison in Wyoming and provide a really helpful blueprint as we think about how to maximize community benefits where other carbon removal projects break ground.
Radhika Moolgavkar: You know, Susan, one of the things we don’t talk about as much in this show, but there appears to be A decent amount of state money, at least in this project and maybe for other CDR projects, you know, what what do you know about the nature and scale of that funding and any any thoughts on how companies who are early in the space should look to seek it out?
Susan Su: Yeah, I mean, I think the federal level funding gets a lot of attention as to as to prizes and things like that. But there’s so much state and regional Money available, even for like very kind of technology forward solutions like not always technology forward, but including technology forward solutions like carbon removal through DAC. The Wyoming governor’s office has had all year really this kind of matching funds opportunity where they’ve set aside $100 million to back Carbon removal organizations that are able to also bring in matching funds from the private sector, whether it’s philanthropic dollars or venture dollars.
And I don’t think that many people know about it, actually, which is a common problem with a lot of these state funding opportunities. I’ve just kind of noticed that anecdotally. I haven’t done an official survey even myself to see what all there is In each of the 50 states, and that’s probably part of the problem is that there really isn’t an easy database that you can kind of go after. As a leader of an organization, you have to be quite diligent and on top of it. I will say as a side note, though, that amongst other investors, we always talk about like, oh, this funding, this founder or this company is really good at getting grants.
And that’s like a checkbox that we like to see. So whether that’s the founder themselves, but it honestly is so time consuming to add on to your plate as a founder, or whether they have somebody dedicated, focused on policy, or whether they can lean on something like the Carbon Business Council, just something a little bit out, a third party that they can sort of look to get help in securing the public money. It’s so worthwhile, not only because Good investors, good private investors should always welcome non dilutive capital. Um, into the bank, but also because it’s legitimizing, it helps to, and ultimately you’re going to have to build those relationships with state lawmakers and the state community at large anyway, as evidenced by this piece and Inside Climate News.
And so you might as well, um, get started and get some funds for it. I will say for anybody who’s listening to the podcast right now, I just loved this piece so much. Um, By Nicholas Kuznets, great reporter at Inside Climate News, a little shout out there, but it’s very poignant and I think it’s worth reading slowly, not skimming, reading slowly and really reflecting and putting yourself in the shoes of both yourself as somebody who cares about climate change and wants to see it mitigated, but also these local community members and what they’ve been through.
It’s a really tough problem and I think it’s very easy for companies that are sort of VC backed or they’re like in Pasadena, carbon captions located in Pasadena or wherever to sort of say, well, coal country, that’s where we’re going to put these plants and we’re going We’re going to put the solution and I think it really is a good moment to pause and develop empathy for the people whose backyards this is going to be in because they have concerns that are very, very legitimate. Yeah, I just thought it was a really great piece and I encourage everybody to go for it.
I’ll read maybe just if you don’t mind one little passage here that says, Irwin, talking about a person named Michelle Irwin, is the Southwest organizer for the Powder River Basin Resource Council, a Wyoming environmental nonprofit. And when she learned about carbon capture’s plans, she was somewhat miffed by the Project Bison name. You talk about this thing about purchasing carbon credits. Well, you know, there you go, she said, pointing to her animals as the sunset, casting a sharp yellow hue across their matted fur. The bison’s breath roared through their nostrils like monstrous billows.
Bison were once a keystone species and ecosystems across the West. They grazed on native plants like sagebrush that cattle avoided. Their stampedes turned the soil and helped seeds germinate. The wallows that the bison dug by rolling in the dirt became ephemeral pools after scarce rains, little watering holes. Some academic research has suggested that restoring grassland ecosystems could help the land sequester far more carbon dioxide than it does today. Like a massive natural carbon removal, helping to pull back what humans have released. So anyway, I think there are a lot of really great nuanced considerations here.
