The Impact Innovator | Issue 284
In this week's The Impact Innovator edition:
The Biden Administration is putting almost $3.5 billion into improving the strength and resiliency of the United States’ electric grid, government officials said on Wednesday. The money is coming from the?Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which President Joe Biden signed in November 2021, and Wednesday’s announcement marks the first round of funding out of $10.5 billion that was allocated as part of the?Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships (GRIP) Program?to improve the nation’s electric grid. The $3.46 billion announced Wednesday will go to 58 projects across 44 states, including some 400 microgrids across the country, the Department of Energy said. The investments in the electric grid will get more than 35 gigawatts of clean energy onto the grid, the Department of Energy says. For some sense of perspective,?a mid-size city needs a gigawatt of electricity, Microsoft co-founder and climate investor?Bill Gates?said in his book,?“How to Avoid a Climate Disaster.”
The $3.46 billion in government funding announced Wednesday will be joined with $4.7 billion in?investments from the private sector, bringing the total amount of catalyzed investment into the grid to $8.16 billion. “Right now, the U.S. electric grid is the largest connected machine in the world. It’s 5.7 million miles of transmission and distribution with about 55,000 substations,” Jennifer M. Granholm, secretary of the U.S. department of energy, said on a conference call with reporters on Wednesday. “And it needs upgrading, clearly,” Granholm said.?More than half of the transmission lines and power transformers were installed before 1970,?Mitch Landrieu, White House Infrastructure Implementation Coordinator, told reporters on a conference call with reporters on Wednesday.?And an old grid breaks down a lot, particularly in extreme weather events. Investing in the electric grid has direct impacts on the lives of people, Landrieu said.?The program marking federal funding for upgrading the electric grid was popular — the Department of Energy received 700 concept papers or letters of interest from all over the country, a senior administration official told reporters. From there, 300 applications were encouraged to go on to the next stage of the application process and then 58 were ultimately selected.? As an example of one of the successful applications, Georgia will receive $507 million will to invest in battery storage, local microgrids, other investments in grid reliability and in new transmission lines.
General Mills, Walmart and Sam’s Club announced a collaboration today to help accelerate the adoption of regenerative agriculture on 600,000 acres in the U.S. by 2030. This represents the approximate number of acres General Mills uses to source key ingredients for its products sold through the retailers.?Regenerative agriculture practices are aimed at addressing the environmental impact of the sector, and include techniques to improve and restore ecosystems, build soil health and fertility, reduce emissions, enhance watershed management, increase biodiversity, and improve farmers’ livelihoods.?Agriculture has emerged as a major focus area for climate action, as the sector accounts for a significant proportion of GHG emissions, and is among the most difficult areas to address climate impact.
The sector contributes a significant proportion of the climate impact of the food and beverage sector, which in turn accounts for approximately a third of global GHG emissions.?According to the companies, the goal of the new initiative is to support the transition to regenerative agriculture production in the Northern and Southern Great Plains through systems change and elevate the potential for more resilient yields for farmers through efforts that will help improve soil health, watersheds, biodiversity, climate change and farmer economic resilience. The project puts General Mills on pace to exceed its goal to advance the adoption of regenerative agriculture on one million acres by 2030, as well as contributing to?Walmart’s goal?to protect, more sustainably manage or restore at least 50 million acres of land by 2030.
Overstory, a climate tech startup that leverages artificial intelligence (AI) to mitigate wildfires, protect biodiversity, and help industries make smarter decisions about natural resources, announced today that it has raised $14 million in Series A financing. The round was led by?B Capital, with participation from?The Nature Conservancy, among other top climate-minded investors. The latest raise brings Overstory’s total funding to $25 million.
The new investment will accelerate the company’s development of its global vegetation intelligence platform, which provides insights about the location, size, health, and species of any tree on Earth. Improperly maintained vegetation is a major contributor to both power outages and some of the most devastating wildfires. Overstory’s initial focus is to provide electric utility companies with visibility, risk analysis, and optimization recommendations for vegetation management by applying artificial intelligence to satellite imagery.?Amsterdam-based Overstory’s mission is to help solve the climate crisis by providing tree-level insights about the planet’s vegetation. The company is building technology that mitigates wildfires, protects biodiversity, and helps people make smarter decisions about our natural resources. In just over five years, Overstory has actively monitored about 2 million acres, and protected $6 billion of utility assets.
