Hello team,

Happy Sunday. I had an interesting moment in Boston on Thursday when the woman sitting next to me at a panel at MIT chuckled, leaned over, and showed me her phone at 5:15 pm. She’d just received my Thursday newsletter (when my life is in order, these bad boys are scheduled). 

So even though I’m (probably) not sitting next to you right now as you open this email, imagine I’m smiling at you, saying “thanks for being here!” 

In today’s email:

• Undamming hydropower growth with modular turbines
• Fundraising announcements across climate tech
• Other climate tech, climate, and energy headlines

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DEALS IN FOCUS

I helped judge the MIT Climate and Energize prize competition on Thursday (you can watch all 8 hours of it here; pitches starts around the 2-hour & 30-min mark).

Eight total teams from the U.S. and Europe competed. Their solutions spanned everything from long-duration energy and heat storage to carbon removal. 

Notably, none of the teams were pitching new power generation tech. When the competition started 16 years ago and was called the ‘Clean Energy’ prize, I imagine few teams were working on anything besides that.

There’s a good reason for the shift in focus. Since 2007, the world has made a lot of headway in figuring out how to build, deploy, and finance clean energy technologies. Most of the energy transition could be borne by building existing tech and infrastructure; it doesn't depend on inventing new generation technologies (new energy storage solutions are still needed and welcome).

Still, that doesn’t mean we should abandon novel renewable energy concepts entirely. One firm that announced a new fundraise this week wants to deploy more distributed hydroelectric systems across existing waterways. Their turbines are to canals what solar panels are to roofs. 

Undamming hydropower

Hydroelectric power still holds the crown as the #1 source of renewable energy globally, producing about as much power as solar and wind combined (for now). Most hydroelectric generation stations are big dams. At least back in 2016, of the ten largest power plants in the world, nine were dams.

There are other, smaller power generation technologies that harness the flow of water. The concept has been around for a long time. Think about the old grist mills for grinding grain you’ve probably seen in Europe or the East Coast. Now, Emrgy, based out of Atlanta, wants to build more flow-of-water systems in the 21st century. The firm makes hydroelectric turbines designed for waterways and announced an $18.4M Series A this week, led by Oval Park Capital.

Because many of the best sites for hydroelectric dams were developed in the 20th century, hydroelectric power generation capacity globally (ex-China) hasn’t grown quickly since the 1990s. The Chinese are still building new hydroelectric capacity, both in China and abroad. But China is the exception, as they've developed every power generation hand over fist.

However, technologies like Emrgy's could be vital in undamming hydroelectric power in developed countries. Their turbines come with a few advantages:

• Like solar arrays are comprised of many small panels, Emrgy's turbines come in 5 to 25 kW modules that can be connected to create larger arrays (the firm targets 10 to 20 MW arrays). Manufacturing smaller systems like this is more scalable than building big dams.

• Like solar panels on roofs, many waterways are close to grid infrastructure and industry. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation operates 1,600 miles of main canals. This should make deploying Emrgy's systems easier.

• Like solar projects, financing smaller, modular hydroelectric systems should be reasonably straightforward. Even bigger, utility-scale solar projects follow a tried and true project and tax equity financing playbook.

Emrgy’s turbines deployed on a river in Denver (via Emrgy)

Perhaps most importantly, hydroelectric power has a higher capacity factor than solar and wind. Running water is more consistent – although drought conditions can still pose a threat – than sunshine and wind, making innovation in long-duration energy storage and new electric transmission infrastructure less of a prerequisite to take full advantage of hydropower.

With funds in tow, Emrgy plans to open its first major manufacturing facility in Aurora, Colorado, to produce up to 5 MW of turbine capacity monthly. It has successfully deployed its turbines both domestically and internationally already.

The net-net

It can take decades to build a new transmission line or nuclear power plant in the U.S. Against that backdrop, it’s no wonder that a lot of renewable energy capacity and power generation growth has come from more distributed systems like solar panels and wind turbines, where the underlying modules are easier to scale from a manufacturing perspective and easier to deploy.

Designing hydroelectric turbines to follow the manufacturing and deployment path that solar paved makes a lot of sense. If Emrgy can make it make cents, too, their future should be bright!

