SF Bay Area Climate Tech: January 23 - January 29, 2023
All things food and fun with ag tech summits and climate happy hours across the SF Bay Area this week!
Hi friends,
Kick off the week on Monday in San Mateo with an event on Digital Farming and AgTech Ecosystem. On Tuesday, swing by the Climate Tech Mixer: Battery x Bio Tech in San Francisco. Stay in SF on Wednesday for the Sustainable Food Summit and a casual MCJ meetup at Zeitgeist. On Thursday, make friends with architects at the USGBC Northern California: 2023 Community Kick-off near Union Square or head to the Exploratorium in the evening for After Dark: Ice Stories. If you’re in the North Bay, get involved at the Sebastopol Climate Engagement Series. Wrap up the week on Saturday with the Climate Reality Project Bay Area Member Social at Gilman Brewing in Berkeley, or head to a film screening of 8 Billion Angels in San Mateo.
Cheers,
Alec and Sonam
Hot Take: Every Job is a Climate Job!
My mantra: every job is a climate job!
There’s no question that we’re going through a huge shift in the global economy. Inflation reached 9.1% last year, the biggest year increase since 1981. There are layoffsacross the tech industry, with household names cutting back and watching their share prices drop. The era of low interest rates making money virtually free is gone.
The bright side: The Age of Climate Industrialism is in full swing! New talent, innovation, founders, funders, and government action have all mobilized to develop the real solutions that we need to respond to climate change. This is the optimistic, action-oriented response to climate doom and gloom - a bet that climate solutions rooted in abundance and progress will create value for people in their daily lives and more broadly across their communities.
This is the new face of Climate Industrialism - building new technologies, learning new skills, and putting climate solutions to work in our streets and neighborhoods! Credit to Lyn Stoler for the fabulous drawing!
I believe this is going to be a significant driver of economic growth over the next decade. These are the boots-on-the-ground jobs that will help us truly decarbonize and adapt our society to climate change → and this labor transition is already happening!
The transition to clean energy is expected to generate 10.3 million new jobs globally by 2030 per a recent study by the World Economic Forum. Wind turbine service technicians make up the second-fastest growing occupation in the U.S. behind nurse practitioners, with a 44% growth rate projected in the next decade. According to electrification nonprofit Rewiring America, the US needs a million new electricians to complete the new wiring needed for the energy transition. We need to be spending $9.2 trillion per year as a globe to get to net zero by 2050 - all in all, that translates to A LOT of jobs!
There’s a job for everyone, really. Stats: Visual Capitalist/IEA World Energy Outlook.
So, where can you start? Take an inventory of your skills, think about what problem you want to solve, and most importantly, find your people. There are TONS of resources out there to help you along the way, and I want to highlight a few of them:
Climate Career Week (happening as we speak!) - a free virtual event with 17 sessions, 40+ speakers, office hours, and more.
Terra.do - online cohort based courses to learn about climate tech, policy, and vc, career fairs, and a community of climate enthusiasts
Climate Draft - on-ramp to connect the climate curious to learn about various industries and connect them to early stage companies
Work On Climate - slack channel and resource network with 10,000+ members (fourfold more than last year!)
Climatebase - list of 40,000 jobs from more than 3,000 climate tech companies, with more than 600,000 people using the resource globally
Greenwork - training thousands of field staff to install everything from solar panels to HVAC systems, helping to solve a significant skilled labor shortage
BlocPower’s Civilian Climate Corps - provides training and job opportunities to New Yorkers in neighborhoods impacted by crime
Climate People - climate tech recruiting group matchmaking between people looking for jobs + companies hiring
I’ll end with my giant twitter thread on some of my favorite climate tech companies hiring. You'll work with nice people, and you'll save the world (literally).
By Sonam Velani
Community Shout-Outs
🌎 Climate Tech Cities
Our platform is expanding! We started as an 8-person dinner and now have almost 3,000 members in our community. We’ve had people across the world reach out to us to start their own chapters - so we’re launching a new Climate Tech Cities organization to kick of 2023! If you have friends who are interested in becoming chapter leads, please share the word! Here’s to a global network of local communities making a positive impact!
👩🏻💻Seed Consulting Group
Seed Consulting Group is a volunteer-run non-profit that offers pro-bono consulting services to sustainability organizations. They started in LA in 2014 and recently opened a chapter in NYC. We worked with them in the Fall, and they’re interested in working with any non-profit sustainability organizations in NYC or the wider East Coast during their upcoming spring project cycle, kicking off in March. If you’re interested in getting help for your organization or volunteering, reach out to Connor Nolan connornolan@seedcg.org or Holden Mackey holden.mackey@seedcg.org.