Bedrock Energy – a technology startup that designs, constructs, and delivers geothermal heating and cooling systems – recently announced $8.5 million in seed capital. The financing round is led by Wireframe Ventures, with participation from Overture Climate VC, Long Journey Ventures, Cantos, Toba Capital, First Star Ventures, Divergent Capital, and Climate Capital. The funding will speed up manufacturing and deployment of technologies that improve the economics of all-electric geothermal HVAC systems, helping real estate properties achieve Net Zero operations.
The company is developing a novel technology stack that combines autonomous drilling and advanced subsurface modeling to triple the speed and space efficiency of geothermal projects. And these advantages enable geothermal HVAC to fit into dense, urban locations with sensors that uniquely validate real-time construction accuracy. The payback periods under five years allow real estate owners and investors to decarbonize large properties with double-digit internal rates of return.?Federal incentives can offset the upfront cost of geothermal systems by 30% to 60%, while local and state climate policies are increasingly pressuring large real estate owners to look for ways to decarbonize their assets. And these factors – combined with Bedrock’s technology innovations – position geothermal heating and cooling as a leading path to reduce emissions and energy costs for urban buildings across the U.S.
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Danish investors Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners have closed on two new funds for a combined €2 billion (~$2.1 billion) to invest in clean energy and clean fuels.?Why it matters:?A record amount of money is being invested in solar projects globally, despite the headwinds of high interest rates. CIP says the two funds were raised from pension funds, life insurance companies, sovereign wealth funds, family offices, asset managers and corporate investors.
The clean fuels fund will back projects and companies that produce renewable natural gas from food and agriculture waste, biofuels from waste wood, and liquified natural gas. The clean energy fund will provide debt financing for renewable projects across Europe, North America and Asia Pacific and has already made three investments for a total of €236 million. CIP held the first closing of its flagship fund CI V at €5.6 billion earlier this year.Big picture:?Climate investors are funneling money into global solar, wind and battery projects as utilities and energy companies strive to hit net-zero goals and regulations.
HSBC Asset Management?has launched a new thematic equity ETF in Europe providing exposure to companies developing solutions for the climate transition.??The?HSBC Nasdaq Global Climate Tech UCITS ETF?has been listed on?London Stock Exchange?in US dollars (HNCT LN) and pound sterling (HNCS LN), as well as on?Deutsche Boerse Xetra?(H41V GY) and?Borsa Italiana?(HNCT IM) in euros.?The fund is linked to the?Nasdaq CTA Global Climate Technology Index?which selects its constituents from a global universe of stocks with market capitalizations above $300 million and average daily trading volumes greater than $1m.?The index harnesses insights from the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) to screen for companies operating within industries aligned with the climate technology theme. These include power generation and storage, climate infrastructure, transportation, sustainable agriculture, and food technology.
Firms identified as belonging to the above industries are then scored across three dimensions: Thematic Revenue Score, Transition Score, and Innovation Score. The Thematic Revenue Score gauges the percentage of a company’s revenue derived from climate tech; the Transition Score qualitatively assesses a company’s progress towards a carbon-neutral business; and the Innovation Score is a measure of the company’s influence on achieving global carbon neutrality, considering factors like R&D investment and patent activity. Based on these scores, companies are categorized as either Tier 1 or Tier 2. Tier 1 companies generate at least 50% of their revenue from climate tech, while Tier 2 companies must have at least 25% revenue exposure while also exhibiting high scores in transition and innovation. The index uses a modified theme-adjusted free-float market capitalization-weighting scheme. Each company is assigned a ‘Weighted Score’ based on its performance across the three score dimensions, which then plays into the security’s Theme-Adjusted Free Float Market Value. This nuanced approach ensures that the index constituents reflect not just market value, but also their alignment and impact within the climate tech sector. The ETF comes with an expense ratio of 0.50% and is classified as an Article 8 product under the European Union’s Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR).
High in the Alps, two Swiss companies are repurposing obsolete satellite antennas into giant solar panels, taking advantage of Switzerland's mountainous terrain to generate much-needed green energy.?The installation is the second of its kind in the town of Leuk in the Valais canton to turn an old antenna into an energy powerhouse.?Its mountainous location means the solar panels will get more direct sunlight, especially in winter, than if they were installed near mistier, low-lying urban areas.??"Former satellite antennas are ideal as solar energy systems," said CKW Group, the energy services provider that assisted Leuk Teleport and Data Center with the repurposing of its antenna.?"They can be flexibly aligned with the sun and thus generate more electricity than conventional solar panels."?
