SPARK: Student raises $200k for energy investments
Energy Terminal Weekly Newsletter
June 6th 2023 | Issue #54 | Subscribe here
Happy Tuesday!
Welcome back to ET weekly, Energy Terminal's weekly newsletter where we cover trends, opportunities, events and updates across the energy industry.
In this issue:
☀️ SunCast Apprenticeship Opportunity
🖥️ Investigative Climate Journalism?!
♻️ Mandating Battery Recycling
🔧 Building a Clean Energy Fund
🌊 Making Hydro more like Solar
🚨 Top 3 Energy Opportunities 🚨
1) Digital Marketing Apprenticeship, SunCast Media
SunCast Media is the go-to resource for entrepreneurs and sales professionals alike in the renewable energy space. This Digital Marketing Apprenticeship is a fantastic opportunity to strengthen digital marketing skills, while learning about the clean energy sector.
2) Marketing Intern, LevelTen Energy
LevelTen Energy is the leading provider of transaction infrastructure for the renewable energy economy. The Marketing Intern will support LevelTen's efforts to provide the industry with timely and relevant market intelligence through supporting content production for LevelTen’s weekly industry newsletter, and by composing social media posts.
3)Investment Associate, Energy Foundry
Energy Foundry is a pioneer in the cleantech industry, recognized for its ability to invest in and develop disruptive companies that deliver exceptional outcomes and impact. Key focus areas include sourcing and managing a deal pipeline, supporting a market intelligence insights, and working closely with our strategic partners.
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📣 SPARK Episode 2!
Shikhar Verma is a Rice University student and the Founder and Chief Investment Officer at the Rice New Energy Fund (RNEF), a $200K energy fund managed by students. They focus on exposing students to investment management, involving students in the energy transition, and building and leveraging an industry network. Shikhar begins by outlining how he got his start in energy and made his way to Rice University, and then goes into detail about RNEF, from building the team and raising capital to his hopes for the fund moving forward. Finally, he shares his biggest lessons from his experiences so far, such as having clear goals and finding a balance between looking good and actually being good at what you are doing.
📚 Reading List
Investing money "cleanly", billions for rural America + growth of the green industrial industry . Check out this week’s handpicked reading list to learn more about these groundbreaking energy topics 🔥
🎙️Podcasts:
The Carbon Copy, How will we power all those green factories?
The US manufacturing sector is growing, and this will allow necessary industrial equipment for the energy transition to be built in the US instead of abroad
This change will hopefully prevent supply chain issues from becoming as serious an issue as in the past
By manufacturing more products at home the US can meet more environmental regulations and can also power many of its factories with renewables
The renewables each factory will rely on will depend greatly on the time of the day that the factory must be running
The Energy Gang, AI in energy; evolution or revolution?
AI isn’t new in energy; GE has been developing AI for over a decade and BP invested in an AI company in 2017
Already, AI has been used to optimize power generation, improve grid management, and make energy more efficient.
Two areas where AI has a lot of potential for impact in energy are predicting demand and improving energy storage
However, while there is a lot of potential, challenges cybersecurity concerns, biases in AI algorithms, data quality and availability, etc. need to be better thought through for AI to really have a revolutionary impact
Catalyst with Shayle Kann, Four ways to store sunlight
The fossil energy storage available in the U.S. can last 47 days; but renewable energy storage capacity is a matter of minutes or seconds
Four technologies available for renewable energy storage include lithium-ion batteries, heat storage, iron-air batteries, and hydrogen
We need a mix of short-term, mid-term, and long-term energy storage to account for both intraday and seasonal variation in renewable energy production and electricity demand
Other emerging technologies outside of these four could also prove helpful
📰️ Articles:
The Hill, Biden administration announces nearly $11 billion for renewable energy in rural communities
The Biden Administration announced that nearly $11 billion will be distributed through programs, such as loans and grants, under the USDA, with the purpose of expanding renewable energy, creating jobs, and building infrastructure in rural areas
This investment should spur economic growth in historically underserved and economically disadvantaged communities, while also contributing the the administrations larger emissions targets
The USDA has committed to implementing and managing these projects in collaboration with other federal agencies, state governments, tribal organizations, and members of the private sector
Zoomer, Clean Money
Three type of sustainable investing: ESG integration (analysis of a company’s environmental, social and governance practices), negative screens (investments that avoid certain industries), and impact investing (investing in companies that have the potential to positively change the world)
It is important to be aware of greenwashing when making sustainable investments - do your research on the company you are making an investment on
Sustainable funds are very similar to traditional ones in terms of structure, the market fluctuates and as such the return on investment does too. But, overall returns on sustainable funds have been slightly better than traditional funds
Climate Tech VC, Permitting Potpourri
Hundreds of gigawatts of proposed clean energy projects are stuck in the interconnection and permitting process, and most will fail
Permitting reform aims to do four things: Create a time limit, impose a page count for proposals, pick a point agency to address proposals, and narrow the EPA's scope of engagement
Alongside permitting reform, many bills seek to build new transmission capacity to accommodate new energy projects
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