And I do appreciate what states like Wyoming are doing in trying to foster new industry to replace coal. And I think it initially started out as a way to give coal more of a lifeline. And now they see it as something that can kind of come in and supplant entirely. But at the same time, there’s no easy answers to any of this. And I think the article does a good job at outlining the trade-offs that not only Wyoming is facing, but that we’re really facing everywhere across the carbon removal industry.
Radhika Moolgavkar: Thanks, Susan. That was a great answer. And I think I’ve mentioned before, I have spent time in Kentucky and Appalachia and coal country and You know, I think they often get overlooked. People in these states often get overlooked in that their perspective is often seen as sort of naive, which is totally not fair, and it’s not the way you’re going to reach the community and make them change their minds. I just happen to have witnessed it myself when I lived in Kentucky, so I have some personal history around it. My final question for you both about this is, though, oil and gas country, you know, We would expect to see a lot of development around carbon capture there, places like Wyoming, the Permian Basin, and some of Exxon’s projects in the Gulf.
So where do you both see oil and gas meeting CDR and how to navigate that very difficult political, economic, and You know, just EJ perspectives around that. Ben, I’ll start with you, and then Susan, I’ll give you the final word.
Ben Rubin: Yeah, yeah, it’s a good question. I think that there are Many carbon removal companies that exist today who are working fully independently of oil and gas companies who want to work through their own solutions, their own ideas. That is companies doing direct air capture. It’s also companies working on a host of other methods, whether it’s nature-based solutions, biochar, ocean-based carbon removal. And then there are also some oil and gas companies who are actively looking at how they can take some of the skill sets that they may have developed with Poor space and geologic storage and what it will mean to sequester CO2 in the ground, who are thinking about We’re thinking about how they can put some of those skill sets towards carbon removal.
I think what will be interesting is with something like the DACA funding announcement, which just opened up, I think it’s likely that we’re going to see a multitude of applications come in. There’ll be some companies who have no connections to oil and gas, companies who think that they’re operating with the teams and the prowess to put in really competitive funding applications. And we’ll also likely see some oil and gas companies involved in Applications or maybe taking the lead on applications who are also working on direct air capture. And so I think we’re seeing that multitude of approaches on display right now, just different approaches and different vantage points about what it’s going to take to get to gigatonne scale carbon removal.
And I think One of your questions, Radhika, is community engagement and how to ensure that these projects are benefiting communities. I think whoever the project developer is, that’s going to remain paramount across the board. Really, how can we maximize benefits? How can we reduce any harms? And how can we make the projects the best that they can possibly be for community members?
Radhika Moolgavkar: Susan, what do you think?
Susan Su: Yeah, I mean, I think it’s tough and I think it makes a lot of sense to kind of have oil and gas and technological carbon removal go hand in hand. I think there’s a really great opportunity to do a better job because I think oil and gas and extractive industries have been extractive, not only of the land, but of those communities that inhabit that land and its communities of people and animals and everything else. Here’s a chance to take what we’ve learned, what we should have learned from those decades and kind of reconfigure and do a better job.
I think, as we mentioned earlier in the podcast, that’s already kind of starting to happen. Carbon capture when did this kind of listening tour across the state of Wyoming. I doubt that the coal industry did that back in the day when they first got started. There’s probably always more that we can do, but The good thing is we can take lessons learned from who’s been kind of walked the path before and start to earn a bit of trust and make it a little bit more collaborative that way. I do think there’s a just very obvious and exciting opportunity to leverage existing infrastructure.
And also to create economic opportunity and potentially really shake things up in terms of folks’ politics. People will often vote what puts food on the table. And as we see EV plants and battery plants being erected in red states or carbon capture taking the place of oil and gas in some of those same states, that’ll be really interesting to see How that affects not only policy, but also politics, because they do tend to go hand in hand. So I’ll be keeping an eye on that.
