MIT’s 15 Climate Tech Companies to Watch 2024

MIT Technology Review has issued a list of 15 Climate Tech Companies to Watch.

No matter what your industry, you will find at least one company of interest to you on this list.

View the list at https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/10/03/1104910/15-climate-tech-companies/. If you subscribe to the Technology Review, you will be able to see MIT’s description of the company and their assessment of why it is a company to watch.

TIP: Subscribe to MIT Technology Review (https://www.technologyreview.com/). You will benefit from its in depth analyses of innovative technologies.  You also will have full access to their annual lists of innovators and innovations to watch.

For your convenience, I have listed the 15 companies named on the list, along with a paragraph about each company.

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LanzaJet
Aviation Fuels
https://www.lanzajet.com/
LanzaJet was formed through the contributions of our investors LanzaTech, Suncor, Mitsui, along with support from All Nippon Airways and the US Department of Energy (DOE). We continue to accelerate our growth through new partnerships and have since welcomed additional investment and support from British Airways, Shell, Microsoft, Breakthrough Energy, Southwest Airlines, Groupe ADP, and MUFG.

Pano AI
Wildfire Detection
https://www.pano.ai/
Pano Rapid Detect is a connected, intelligent platform for fire professionals that helps them to detect threats, confirm fires, and disseminate information to responders, faster than ever before.Pano Rapid Detect speeds response time by empowering detection specialists with enhanced visual equipment and rapid data analysis, supported by AI. Specialists have a single, unified view combining ultra-high-definition cameras, geo satellite data, field sensors, legacy cameras, emergency alerts, and other data feeds — as well as the ability to share everything in real-time with their extended team. Altogether, this makes it possible to quickly identify and contain devastating wildfires, protecting lives, property, and our forests.

Solugen
Chemicals
https://solugen.com/
Verza360® is a series of multifunctional, organic acid-based chelating agents that optimize performance, lower total cost of operation, and boost your bottom line. Seamlessly integrating into existing formulations, Verza360 is a proven solution to tackle longstanding challenges in oil and gas systems.

Ceibo
Mining
https://www.ceibo.tech/
Ceibo’s technologies aim for cleaner operations and help recover copper with existing mine site infrastructure. Our innovations are designed for easy integration into operations to support increased production while reducing water use and environmental impacts.

Rondo Energy
Energy Storage
https://rondo.com/
From calcining to cogeneration, from food processing to fuel production, Rondo’s Heat Battery is compatible with 90 percent of industrial processes and power needs. Our modular units are designed to serve the unique capacity and temperature requirements of each facility, and the output is configurable to customers’ specifications. (Aramco is a corporate investor)

Rumin8
Food & Agriculture
https://rumin8.com/
Scientists have discovered a solution for enteric methane in rangeland plants and red seaweed, with trials revealing reductions of emissions from cattle. With the cost, complexity and environmental impact involved in ocean-based seaweed cultivation, Rumin8 saw an opportunity to reproduce the target compound from the plant rather than mass producing the plant itself.

BYD
Electric Vehicles
https://www.byd.com/us
Founded in 1995, BYD is a leading technology company devoted to leveraging innovations for a better life. With more than 27 years of expertise, BYD has established itself as an industry leader in electronics, automotives, renewable energy, and rail transit. As a global leader with more than 30 industrial parks across 6 continents, BYD's zero-emission solutions, focused on energy generation and storage, are expansive and widely applicable

First Solar
Renewable Energy
https://www.firstsolar.com/
First Solar, Inc. is a publicly traded American manufacturer of solar panels, and provider of utility-scale PV power plants, supporting services that include finance, construction, maintenance and end-of-life panel recycling.

Electric Hydrogen
Hydrogen
https://eh2.com/
Green hydrogen has historically been inhibited by the high cost of electrolyzers. Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe. When produced using electrolyzers, devices that split water with renewable electricity, hydrogen is a no emissions replacement for fossil fuels. Electric Hydrogen was founded to make green hydrogen cost-competitive. We took a fresh approach to the design and scale of electrolyzers. We build a “stack” of electrolysis “cells” that produces hydrogen at a transformational low cost versus today’s available technology.

