SF Bay Climate Tech: February 13 - February 19, 2023
Many climate meetups, meatless meat workshops, and sustainable batteries that keep you going!
Hi friends,
This week is a little quieter, with two events in the Mission on Wednesday: a sustainable batteries panel at Manny’s and Work on Climate Wednesday at Southern Pacific Brewing. Kick off next week on Tuesday the 22nd with the SF Climate Tech Meetup at Studio 45 with a dual theme of fusion and AI. Next Wednesday, head to Zeitgeist for the Bay Area Terra.do meetup, Lazy Dog in Fremont for the Cleantech Open Bay Area Meetup, or Mountain View for the Fujitsu ActivateNow Technology Summit with a focus on sustainability. Next Thursday, nerd out about energy with the DER Task Force Happy Hour at the Page in SF, or swing by Burlingame for a talk on food and climate change. On Saturday, get a taste of the future in Mountain View with the Meatless Meat Up: Plant-based Tasting & Workshop.
Cheers,
Alec and Sonam
Hot Take: Show Your City Some Love 💕
I do *lots* of career chats with people transitioning into climate – most of you know my mantra, the more the merrier fighting the food fight! One of the most frequent questions I get: “How can I start to get involved?” My answer: get your boots on the ground and change the equation in your own streets and neighborhoods!
For all the time we spend talking about the hundreds of billions of dollars coming down the pipe through the IIJA, CHIPS, and IRA, these funds have to be deployed in local communities across the country. It means funds for new, sustainable, affordable housing. It means green (and hopefully not too much gray) infrastructure on your waterfronts to protect against sea level rise. It means funds for solar panels on the rooftops of your kids' schools. It means wind turbines in the farms upstate and waters off your coasts. It means transmission lines to bring power from renewable generation sources to the population centers that need it most.
Unfortunately, naysayers abound left and right. The NIMBY phenomenon of “not in my backyard” not only runs deep, but very much so runs across every corner of our society. Case in point: there are dozens of projects across the Bay Area that have not crossed the finish line because of community opposition. These include permanent supportive housing to alleviate homelessness to multistory residential in the Panhandle that has been thwarted under the guise of CEQA environmental regulations. These are well-connected neighborhoods and exactly where we should be building tall, beautiful, sustainable buildings.
The reality is that it often takes a village to get this stuff off the ground, literally. One of the best ways you can ensure that these types of transformative projects get going is by joining your local Neighborhood Group Organization – showing up to make your voice heard on how we can make our city sustainable. Rather than community opposition, YOU can be the voice of reason and make the case.
Community Shout Outs
🌎 Climate Tech Cities
We are expanding! We started as an 8-person dinner and now have over 3,500 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!
Events This Week and Next
🔋 1.5 C - Sustainable Batteries Panel Event: Wed, Feb 15
🌎 Work on Climate Wednesday: Wed, Feb 15
⚛️ SF Climate Tech Meetup: Fusion x AI Panel: Tue, Feb 21
🌿 Fujitsu ActivateNow Technology Summit, Silicon Valley: Wed, Feb 22
🌱 Cleantech Open Bay Area Meetup: Wed, Feb 22
🌎 Bay Area Terra.do meetup: Wed, Feb 22
⚡️ DER Task ForceBay Area Happy Hour: Thu, Feb 23
🍽 The Earth on Your Plate: Thu, Feb 23
🥙 Meatless Meat Up: Plant-based Tasting & Workshop: Sat, Feb 25
Read on for more details about this week’s happenings and upcoming events this month
Upcoming Events
🏥 Sustainable Healthcare Workshop: Mon, Feb 27
🌎 The Great Displacement with Jake Bittle: Mon, Feb 27
🍀 Charm Industrial Open House & HH with WCS: Tue, Feb 28
⛏ Architectures of Extraction: A Just Transition Dialogue: Thu, Mar 2
🌎 Project: Planet: Mon, Mar 6
⚡️ BERC Energy Summit 2023 - Making the Energy Transition Work: Wed, Mar 8
🌱 Climate, Business & Innovation Summit 2023: Wed, Mar 8
👖 Future of Fashion Conference: Thu, Mar 9
💧 Hydrocolonialism Symposium: Fri, Mar 10
⚡️ Energy Innovation Forum: Low Carbon Innovation: Wed, Mar 15
🌳 Nature X Carbon Bay Area Monthly Meetup: Mon, Mar 20
Events This Week
🔋 1.5 C - Sustainable Batteries Panel Event
When: Wed, Feb 15th from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM
Where: Manny’s, 3092 16th Street, San Francisco, CA 94103
The future of EVs, grid storage, and electrification relies on a sustainable supply chain for batteries. But, there are many challenges: the cost of lithium has soared over 400% in the last year. And many critical minerals, such as cobalt, are produced in countries with poor track records on human rights. Making EVs accessible, practical and affordable enough to replace the 300 million gas burning vehicles in the US over the next 20 years will require massive investment in the battery supply chain. Doing so in a just, equitable, and sustainable way will be even more challenging. 1.5C will convene cutting edge startups addressing these issues for an evening of education, inquiry, and networking.
🌎 Work on Climate Wednesday
When: Wed, Feb 15th from 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM
Where: RSVP for Location
We were blown away by the response to January's happy hour (273 RSVPS! 🤯) so we're making this meet up monthly. Come meet others working on climate or trying to get into the space. Bonus points if you bring a climate curious friend! Location to be confirmed by Feb 8.