🧑🏽🔬Climate Career Week
Climate Career Week is 5 days of free virtual events for tech workers interested in exploring career opportunities in climate. Events include Office Hours, Meetups, Jobs, and Resources hosted by our friends at Climate Draft, Terra.do, MCJ Collective, and Work on Climate.
Events This Week
🧑🌾 Digital Farming and AgTech Ecosystem: Mon, Jan 23
👩🔬 SF Climate Tech Mixer: Battery x Bio Tech: Tue, Jan 24
🥕 Sustainable Food Summit: Wed, Jan 25
🍻MCJ Drinks & Network in SF: Wed, Jan 25
🏡 USGBC Northern California: 2023 Community Kick-off: Thu, Jan 26
❄️ After Dark: Ice Stories: Thu, Jan 26
🌱 Sebastopol Climate Engagement Series: Thu, Jan 26
🎬 Film screening - 8 Billion Angels: Sat, Jan 28
🌤 Climate Reality Project Bay Area Member Social: Sat, Jan 28
Read on for more details about this week’s happenings and upcoming events this month
Upcoming Events
📈 Markets vs. Mandates: Env. Quality and Economic Prosperity: Mon, Jan 30
⚡️ NEDO SV Foresight Seminars: Inventing the Future: Session 3: Mon, Jan 30
🚗 Attribute-based Subsidies and Market Power for Electric Vehicles: Wed, Feb 1
🖋 Liz Ogbu: Design/ing in the Apocalypse: Thu, Feb 2
☕️ Climate Tech Cafe: Thu, Feb 2
👩💻 Climate Co-Working Thursdays - Kickoff!: Thu, Feb 2
🌳 Nature X Carbon Bay Area Monthly Meetup: Mon, Feb 6
🌱 Net-Zero is Not Enough: Innovative Solutions to Cool the Planet: Wed, Feb 8
🌇 Rising Leaders Committee Celebration: Thu, Feb 9
🍹 2023 Happy Hours + Startup Showcase Kickoff!: Thu, Feb 9
🧘♀️ Bay Area Women in Climate Investing & Finance - Yoga: Sat, Feb 11
✅ Greenaction's 25th Anniversary!: Sat, Feb 11
🔋 1.5 C - Sustainable Batteries Panel Event: Wed, Feb 15
🌿 Fujitsu ActivateNow Technology Summit, Silicon Valley: Wed, Feb 22
🥗 The Earth on Your Plate: Thu, Feb 23
🥙 Meatless Meat Up: Plant-based Tasting & Workshop: Sat, Feb 25
🏥 Sustainable Healthcare Workshop: Mon, Feb 27
🌎 The Great Displacement with Jake Bittle: Mon, Feb 27
Events This Week
🧑🌾 Digital Farming and AgTech Ecosystem
When: Mon, Jan 23rd from 9:00 AM to Fri, Jan 27th at 5:00 PM
Where: 1850 Gateway Drive, San Mateo, CA 94404
Designed specifically for city agencies and industry experts, the program includes 5 full days of an immersive experience with the most innovative startups, industry leaders and experts who will give you exclusive insights into the technology-driven transformation for the future of digital farming.
👩🔬 SF Climate Tech Mixer: Battery x Bio Tech
When: Tue, Jan 24th from 6:30 PM to 8:00 PM
Where: Studio 45, 45 29th St, San Francisco, CA
Join for a zero proof happy hour to mix and meet builders, researchers, and investors in the battery and bio tech space. drinks and snacks provided. event supported by studio 45, a hard tech prototyping co-working space in the mission climate founder dojo, a 3 month program supporting early stage founders
🥕 Sustainable Food Summit
When: Wed, Jan 25th from 9:00 AM to Thu, Jan 26th at 5:00 PM
Where: Merchants Exchange Club, 75 Leidesdorff Street, San Francisco CA 94104
The Sustainable Foods Summit will feature regenerative agriculture, upcycled foods, and ingredient innovations. For the first time, the executive summit will discuss approaches to encourage regenerative practices and upcycling in the food industry. How is regenerative agriculture gaining traction? What are the implementation, standardisation and scaling issues? What are the opportunities with upcycled foods? How can upcycling create novel ingredients? What are industry best-practices for setting up supply chains for such products? What are the marketing issues for sustainable foods? Such questions will be addressed in this edition.
🍻MCJ Drinks & Network in SF
When: Wed, Jan 25th from 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM
Where: Zeitgeist, 199 Valencia St, San Francisco, CA 94103, USA
Rain is finally over! Come meet up with the Bay Area MCJ and larger climatetech community. More details about the MCJ climate tech online community and podcast: https://myclimatejourney.co/. This will be a casual meetup, no set agenda.