Pivot Bio
Food & Agriculture
https://www.pivotbio.com/
Perhaps no pursuit is more noble than that of a farmer. Producing the food, fuel and products we depend on is all in a day’s work for farm families worldwide. Pivot Bio is dedicated to supporting farmers with products that optimize crop production through specifically timed and placed nitrogen delivery. Together, we are working toward a future that is more efficient, profitable, predictable, safe and sustainable for farmers and the planet.

Kairos Power
Nuclear Fission
https://kairospower.com/
The Kairos Power FHR (KP-FHR) is a novel advanced reactor technology that leverages TRISO fuel in pebble form combined with a low-pressure fluoride salt coolant. The technology uses an efficient and flexible steam cycle to convert heat from fission into electricity and to complement renewable energy sources.

Form Energy
Energy Storage
https://formenergy.com/
To run the grid reliably and affordably, we need new cost-effective technologies capable of storing electricity for multiple days. In pursuit of this, we have reinvented and optimized the iron-air battery for the electric grid. The active components of our iron-air battery system are some of the safest, cheapest, and most abundant materials on the planet — low-cost iron, water, and air. Iron-air batteries are the best solution to balance the multi-day variability of renewable energy due to their extremely low cost, safety, durability, and global scalability. Our first commercial product using our iron-air technology is optimized to store electricity for 100 hours at system costs competitive with legacy power plants. This product is our first step to building a more reliable, resilient and secure electric grid: making low-cost clean energy available when and where it’s needed, even during multiple days of extreme weather, grid outages, or periods of low generation.

Gogoro
Electric Vehicles
https://www.gogoro.com/
Gogoro Inc. is a Taiwanese company that developed a battery-swapping refueling platform for urban electric two-wheel scooters, mopeds and motorcycles. It also develops its own line of electric scooters and offers its own vehicle innovations to vehicle maker partners like Hero, Yamaha, Aeon Motor, PGO, eReady, and eMOVING. Gogoro also operates GoShare, a rideshare service, in Taiwan and Ishigaki Island in Japan. Gogoro Smartscooter, the first consumer product from Gogoro, was revealed at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas in January 2015. Along with the scooter, Gogoro announced a battery-swapping network under the name Gogoro Energy Network.

Sublime Systems
Cement
https://sublime-systems.com/
Today’s portland cement is made by cooking limestone, sand, and clay in massive fossil-fueled 1450°C kilns. This results in a tremendous amount of CO₂: on average 0.9 tonnes per tonne of OPC in the USA. About half of this CO₂ is released from limestone, which is ~50% by weight CO₂, as it decomposes in the kiln to form reactive lime. The other half of the CO₂ emissions is from the fossil fuel (often bituminous coal) needed to reach 1450°C, the temperature required to form the crystal structure characteristic of OPC. This temperature is currently impossible to electrify efficiently. We skip both emissions sources, instead using the elegance of electrochemistry to extract reactive calcium (Sublime Lime™) and silicates from abundant raw materials that are then blended into a final Sublime Cement™. Our cement’s crystal structure is different than the OPC produced in a fiery kiln, but its performance and hardened phase in concrete are the same.

Sun King
Renewable Energy
https://sunking.com/
We design, distribute, install, and finance solar energy solutions for those who cannot access or afford traditional electrical grid connections. The energy needs of consumers in Africa and Asia are diverse. From cost-effective and durable lamps to powerful home and business energy systems as well as modern entertainment and energy storage systems, Sun King's broad array of products unlock a higher quality of life.

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Google® Better!
Jean Steinhardt served as Librarian, Aramco Americas (https://americas.aramco.com/ ), Engineering Division, for 13 years. He now heads Jean Steinhardt Consulting LLC, producing the same high quality research that he performed for Aramco.

Follow Jean’s blog at: http://desulf.blogspot.com/ for continuing tips on effective online research
Email Jean at jstoneheart@gmail.com with questions on research, training, or anything else

Inside a high-tech cement laboratory -- The path from concept to commercialization

 
You're only given a little spark of madness. You mustn't lose it. -- Robin Williams

MIT’s The Spark newsletter recently highlighted a company working on enabling cement production that produces far less carbon emissions than traditional processes.

