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Dear friends,

Last week, I reached out with a call for your support—thank you to everyone who responded. Your financial contributions directly enable our efforts to provide our climatetech startups the resources they need, while helping maximize our impact and accelerating the deployment of new climate solutions. Your generosity is not just an investment in our incubator—it’s an investment in a more sustainable, resilient future. If you’re interested in speaking with our team about how you could support our work, please don’t hesitate to reach out.

As our team prepares for a well-deserved winter break (Dec. 25 through Jan. 1), I’m reflecting on the remarkable year our Boston and Houston incubators had.

First, to our startup members: bravo! Across our incubators, we welcomed 59 new member companies working on innovations ranging from energy-efficient air conditioning to reliable energy storage to low-emission steel production. In 2023, Greentown startups installed more than 1,000 EV chargers, secured plans to deliver up to one billion gallons of sustainable air fuel, kicked off production at the United States’ first rare-earth refinery, began operations at a geothermal plant in partnership with Google, and so much more. There isn’t enough room in one newsletter to celebrate all the milestones, but to call out a sampling of major achievements:

Partnerships + Deployments

Cemvita will provide up to 1 billion gallons of sustainable air fuel to Greentown partner United Airlines and opened a pilot plant in Houston to produce eCO2 oil, a soybean oil replacement made from converted carbon emissions.
Fervo Energy and Google’s next-generation, 3.5-MW geothermal plant, called Project Red, began supplying carbon-free electricity in Las Vegas.
Form Energy had a banner year deploying its cost-effective, multi-day energy-storage systems, partnering with the State of West Virginia to build its first iron-air battery manufacturing facility in the city of Weirton; winning a $12M grant from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority to roll out a 10 megawatt/1000 megawatt-hour iron-air-battery system in New York State; partnering with Georgia Power to deploy a 15 megawatt/1500 megawatt-hour iron-air-battery system in Georgia; and deploying its technology at two of Xcel Energy’s retiring coal plant sites.
Phoenix Tailings began production at the United States’ first rare-earth refinery using its zero-waste, zero-emission technology.
SWTCH installed 929 Level 2 EV chargers at apartment buildings across Canada; collaborated with Plugin Stations Online to deploy 100 public EV chargers throughout New York State; and partnered with AutoGrid to integrate 250 EV chargers in multi-tenant properties into an active-demand-response program with a Canadian utility.

Funding

Amogy raised $150M in Series B funding for its emission-free, energy-dense, ammonia-power solutions. Greentown partners Mitsubishi Corporation and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries joined the Series B-2.
Eden closed a $12M seed funding round—which was upsized and oversubscribed—for its Electrical Reservoir Stimulation technology, which it will deploy across geothermal, geologic hydrogen, and sustainable mining applications.
Lydian raised $12M in seed funding to decarbonize air travel with power-to-liquid fuels.
Ohmium, a green hydrogen company, raised a $250M Series C for its proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrolyzer technology.
Peak Power, a provider of energy-optimization software and services, raised a $35M round led by Greenbacker Capital Management. It also secured $200M to deploy and finance energy-storage projects for commercial and industrial facilities.
Sublime Systems raised a $40M Series A to advance its groundbreaking manufacturing process for low-carbon cement.

Second, to our supportive corporate partners and investors: thank you! We welcomed 13 new partners into our network of industry leaders this year and have seen tremendous progress across the spectrum of corporate climate action. Our team was able to facilitate more than 300 startup-corporate introductions and curated more than 50 partner engagements, leading to an impressive number of MOUs, investments, pilots, and collaborative projects in addition to the ongoing guidance and mentorship our partners regularly provide our community. Additional partner highlights include:

The culmination of five accelerator programs →

Go Make in partnership Mitsubishi Corporation (Americas) and M-Lab Companies to accelerate partnerships to deploy and commercialize supply-chain-decarbonization solutions;
Go Move in partnership with BASF and Magna to advance solutions that decarbonize the automotive industry’s life-cycle impact.
Go Energize in partnership with Vineyard Wind—a joint venture between Avangrid and Vineyard Offshore—and the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center to advance innovations for responsible offshore wind development.
Year One of the Advancing Climatetech and Clean Energy Leaders Program (ACCEL), our accelerator intended to bolster BIPOC-led startups in partnership with Browning the Green Space.
Year Three of The Carbon to Value Initiative, a multi-year collaboration among the Urban Future Lab at NYU Tandon School of Engineering, Greentown Labs, and Fraunhofer USA, supported by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority.

The kick off of three new accelerator programs →

Go Make 2023 in partnership with Shell to enable a circular, net-zero-carbon economy.
Go Build 2023 in partnership with Saint-Gobain to advance circularity and decarbonization in the built environment.
Year Two of ACCEL—accepting applications until Jan. 5!

Our Investor Program team expanded our network of investors to more than 660 funds while facilitating more than 500 introductions for our founders to active investors.

And finally—last but certainly not least—to our dedicated staff team: your passion, commitment, and hard work are so deeply appreciated. You not only provide incredible support to our entrepreneurs, host hundreds of impactful events annually, foster meaningful relationships with our partners, and produce high-quality work, but you also make work fun! We bolstered our leadership team with the addition of Timmeko Moore Love, our Houston General Manager and Senior Vice President, and Aisling Carlson, our Senior Vice President of Partnerships. It has been a delight working alongside all of my Greentown colleagues since taking on the role of CEO and President in September and I can’t wait to see all that we accomplish together in 2024.

We’ll be in touch next month with information about upcoming events and in the meantime, please don’t hesitate to reach out if you’re interested in getting engaged with Greentown or supporting our work. Until then, from our community to yours, we wish you a wonderful holiday season with family and friends.

My very best,

Kevin T. Knobloch
CEO and President
Greentown Labs

Celebrating 2023 milestones and extending gratitude