DEAL HEAT

Medium-sized venture funding rounds

🏢 Infogrid, based out of London, raised $90M in Series B funding for its building management platform that helps customers monitor air quality, occupancy, and energy consumption data. Original Capital, SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Northzone, and others participated. Read more here. (U.K., Built Environment)

🌞 Solarmente, based out of Barcelona, raised ~$55M million in funding from GNE Finance for its rooftop solar and solar subscription / financing business. More here. (Spain, Energy)

⛏️ Energy Exploration Technologies, based out of San Juan, Puerto Rico, raised $50M in Series B funding for its lithium extraction and refining technology. GM Ventures led. More here. (U.S., Industry)

⚡  Hometree, based out of London, raised $46M in Series B funding for its residential energy services business that helps customers install, manage, and finance renewable energy solutions for their homes. 2150 and Energy Impact Partners led. More here. (U.K., Built Environment)

🔌 Spring Free EV, based out of San Francisco, raised $31M in Series A funding and a debt facility for its portfolio of fintech products designed to accelerate EV adoption. Spring Lane Capital led. More here. (U.S., Transportation)

🌾 Carbon Robotics, based out of Seattle, raised $30M in Series C funding for its robots that use lasers to kill crop weeds. Sozo Ventures led. More here. (U.S., Food and Agriculture) 

📊 ClimateAI, based out of San Francisco, raised $22M in Series B funding for its machine learning-driven climate risk forecasting tools. Four Rivers Group led. More here. (U.S., Climate Management) 

🏢 Citron, based out of Paris, raised ~$22M in equity financing for its building resources management and optimization platform. Eiffel Investment Group led. More here. (France, Built Environment) 

💦 Emrgy, based out of Atlanta, raised $18.4M in Series A funding to electrify waterways with hydroelectric turbines that generate electricity from flow of water rather than water pressure. Oval Park Capital led. More here. (U.S., Energy)

⚡ SuperNode, based out of Dublin, raised ~$18M in funding from the firm's founder, Eddie O'Connor, and Aker Horizons for its power transmission technology. More here. (Ireland, Energy)

⚡ Ryse Energy, based out of Abu Dhabi, raised $15M in growth equity for its wind and solar manufacturing business. RWE Energy Transition led. More here. (UAE, Energy)

💸 AGRI3 Fund, created by the United Nations Environment Programme and Rabobank, raised $13.5M from the Global Environment Facility to provide loans to commercial banks and other financial institutions for sustainable agriculture and forestry. More here. (Netherlands, Finance)

🔌 ChargeLab, based out of Toronto, raised an additional $15M ($10M in equity and $5M in debt) in Series A funding (bringing the round's total to $30M) for its EV fast-charging technology. Silver Comet and Eaton led. More here. (Canada, Transportation)

⬇️ Noya PBC, based out of San Francisco, raised $11M in Series A funding for its direct air capture technology based on sorbent materials. Union Square Ventures and Collab Fund led. More here. (U.S., Carbon Markets)

Smaller venture funding rounds

👚 Kintra Fibers, based out of Brooklyn, raised $8M in Series A funding for its alt-materials business, which includes things like a bio-based polyester alternative in its portfolio. H&M Group led. More here. (U.S., Industry)

💸 Crux, based out of Washington, D.C., launched this week with $4.6M in seed funding led by Lowercarbon Capital. The firm aims to "help developers, tax credit buyers, and financial institutions transact and manage transferable tax credits." More here. (U.S., Finance)

🔋 Haven Energy, based out of Los Angeles, raised $4.2M in seed funding for its home battery systems. Lerer Hippeau and Giant Ventures led the round. More here. (U.S., Energy)

📊 TablePointer, based out of Singapore, raised $3M in seed funding for its energy-efficiency SaaS platform targeted at small and medium-sized businesses. Wavemaker Partners, AgFunder, and Engie led the round. More here. (Singapore, Energy)

⚡💦  Plagazi AB, based out of Gothenburg, Sweden, raised ~$2M in Series A funding from Uturn2innovation to develop its waste-to-green hydrogen project. More here. (Sweden, Industry)

🌲 Xilva, based out of Zurich, Switzerland, raised $1.8M in pre-seed funding for its global marketplace for investments in reforestation and prevented deforestation projects. Brainforest, Bloomsbury Natural Capital, Insurtech.vc, and others participated. More here. (Switzerland, Nature-based solutions)

🌾 BX Technologies, based out of London, raised ~$1.8M to help unlock new primary farm data to drive supply-chain decarbonization insights for food and beverage suppliers. Counteract led. More here. (U.K., Food and Agriculture)

⚡ Conduit Tech, based out of Somerville, MA, raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding for its high-efficiency HVAC systems installation business. Breakthrough Energy Ventures led. More here. (U.S., Built Environment)

🔌 Veloce Energy, based out of Denver, raised an undisclosed amount of Series A funding for its tech and financing platform designed to accelerate the deployment of EV charging infrastructure. ITOCHU, a Japanese conglomerate, and Ecliptic Capital led. More here. (U.S., Transportation)