Cement, the glue that binds together the aggregates that make concrete the amazing building material that it has been since ancient Roman engineers began using it, requires high heat to produce.

Startup Sublime Systems has developed a technique using electrochemistry to produce cement at a much lower cost to the environment.

The Spark’s article describes the approach.  Equally interesting to me is the progress the company has made from bench scale to demonstration scale, and their plan to move on to commercial scale. It is a fascinating look into the challenges faced by any company trying to move from concept to commercialization.

TIP: Subscribe to MIT The Spark (https://www.technologyreview.com/ )

Here are excerpts from the article in The Spark …

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The Spark
By Casey Crownhart • 07.05.23

Hello hello, welcome back to The Spark!

A few weeks ago, I found myself in a room where fluorescent lights reflected off the stainless steel tanks lining the walls. The setup reminded me of an exceedingly high-tech craft brewery.

I wasn’t at a cider tasting, but on a visit to Sublime Systems (https://sublime-systems.com/ ), a Boston-based startup working to clean up one of the world’s toughest climate challenges: cement. Today, making cement involves a whole lot of fossil fuels, and this one material accounts for about 8% of global emissions.

But it might not have to be that way. So for the newsletter this week, come along with me to see what the startup is up to, and how its process could change the way we build.

To sum it up briefly, cement is a climate nightmare for two main reasons.

One, the process used to make cement requires super-high temperatures which today basically means you have to burn fossil fuels in the process. Second, there are chemical reactions involved in transforming minerals into working cement, and those release carbon dioxide.

Sublime’s answer is to use electrochemistry. The company’s cofounders, Yet-Ming Chiang and Leah Ellis, both made their mark in the battery world before turning to building materials. While at MIT, the duo developed a set of chemical reactions powered by electricity that can transform minerals into the cement we know and love today. They cofounded Sublime Systems in 2020.

What I was most interested in during my visit was seeing how the company is taking lab results and transforming them to work at a much larger scale.

Things started out small: the first time she and a labmate made cement, it was about the same volume as a single die.

Years later, that small scale is almost inconceivable when you look around the company’s pilot facility. The ceilings feel dozens of feet high, and I wouldn’t be able to get my arms around the tanks that line the room.

This facility started up in November 2022, recalls Mike Corbett, Sublime’s head of engineering. The team moved quickly to build it, going from design to execution in about nine months.

The company is doing something entirely new by bringing electrochemistry to cement production. But they’ve been able to leverage technology from other industries, like mining and chemical production, to find equipment that will work for what they’re trying to do. “You can usually beg and borrow from other industries to solve similar technical problems,” Corbett says.

The pilot line is a huge upgrade from the early days, but as Ellis put it, in the grand scheme of the industry, it’s still “a cement plant for ants.”

The next step for the startup is to build a demonstration facility producing around 100 tons per day. “That’s the size where you’re no longer invisible to the cement world,” Ellis says. The current goal is to have that facility running in 2025. After that, there’s yet another step: commercial scale, at about a million tons a year.

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TIP: Google sublime systems cement
Some results …

