With over 100 events and 1000 attendees, the first ever D.C. Climate Week in Washington D.C. promises to be a hugely impactful event, bringing together like minded people and showcasing some of the latest thinking and innovation.
Ralph Cochrane interviews co-organisers C'pher Gresham & Vid Micevic
[00:00:01]
Ralph Cochrane:
Welcome back to Tech for ClimateAction TV with me, Ralph Cochrane. Now, if you're listening to this as apodcast, you might like to know that you can also see our guests, and of course,me in the studio, on our YouTube channel. Or if you are watching the video,you might like to know that you can listen to this on all yourfavorite podcast platforms, including Spotify, apple, and Amazon. Now onto this week's episode,we are covering DC Climate Week. It's something we're really excited about. This is the first time it's happened andwith over a hundred events, it promises to be something pretty spectacular.
If you are interested in all thingsclimate, tech, policy, nature, water. All of it, you can see and hear fromsome of the experts in the DC area. And I'm delighted to welcometwo of the co-organizers of DC Climate Week, C'Pher and Vid. Welcome. We're excited to be here. Thanks for having us. Now, I should also say that Tomand Simon from the Tech for Climate Action Team have helped to organizethe policy day at DC Climate Week, but Sifa, tell us a little bit aboutthe background and also when is it. DC Climate Week is April28th through May 2nd, 2025. We started with an idea about ninemonths ago and built the movement to get to where we are today with over ahundred events happening, thousands of attendees all happening here in C'Pher.
All of you have done an incredible job. I just wonder, what's thestory behind DC Climate Week? Why now, and why are you doing this? DC's the center of policy, and wealso have a large funding atmosphere here, and we have some of theworld's most renowned international development banks, nonprofits, NGOs,that are at the tip of the spear for climate action and sustainabilityand environmental sustainability. And so it just made sense. We said, let's bringthe community together. Let's validate this by talking withindividuals that are running incubators. Accelerators are also working in theinternational development space to make a DC Climate Week happen here, and itreally is about shining the spotlight.
On all of the organizations from thelocal groups like Casey Trees to the internationally renowned groups likeWRI and World Wildlife Fund and other groups that are based in here in C'Pher. We wanted to give a stage for all ofthese amazing experts especially at a time when we know that climate actionis really gaining a lot of momentum. Very true. And we are really excitedto be supporting you. I noticed as well that theorganization is quite clever. There's a hub each day, and I thinkthe idea is that any of the events that are taking place take you about.
Less than 10 minutes to walkto, so that's also a great idea. But coming to you vid, what highlightsare you really looking forward to? Monday, our hub's gonna beclimate, tech and innovation. And that day is gonna be at thenew Bloomberg Center which is the old museum for all anyone that'sbeen in the DC area for a while. And those are gonna be some reallyhigh packed, sessions, essentially. Some sessions might include lightningtalks with hard tech founders, for example, but also financing mechanismsfor early stage startups and the whole sort of climate technology sphere.
The next day on Tuesday, the. Our main hub is gonna be at the MLKlibrary, and that's gonna be really focused on policy and advocacy andwe're, we'll definitely chat more about this, but we've partnering with a groupcalled Climate Tech for Action, and they are an amazing group and, part of thereason why we're on this podcast today. So we're just huge fans of the workthey're doing and we're really looking forward to continuing the partnership. They are experts on the policy side ofthings and we wanted to combine forces. And then on Wednesday we have climateFinance and economy and that will be focused at International Square.
And then on Thursday we'llhave Nature Day and Friday actually, we'll have two events. One will be called mobility and waterand the other urban development as well. It's gonna be a jam packedschedule during that week. But really these hub events aremeant to be like the cornerstone of here's what's happening this day. But also there's so many other participantevents happening throughout the week. So there's hub programmingand then participating events. And these are a hundred plus eventsthat are grassroots organized by other organizations and so on.
Moving forward. It's just incredible howmany events there are. But let's give a quickshout out to the website. So if people wanna findout more, where do they go? Just go to C'Pher climate week.com. There's gonna be two call to actions rightnow, which is view events or at an event. And then also in the about page, it justshares more about who's behind the scenes. Me and Cfer are only a small sliverof the amazing volunteers that are putting this all together. So dcclimateweek.comlimateweek.comis the best way to start. And just talking to youboth before we came on air.