⚛️ SF Climate Tech Meetup: Fusion x AI Panel
When: Tue, Feb 21st from 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM
Where: Studio 45, 45 29th street, San Francisco, CA 94110
Join for our first panel event of the year discussing the intersection of nuclear fusion and applications of different machine learning models. we'll have guest speakers share their perspective, a chance for audience q+a, and mix + mingle portion. speakers include:
dr. clea kolster is partner and head of science at lower carbon capital, investing in climate solutions that reduce greenhouse gas emissions across heavy industry, transportation, food and ag, power, fuels and carbon removal; founder of a clean energy access company in West africa; and a phd. focused on large-scale carbon capture and storage (ccs), co2-enhanced oil recovery and energy systems modeling from imperial college london.
dr. brian spears is the principal investigator at the lawrence livermore national laboratory where he focuses on large scale, high performance computing and the confluence of deep learning for confinement systems. he completed his phd in mechanical engineering and applied math from university of california berkeley.
dr. rachel slaybaugh is principal at dcvc. she is focused on climate, sustainability, and energy investments. before joining dcvc, rachel was an associate professor of nuclear engineering at the university of california, berkeley as well as division director at lawrence berkeley national laboratory where she ran the cyclotron road division.
🌿 Fujitsu ActivateNow Technology Summit, Silicon Valley
When: Wed, Feb 22nd from 9:00 AM to 7:00 PM
Where: TBA, Mountain View, CA 94043
With a theme of “Turning Crisis into an Opportunity: Technologies Powering Sustainability Transformation,” our technology summit will focus on the dynamic role of advanced technologies in driving sustainability transformation through digital innovation via compelling keynotes, thought-provoking panel sessions, and insightful technology demonstrations. It’s an excellent opportunity for digital transformation corporation decision-makers, startups, venture investors, and graduate school students to interact with Fujitsu’s management team, researchers, and fellow technology thought leaders from Silicon Valley’s thriving innovation ecosystem.
🌱 Cleantech Open Bay Area Meetup
When: Wed, Feb 22nd from 5:00 PM to 7:00 PM
Where: Lazy Dog Restaurant & Bar, 3100 Newpark Mall, Newark, CA 94560
Interested in cleantech startups and entrepreneurship? Want to chat about the latest and greatest in the cleantech commercialization support ecosystem in California, and beyond? Us too! Join Cleantech Open West on for a session of networking with like-minded folks! Whether you're into growing your own startup, learning about evolving cleantech markets or environmental public policy, or just meeting new people, there's something here for you! We're excited to have familiar faces and new ones all come together at this event! Learn more about Cleantech Open, how you can be involved, or whether or not your startup should apply to the program!
🌎 Bay Area Terra.do meetup
When: Wed, Feb 22nd from 7:00 PM to 10:00 PM
Where: Zeitgeist, 199 Valencia Street, San Francisco, CA 94103
Terra.do is a climate education, networking and community platform. We are a group of alumni of their Learning for Action online course, serving as ambassadors in the Bay Area. For this event there's no set agenda—it's a casual drinks-and-bites kind of thing. Pay for yourself at the bar and mingle with the Bay Area ambassadors and the rest of the community.
⚡️ DER Task ForceBay Area Happy Hour
When: Thu, Feb 23rd from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM
Where: The Page, 298 Divisadero Street, San Francisco, CA 94117
DER Taskforce is where passionate DERs talent comes to learn, teach, and collaborate. Whether you develop projects, write software, market EVs, advocate policy, finance projects, analyze markets, fund companies, or just want to learn about how people and businesses interact with energy, this is where you want to be.
🥗 The Earth on Your Plate
When: Thu, Feb 23rd from 7:00 PM to 8:30 PM
Where: Burlingame Community Center, 850 Burlingame Avenue, Burlingame, CA 94010
Mohan Gurunathan will explore the connections between our daily food choices and climate change, deforestation, species extinction, water scarcity, air and water pollution, ocean dead zones, world hunger, and many other serious environmental and social problems. You’ll learn how simple dietary changes, adopted on a large scale, are essential for solving some of humanity's greatest challenges. Mohan is an engineer, entrepreneur and activist who has lived and worked in Silicon Valley for over 20 years. He is an expert on food systems sustainability, and a well-known public speaker on environmental, public health and animal welfare issues.
🍽 The Earth on Your Plate
When: Thu, Feb 23rd from 7:00 PM to 8:30 PM
Where: Burlingame Community Center, 850 Burlingame Avenue, Burlingame, CA 94010
Mohan Gurunathan will explore the connections between our daily food choices and climate change, deforestation, species extinction, water scarcity, air and water pollution, ocean dead zones, world hunger, and many other serious environmental and social problems. You’ll learn how simple dietary changes, adopted on a large scale, are essential for solving some of humanity's greatest challenges. Mohan is an engineer, entrepreneur and activist who has lived and worked in Silicon Valley for over 20 years. He is an expert on food systems sustainability, and a well-known public speaker on environmental, public health and animal welfare issues.
🥙 Meatless Meat Up: Plant-based Tasting & Workshop
When: Sat, Feb 25th from 12:30 PM to 1:30 PM
Where: Mountain View Community Center, 201 South Rengstorff Avenue, Mountain View, CA 94040
This workshop is open to anyone, but is specifically geared for those who are unfamiliar with and do not follow, a plant-based or plant-forward diet. Feel free to email us at healthyplate@acterra.org for questions. Acterra, Clorofil, and the City of Mountain View are joining forces to offer this one of a kind plant-based tasting & workshop focused on tasty ""meats"" made from plants. If you've ever been curious about how to make easy meat substitutes using ingredients such as tofu, mushrooms, and tempeh, this event is for you.
Join the Fun!
Submit Events
We know all of you are cooking up great events 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 3,500+ 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!