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Electrochemical Synthesis of Low-Carbon Cement
Project Innovation + Advantages:
Cement is responsible for 8% of global CO2 emissions. Currently, the only economical way to make Portland cement’s key ingredient, lime, is by thermally decomposing limestone. This reaction contributes ~75% of cement’s emissions. Sublime Systems (Sublime) will build an electrochemical system to produce lime using off-peak renewable electricity and calcium sources that do not release CO2. The lime produced may possess exceptional purity, consistency, and reactivity, enabling next-generation low-carbon cements. If successful and scaled, Sublime’s electrochemical synthesis of lime would reduce energy-related emissions in the U.S. from lime and cement making while simultaneously providing ancillary grid services, enabling proliferation of renewables.
https://arpa-e.energy.gov/technologies/projects/electrochemical-synthesis-low-carbon-cement
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Online published (draft) 25 OCT 2022
Dr. Jutta Lauf for NATO ENSEC CoE
Is de-carbonising the construction industry possible? An overview of advances in materials and processes
Jutta Lauf
Dr. Jutta Lauf was a Research Fellow at the NATO Energy Security Centre of Excellence from 2020 to
2022.
Corresponding address: NATO ENERGY SECURITY CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE, Research and Lessons Learned
Division, Šilo g. 5A, LT-10322 Vilnius, Lithuania, NATO Energy Security Centre of Excellence, info@enseccoe.org
Cement, a key product for construction, is by mass the largest manufactured product on Earth.
Combined with water and mineral aggregates it forms cement-based materials (e.g., concrete
and mortar), the second most used substance in the world after water. Cement based building
materials are energy and cost efficient1, but the globally large scale usage (4.6 *1012 tons in
2015)1 led to 3% of globally emitted carbon dioxide (CO2) in 20202. Additional advantages are
the wide availability of the raw materials, a sufficient long period of time before settling and
its longevity. All these properties make it a versatile material, which is used in many of NATO’s
infrastructures (Figure 1).
Figure 1: NATO headquarter in Brussel, Blvd Leopold III, 1110 Brussels, Belgium. It was
constructed as a “Green building” mainly from concrete. Generally the “green” credentials are
related to the operation of the building, not its construction.4; 3
The traditional form of cement is the so-called ordinary Portland cement (OPC). The
production process requires grinding and calcining (heating to high temperature of approx.
1450 °C) a mixture mainly consisting of limestone and clay. The resulting intermediate
material - known as clinker - is ground to a fine powder with 3–5% gypsum added to form OPC.
The production of OPC generates on average 842kg CO2 per ton of clinker. Fossil fuel
combustion is responsible for less than 40% of total CO2 emissions, while limestone (CaCO3)
decomposition during calcination to calcium oxide (CaO) is responsible for the remainder5; 1.
In essence, CO2 emissions from clinker production is a mixture of both, an unavoidable
chemical reaction, and the heating process to start the chemical reaction. Therefore,
increasing the energy efficiency of clinker production is not sufficient to significantly reduce
emissions. Carbon capture technologies are necessary to achieve this goal. Significant
https://enseccoe.org/data/public/uploads/2022/11/emissions-in-construction.pdf
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Google® Better!
Jean Steinhardt served as Librarian, Aramco Americas (https://americas.aramco.com/ ), Engineering Division, for 13 years. He now heads Jean Steinhardt Consulting LLC, producing the same high quality research that he performed for Aramco.

Follow Jean’s blog at: http://desulf.blogspot.com/ for continuing tips on effective online research
Email Jean at jstoneheart@gmail.com with questions on research, training, or anything else

10 Breakthrough Technologies 2023

Each year, according to Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Technology_Review ), MIT Technology Review publishes three lists …

• Innovators Under 35 (formerly TR35)
• 10 Breakthrough Technologies
• 50 Smartest Companies

All three lists are valuable to anyone interested in identifying promising start-ups. This year’s list of the top 10 Breakthrough Technologies came out a few weeks ago.

The three technologies that caught my eye are highlighted below.

But, first, here is a three-point strategy you might want to consider going forward …

• Look at the 10 Breakthrough Technologies list
• Subscribe to MIT Technology Review. This will give you easy access to each of the annual lists (https://www.technologyreview.com/ )
• Once you subscribe, take the time to read, or at least to browse, each bimonthly issue.

Energy is of particular interest to me. As such, here are the three technologies that stood out to me. Some of the firms of interest that are listed are …

SiFive
https://www.sifive.com
SiFive is a fabless semiconductor company and provider of commercial RISC-V processor IP and silicon chips based on the RISC-V instruction set architecture. SiFive's products include cores, SoCs, IPs, and development boards. SiFive is the first company to produce a chip that implements the RISC-V ISA. Wikipedia

SemiFive
https://semifive.com
SEMIFIVE, hand in hand with global innovation leaders, is growing as a leading partner for future SoC designs, and thereby becoming: The New Global Hub of Custom Silicon. Founded in Seoul in 2018, SEMIFIVE is basing its foundation on Korea’s semiconductor design competency that was amassed for more than 20 years.