One antenna of the kind can meet the energy needs of 25 households, according to CKW Group. The antennas covered in solar panels, which resemble flying saucers, measure 32 meters (105 ft) in diameter and are located some 1,000 meters above sea level, allowing them to receive an optimal level of sunlight, even in winter. In August last year the Swiss government launched a voluntary campaign to urge consumers and businesses to conserve energy to prevent shortages of gas and power. Solar energy could prove to be part of the solution. "Switzerland is facing a major challenge: by 2050, there will be a shortfall of around 50 terawatt hours of electricity per year," said Axpo Group, Switzerland's largest producer of renewable energy which owns CKW Group.
The pharmaceutical industry is a significant contributor to the pollution, largely due to the prevalence of?single-use plastic bottles, most of which end up in landfills.?Diminishing that plastic waste is the focus of startup?Cabinet Health, whose founders believe that the healthcare industry can’t ignore a waste stream that’s literally endangering humans’ wellbeing. As consumers increasingly switch to mail-order drug services, the company sees an opportunity to make that transition sustainable and eliminate single-use plastics. This week, it’s launching the first refillable and compostable prescription service, whereby it will send medicines in bio-based pill pouches that can naturally decompose in the backyard.?Starting Wednesday, users can sign up for the service?on the website; Customer service representatives will be available to help transition from their current system to Cabinet’s. For each prescription, customers will receive a refillable, recyclable glass bottle, personalized with their name and dosage directions, as well as the compostable pouches each time they get a refill.?
It took some time to design each pouch for different medicines, which need different temperatures, moisture environments, and UV ray exposure. “All pouches are not made equal,” Gong says. “What the consumer sees as one pouch, there’s been hundreds of different iterations to adapt to the next requirement for the product.” Once empty, the pouches can be composted in “your classic worm bin,” Gong says. For city residents, they should be compostable in municipal programs; they’re also approved by?Lomi, a smart composting machine brand designed for the kitchen, which Cabinet has partnered with. In a Lomi, a pouch can be turned into usable soil within a few days.? Currently, Cabinet has 150 prescription drugs on offer, which it says is about 80% of the most commonly dispensed oral medications. By mid-2024, it aims to expand that to 800, including liquid medications and birth control, both of which will need different formulations of the pouch. As the service officially launches, Cabinet says it already has 20,000 potential customers in its system who have expressed a desire to onboard. Depending on the drugs, they could receive them within a week of registration.
A 50-year-old Swedish woman who lost her hand in a farming accident has been fitted with a cutting-edge prosthesis that has proved transformational.?The bionic hand is based on revolutionary technology that connects directly to a user's bones, muscles, and nerves?– creating a human-machine interface that?allows AI to translate brain signals into precise yet simple movements.?The woman who received the bionic hand, Karin (whose full name is undisclosed), now has a limited sense of touch and can move all five of her bionic fingers individually with a success rate of 95 percent.?After two decades of living without a right hand, she can now carry out 80 percent of her usual daily activities, like preparing food, picking up objects, zipping and unzipping clothes or bags, and turning door knobs or screws.?What's more, after receiving the prosthetic hand, Karin's excruciating phantom pain, which she said felt as though her hand was going through a meat grinder, decreased significantly.
The international team of engineers who worked on the bionic hand recently shared Karin's success in the journal?Science Robotics.?The researchers, who come from Sweden, Italy, and Australia, say it's the first time that a robotic hand with internal electrodes has shown long-term viability for amputations below the elbow.? To provide an interface for Karin's prosthesis to connect to, two implants were placed in her ulna and radius bones. A muscle graft from her leg was then connected to these implants, giving the severed muscles and nerves in the stump of Karin's arm something to reattach to. Importantly, these muscle grafts contained electrodes to amplify signals to the interface.? Because the prosthesis is directly anchored to bone, researchers say it's much more comfortable for patients to wear than conventional 'ball-and-socket' prostheses. What's more, because the sensory electrodes are embedded inside the robotic hand instead of on the outside, direct neural stimulation is consistently and reliably perceived by the hand. Compared to a conventional prosthesis, this new technology improved Karin's grip precision by nearly four-fold. The prosthetic hand has been named Mia Hand, and it was developed by the Italian company,?Prensilia, which specializes in robotic and biomedical devices, and funded by the European Commission.