Private equity and other funding rounds

☀️ Lightsource bp, based out of London, raised $327M in financing to build a 313 MW solar project in Mississippi County, Arkansas. The project will be the largest in Arkansas. More here. (U.S., Energy)

🛒 In acquisitions, Greenwood Sustainable Infrastructure bought a portfolio of community solar + storage projects totaling 1.4 GW+ of capacity across the U.S. and Canada from Saturn Power, based out of Ontario. GSI will invest $200M+ to develop the projects. Read more here. (U.S., Energy)

🛒 Also in acquisitions, Watershed, a market leader in carbon emissions accounting based out of San Francisco and London, acquired emissions accounting and data firm VitalMetrics (based out of Santa Barbara, CA). This consolidation comes in advance of new disclosure rules from the SEC could catalyze more demand. Read more here. (U.S., Climate Data Management)

⚡ In grant funding, the U.K.'s Department for Energy Security and Net Zero will provide $37.5M to develop long-duration energy storage projects from Synchrostor, Invinity Energy Systems, and Cheesecake Energy. More here. (U.K., Energy) 

🚗 Also in grant funding, Blink Charging, based out of Miami, received $7M in grant funding from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (via the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, and New Jersey Economic Development Authority, to bring an electric ride-sharing program to disadvantage New Jersey communities. Read more here. (U.S., Transportation)

New funds 

💰 Carlyle, the PE giant based out of New York, is targeting $2B for a new high-yield debt infrastructure fund. More here. (U.S., Funds)

💰 Warren Equity Partners, based out of Jacksonville, FL, and New York, raised $1.4B+ for its fourth PE fund targeting infrastructure and buildings. More here. (U.S., Funds)

💰 Eclipse Ventures, based out of Palo Alto, raised $720M for its fifth flagship fund and $480M for its second growth fund. The venture firm focuses on investing in industrial tech. More here. (U.S., Funds)

💰 Oxus Capital, based out of Almaty, Kazakhstan, and New York, is launching a new $200M fund to invest in businesses and technologies that promote a "greener and more equitable planet." More here. (Kazakhstan, Funds)

🧪 Asahi Kasei, a Japan-based chemicals manufacturing firm, noted it will invest ~$100M over the next five years in early-stage climate tech startups. More here. (Japan, Industry)

💰 Overwater Ventures, based out of San Francisco, launched to support early-stage firms in "human and planet health" and raised a $20M debut fund. More here. (U.S., Funds)

ELSEWHERE IN CLIMATE TECH

🚗 Policy: The Biden administration, via the EPA, set new limits on tailpipe emissions from cars to accelerate the U.S. transition to EVs. The limits aim for 67% of new vehicles and 25% of new heavy-duty trucks sold by 2032 to be electric. Ideally, the limits will also drive higher fuel economy in internal combustion engines. 

🏭 Onshoring: Ford will invest $1.8B to convert its Oakville Assembly Complex in Ontario, Canada, into an EV production facility. Ford predicts the plant will begin producing EVs in the second quarter of 2024.

⚡ Tech deployment: Ascend Elements' battery recycling plant in Georgia is operational, valorizing lithium-ion batteries and other recycled materials for new technologies.

⬇️ More tech deployment: UNDO Carbon inked a contract with Microsoft to remove 5,000 tonnes of CO2 from the atmosphere by spreading crushed basalt rock on agricultural land. This is the first enhanced rock weathering deal at this scale (to my knowledge)!

🔋 Corporate commitments: Apple will stop using cobalt in consumer electronics batteries by 2025. This effort will depend in large part on recycling batteries. Apple also added another $200M to its carbon removal fund.

⚡💦 Hydrogen hype: Seven U.S. states in the northeast applied for DOE funding (to support a proposed total of $3.6B in investment) to organize and build out a hydrogen hub.

📈 Put a proper 'B' on it: Frontier pushed its total fund size for advanced market commitments in carbon removal over $1B by extending its partnership with firms like Watershed.

📉 Input volatility: While long-term demand forecasts for lithium remain highly bullish, precipitous short-term price declines have forced some Chinese lithium producers to cut back on production.

🚫 so good news: Germany shut down its last three operational nuclear power plants yesterday, in a significant blow to the country's clean energy production capacity. Public sentiment itself had shifted, as more voters than not now support keeping the plants open. 

🌞 Closing on good news: The TransWest Express Transmission Project received final approval from The Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Department of the Interior to build a 732-mile high-voltage system. It will connect three distinct planning regions and add 3 GW of transmission capacity.

Bye now,

— Nick

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