BYD
https://www.byd.com
Founded in 1995, BYD started out as a battery maker and entered the automobile business in 2003. https://asia.nikkei.com
("Build Your Dreams" Chinese: 比亚迪股份有限公司) is a publicly listed Chinese conglomerate manufacturing company headquartered in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. It was founded by Wang Chuanfu in February 1995. The company has two major subsidiaries, BYD Automobile and BYD Electronic. https://en.wikipedia.org
BYD is a major Chinese automaker based in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province. It sells vehicles under the BYD brand.

Redwood Materials
https://www.redwoodmaterials.com
Redwood Materials, Inc. is an American company headquartered in Carson City, Nevada. The company aims to recycle lithium-ion batteries and produce battery materials for electromobility and electrical storage systems. Redwood Materials was reported to have a valuation of about $3.7 billion as of July 2021. Wikipedia

Li-Cycle
https://li-cycle.com
Li-Cycle, which became a publicly traded company in 2021, said it had more than 100 battery suppliers, including a partnership with Ultium Cells, a joint venture between General Motors and the South Korean battery company LG Energy Solution. Li-Cycle also has strategic partnerships with the mining giant Glencore and Koch Industries, the privately held conglomerate with extensive fossil fuel operations. Together, those two businesses have invested $300 million in Li-Cycle. (https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/21/business/energy-environment/battery-recycling-electric-vehicles.html)

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A FEW OF THE MIT TOP 10 TECHNOLOGIES 2023

Computing
A chip design that changes everything: 10 Breakthrough Technologies 2023

Computer chip designs are expensive and hard to license. That’s all about to change thanks to the popular open standard known as RISC-V.
By Sophia Chenarchive page
January 9, 2023

WHO
RISC-V International, Intel, SiFive, SemiFive, China RISC-V Industry Alliance

WHEN
Now
Ever wonder how your smartphone connects to your Bluetooth speaker, given they were made by different companies? Well, Bluetooth is an open standard, meaning its design specifications, such as the required frequency and its data encoding protocols, are publicly available. Software and hardware based on open standards—Ethernet, Wi-Fi, PDF—have become household names.

Now an open standard known as RISC-V (pronounced “risk five”) could change how companies create computer chips. Chip companies such as Intel and Arm have long kept their blueprints proprietary. Customers would buy off-the-shelf chips, which may have had capabilities irrelevant to their product, or pay more for a custom design. Since RISC-V is an open standard, anyone can use it to design a chip, free of charge.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/01/09/1064876/riscv-computer-chips-10-breakthough-technologies-2023/

TIP: Google: RISC-V International

RISC-V is an open standard Instruction Set Architecture (ISA) enabling a new era of processor innovation through open collaboration
RISC-V enables the community to share technical investment, contribute to the strategic future, create more rapidly, enjoy unprecedented design freedom, and substantially reduce the cost of innovation.

RISC-V International is the global non-profit home of the open standard RISC-V Instruction Set Architecture (ISA), related specifications, and stakeholder community

More than 3,100 RISC-V members across 70 countries contribute and collaborate to define RISC-V open specifications as well as convene and govern related technical, industry, domain, and special interest groups.

RISC-V combines a modular technical approach with an open, royalty-free ISA — meaning that anyone, anywhere can benefit from the IP contributed and produced by RISC-V. As a non-profit, RISC-V does not maintain any commercial interest in products or services. As an open standard, anyone may leverage RISC-V as a building block in their open or proprietary solutions and services.

Open source and global standards have a long history of success because they have a license framework that ensures anyone, anywhere can have ongoing access to them.
https://riscv.org/
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Climate change
The inevitable EV: 10 Breakthrough Technologies 2023

Electric vehicles have been available for decades. Now they’ve finally become mainstream.
By James Temple
January 9, 20

WHO
BYD, Hyundai, Tesla, Volkswagen

WHEN
Now
Electric vehicles are transforming the auto industry.

While sales have slowly ticked up for years, they’re now soaring. The emissions-free cars and trucks will likely account for 13% of all new auto sales globally in 2022, up from 4% just two years earlier, according to the International Energy Agency. They’re on track to make up about 30% of those sales by the end of this decade.