🏡 USGBC Northern California: 2023 Community Kick-off
When: Thu, Jan 26th from 5:00 PM to 7:00 PM
Where: Stok's Office, 26 O’Farrell St, Fl. 2, San Francisco, CA 94108
Ring in the new year with the USGBC Northern California Community. Join us for networking event hosted at Stok’s offices. Enjoy special refreshments provided by NCC Annual Sponsor, Epic Cleantec. Miss the Greenbuild buzz already? Join old colleagues and meet new USGBC members for a festive, in-person happy hour gathering. New to the sustainability industry? Join and mingle with emerging and seasoned professionals as we connect again to celebrate the new year. Drinks and snacks will be provided, FREE for members, students, and emerging professionals.
❄️ After Dark: Ice Stories
When: Thu, Jan 26th from 6:00 PM to 10:00 PM
Where: Exploratorium, Pier 15, Embarcadero at Green St, San Francisco, CA 94111
Delve deep into Jen Lewin’s luminous installation The Last Ocean before it leaves the Exploratorium floor! Traverse the artwork’s 1,200-square-foot landscape of interactive platforms—inspired by an Antarctic ice shelf—then learn about how icebergs and ice shelves are studied, reflect on the impacts of climate change, and get up close with some fascinating ice science. Plus, enjoy special performances from dance collective Mix’d Ingrdnts that will activate and illuminate The Last Ocean.
🌱 Sebastopol Climate Engagement Series
When: Thu, Jan 26th from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM
Where: Sebastopol Community Cultural Center, 390 Morris Street, Sebastopol, CA 95472
We want to invite the community of Sebastopol to join us for an evening of pizza, discussion, community building and climate education! The change starts with us and we want to do our part and reduce the effects of climate change in our daily lives and in our community. This will be an ongoing series discussing topics such as Transportation, Energy, sequestration, EV cars, recycling/zero waste and more! This is put on by the community for the community to help and share what we can do to do our part.
🎬 Film screening - 8 Billion Angels
When: Sat, Jan 28th from 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM
Where: San Mateo Public Library, 55 West 3rd Avenue San Mateo, CA 94402
The title of the film refers to the number of people that currently inhabit the earth. In fact, on November 15th of this year, the 8 billionth person was born. The documentary connects all of the planet’s environmental emergencies, including climate change, with unsustainable population growth. Following the film, there will be an opportunity to hear from and ask questions of (via Zoom) the creator of the film.
🌤 Climate Reality Project Bay Area Member Social
When: Sat, Jan 28th from 4:00 PM to 6:30 PM
Where: Gilman Brewing Company, 912 Gilman Street, Berkeley, CA 94710
Join Climate Reality Bay Area at Gilman Brewing Company for food, drinks, and fun! Meet and chat it up the incoming leadership team and other chapter members, and share your ideas for 2023! This is an all-ages, family-friendly event. No cover. Food and beverages will be available for purchase from the venue. Gilman Brewing Company is located in Berkeley, just off the Gilman Street exit on I-80, and 1.3 miles from the North Berkeley Bart station. Transit and carpooling options are encouraged, though street parking is available. Space is limited, so let us know if you can join us! RSVP requested by Wednesday, January 25.
📈 Markets vs. Mandates: Promoting Environmental Quality and Economic Prosperity
When: Mon, Jan 30th from 8:15 AM to 6:00 PM
Where: Traitel Building, Hauck Auditorium, 435 Lasuen Mall, Stanford, CA 94305
On January 30, 2023, the Hoover Institution will host a one-day conference on Markets vs. Mandates: Promoting Environmental Quality and Economic Prosperity. Building on Hoover’s founding principles of generating ideas that define healthy and free societies, the program will examine the differences between markets and mandates for improving environmental quality and energy efficiency while promoting individual liberty and prosperity.
⚡️ NEDO SV Foresight Seminars: Inventing the Future: Session 3
When: Mon, Jan 30th from 5:30 PM to 7:30 PM
Where: Plug and Play Tech Center, 440 North Wolfe Road, Sunnyvale, CA 94085
You are cordially invited to an in-person seminar exploring Innovation in Smart Grid Strategy and Technology. This is the third session of NEDO Silicon Valley Foresight Four Seminar Series featuring solutions to advance the goal of a sustainable future with Net Zero emissions by 2050.
Join the Fun!
Submit Events
We know all of you are cooking up great events across the SF Bay Area that highlight the latest and greatest in our collective effort to save our city - and our planet! 🌍 We would love to spread the word. Please share any event details and we'll add them to the list.
Share Your Ideas
We're excited to grow the Climate Tech community in cities across the globe! What started as an 8-person mid-pandemic outdoor dinner has since morphed into a 2,500+ strong and ever-growing group of rockstars trying to change the world. We aim to be a community resource - built for and by our community. Share your thoughts!