Radhika Moolgavkar: Definitely. All right. So we’re going to end with our last good news of 2022, which I’m sure everybody has heard about on who’s listening to this podcast, but researchers at the Lawrence Livermore Lab announced a breakthrough in their work on generating power via Nuclear fusion. It’s made a big splash in the media because it’s carbon-free energy. It also is, in my personal opinion, nice to see the U. S. taking the lead in a new type of energy, of carbon-free energy, renewable energy, and to see government funding of science being elevated in this way because it’s such a necessity to grow all types of technology.
So kudos to them. I wanted to hear from both of you what you thought of this announcement, and is it too early to really speculate about what it means for CDR since it’s many, many decades away from actually being commercialized? Susan and then Ben.
Susan Su: You know, for as many fusion companies that are out there that have received exciting private financing, it’s I think it gives me personally, this is a little bit my own bias, but it gives me a lot of hope and I find it very exciting that this breakthrough came from our government, came from Lawrence Livermore. And it gives me hope that maybe not all is lost and that we actually can get really cool things done in the public sector. I think we should all be really proud of that, whether we’re Americans or not.
We should just be proud that public taxpayer money can band together and do something amazing. Now, this is just a tiny drop in the bucket. They obviously have only just proven the first step in a long series of a bajillion different steps that need to come from this. But I will just maybe highlight the source of the innovation as worth noting first and foremost. And secondly, that when we look at really some of the technological advancements that affect and stand the chance to change all of humanity, whether that’s things like the Stanford Linear Accelerator or the Hadron Collider, these things require so much money.
And really, nobody has more money than the US government. Tells me that this is the right place for this innovation to be coming out, and hopefully for some of it to be experiencing longevity, for it to be scaling. It’s still exciting also what it implies for the private sector, but I suspect that what we can start to see is maybe more enabling technologies or adjacent technologies emerge on the private sector. A VC-funded company is not going to Be the first to make fusion happen that would absolutely floor me and I don’t think it’ll it makes sense at all, but a VC funded company can sure.
Create the picks and shovels or kind of jump on and further accelerate the opportunities that are kind of raised by this particular breakthrough, so I think that’s maybe one way to. Um, look at it and also just to recognize, um, the magnitude of funding that’s ultimately going to be needed to push these things forward is, um, again, I always say this, but people don’t realize how small venture capital is as a sector. It’s, it’s just really small in the overall financial services, um, sector. It’s smaller than philanthropy and it’s certainly smaller than what the U S government has at its disposal.
So, um, We will be here doing our little part, but it’s awesome to see that our taxpayer dollars are doing a lot of work for us as well.
Ben Rubin: Yeah, great, great points and insights from Susan on that. And thanks for the question on it, Radhika. I agree with what Susan was going on. It’s really exciting. It’s exciting to see that this was led by and developed by the US government. One thing that highlights for me as we’re closing out 2022 is just how we need innovation in climate tech across the board. Solar panels are often referred to as a technology where we’re hoping that other technologies and climate tech can pursue that pathway to have R&D to see the technology cost curve fall to continue redesigning it to maximize the potential of it and so.
I think as we look to 2023, this announcement and this progress, my hope is that it will help catalyze climate tech across the board, whether it’s on battery storage, carbon removal, continue to work around fusion. And I do think it will be exciting in 2023 and beyond as climate tech continues to move forward to ultimately see what the interplay might be between these different approaches and technologies. As we know, Derek air capture can be energy intensive to run there there’s a number of ways around that it can be powered with renewable resources and just as we’re starting to see breakthroughs and.
Advancements in battery storage for different forms of carbon free energy promising this ultimately see how all these different climate tech developments can ultimately blur and progress together.
Radhika Moolgavkar: All right. Well, on that really optimistic note, I will close out the 2022 season. And I thank you both, Susan and Ben, for being here. And I look forward to talking to you both in 2023. And as my final note, just a little shout out to Ross Kenyon, who was overlooked by me during the Thanksgiving episode. But we are thankful for him, too, because this whole podcast was his idea and he has helped shape it and bring it forward. With that, thank you both and have a wonderful holiday.
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