A mix of forces has propelled the vehicles from a niche choice to a mainstream option.

Governments have enacted policies compelling automakers to retool and incentivizing consumers to make the switch. Notably, California and New York will require all new cars, trucks, and SUVs to be zero-emissions by 2035, and the EU had nearly finalized a similar rule at press time.

Auto companies, in turn, are setting up supply chains, building manufacturing capacity, and releasing more models with better performance, across price points and product types.

The Hongguang Mini, a tiny car that starts a little below $5,000, has become the best-selling electric vehicle in the world, reinforcing China’s dominance as the largest manufacturer of EVs.

A growing line-up of two- and three-wheelers from Hero Electric, Ather, and other companies helped EV sales triple in India over the last year (though the total number is still only around 430,000). And models ranging in size and price from the Chevy Bolt to the Ford F-150 Lightning are bringing more Americans into the electric fold.

There are still big challenges ahead. Most of the vehicles must become cheaper. Charging options need to be more convenient. Clean electricity generation will have to increase dramatically to accommodate the surge in vehicle charging. And it will be a massive undertaking to make enough batteries. But it’s now clear that the heyday of the gas-guzzler is dimming.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/01/09/1064889/the-inevitable-ev-10-breakthrough-technologies-2023/
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Battery recycling
Recycling is vital to prevent today’s growing mountains of discarded batteries from ending up in landfills, and it could also provide a badly needed source of metals for powering tomorrow’s EVs. Companies are building facilities that will reclaim lithium, nickel, and cobalt and feed these metals back to lithium-ion battery manufacturers, helping reduce the cost.

TIP: Google: ev battery recycling
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Race to the Future: Electric Cars Are Taking Off, but When Will Battery Recycling Follow?

Many companies and investors are eager to recycle batteries, but it could take a decade or more before enough used lithium-ion batteries become available.
New York Times [EXCERPTS]
By Niraj Chokshi and Kellen Browning
Dec. 21, 2022
Niraj Chokshi and Kellen Browning reported this story from Reno, Nev. Chokshi also traveled to Rochester, N.Y., and Browning to Adelanto, Calif.

Sales of electric cars and trucks are taking off, and the auto and battery industries are investing billions of dollars to upgrade and build factories. These cars could help address climate change, but batteries pose their own problems. Raw materials can be hard to mine, are often found in countries with poor human rights records and require processing that leaves behind noxious waste.
Fortunately, those battery ingredients are also highly reusable. And now a race is on to collect and recycle used lithium-ion batteries. Venture capitalists, automakers and energy companies are pouring money into dozens of start-up recycling companies in North America and Europe.

Among companies recycling batteries, Redwood stands out. The company was founded by J.B. Straubel, a former top Tesla executive, and has raised more than $1 billion from investors, it said. Redwood sees itself primarily as a producer of battery materials — made from recovered or mined metals — and has established recycling partnerships with Ford Motor, Toyota, Volkswagen and Volvo. Redwood also recycles scrap from a battery plant run by Panasonic and Tesla, near Reno, Nev.

It could take many years for recycling to become a thriving industry in the United States. Relatively few electric vehicles are on the road, and most are new. Smartphones, laptops and other electronics also contain lithium-ion batteries, but they are difficult to collect and there are not enough to meet the growing needs of the auto industry.

But lawmakers and environmental groups want recycling to take off quickly to cut carbon emissions, protect the nation from an overreliance on foreign producers and promote the safe disposal of batteries.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/21/business/energy-environment/battery-recycling-electric-vehicles.html

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Google® Better!
Jean Steinhardt served as Librarian, Aramco Services, Engineering Division, for 13 years. He now heads Jean Steinhardt Consulting LLC, producing the same high quality research that he performed for Aramco.

Follow Jean’s blog at: http://desulf.blogspot.com/ for continuing tips on effective online research
Email Jean at research@jeansteinhardtconsulting.com with questions on research, training, or anything else
Visit Jean’s Web site at http://www.jeansteinhardtconsulting.com/ to see examples of the services we can provide