I know that some of the events,in fact many of the events are already oversubscribed. There's been an incrediblereaction to DC Climate Week. Just tell us a little bit abouthow you are managing the demand. Yeah, we're really inspired by themomentum the community already has to support climate initiatives. Each day is actually alreadyoversubscribed at each of the hub locations and how we in ensuredinclusivity for each of the days. Is by having a lottery system tomake sure that we have a broad swath representative of the DCcommunity attending each of the days. So there's still time to attend.
Not only the hub events, but those ahundred plus events that are happening by participating organizations. And some of the pieces that Iwanted to highlight of not only at the hub locations, but at thoseparticipating events is we have. Everything from panel discussionsto tours, to hikes to nature walks. Some of the ones that I'm personallyreally excited about, we have the Daikin Sustainability and InnovationCenter right on Pennsylvania Avenue. They're opening up their innovation centerhosting tours to really get a behind the scenes look of how heat pumps work.
They have ones that are focused on theinnovation side of heat pumps and some of the other technologies that they produce,but they also have policy focused tours to talk about how policies have changednot only in DC and the US but globally. Another event that I'm really excitedabout, and this is the architecture and design nerd in me we have,american Institute for Architects. They're actually hosting a hard hattour of their new newly renovated headquarters, which was I believeit was designed to the 1970s, and they've renovated it to be net zero.
And so that's a really cool behind thescenes look where they actually bringing in the architecture firm, the engineeringfirm, to walk through and get a, a. Behind the scenes look of how a1970s building was then rehabbed, renovated, and made to meet the needsof the, current current situation. There's amazing org called Compost Crew. They have actually a pilot with DCgovernment to get compost from households. And then there's actually a tourof their facility of what happens to the compost when you're, you'vesubmitted it essentially and they pick it up from your doorstep.
Which I think will be really fun. There's another communitycalled up Top Acres. They actually are creating urbanfarms on the top of roofs in DC and they're hosting a happy hour as wellas an urban farming event as well. And then there's. Also a partner of ours, golden Triangle. They're doing basically it'sone of the first LEED cities in the world that they've created. And they're doing a block sort oftour of everything they've done. You'll go through pollination gardens,but also look at LEED buildings and so on. So anyway, what we're really trying todo with these events, it's, yes, we have these hub programming focus areas with.
Panels and really greatdiscussions and amazing speakers. But we'll also have these side activationevents that get the people outside and activate in the local community,which we think is really important. I totally agree. Vid, it is fantastic thatyou are involving the local community and it seems like. All levels of organizationin DC are getting involved. I wanna come on to something calledlead, which if you are not from the US you might not be familiar with. This is the leadership inenergy and environmental design. It is a global standard in greenbuilding certifications and C'Pher.
I know you've got an interestin this area, but just tell us a little bit about what's goingon in DC when it comes to lead. So DC itself was the first leadcertified city globally, and then you have the individual businessimprovement districts that vid was mentioning, like Golden Triangle. They just received platinum leadcertification for the commitment to be really environmentally friendly. Interestingly, DC has the most,profitable or highest rewarding? Solar renewable energy credits forhomeowners that put solar on the roofs. From a policy perspective, theyhave climate ready DC initiative.
They have wildlife plans. DC has 38% canopy tree coverwhich is really high for, as a urban area, as DC actually is. And that's due to a lot of thework of part our partners like Casey Trees that are gonna bespeaking and having some pop-up exhibits throughout DC Climate Week. From an innovation and technologyside, I think we're still at the early curve in DC itself, but ona. More macro scale in the us. I'm sure we've all seen this reportthat for the first time ever renewables out were a higher contributing factorto the US grid than than fossil fuels. Just this spring.
And so that's a really importantkind of tipping point where you're starting to see the economic case. It's not just about green premiumsanymore, but now we're seeing the true economic benefit of net newtechnologies on the renewable side. And then more investmentin some of the longer. Term technologies that are coming online? Yeah, I, first of all, I thinkwhat's really important is to discuss like what a unique place DC is. There's the global influence with theworld banks and so on, but there's also national influence here in the us. Being the capital of the United States.
And then there's that local influencetoo, like the local DC government and the amazing initiativesthat they have going on as well. At the end of the day, I think we wantto be in a world right where we do not depend on policy for these solutions. To win outright on theeconomic case, right? And so the cost curve of solar, forexample, is, has been dramatic in the last decade, and the deploymentof solar has been astronomical compared to other new generationpower sources on the grid in the us. As well as batteries. The long duration energy storage isstill a little bit away, but it's coming.
And the cost curve is also goingon a very similar trajectory with solar, but of course, there's upand coming technologies that need some support, like waste to valueinitiatives, for example, or geothermal. Or critical minerals for batteries too. There's just still a lot of nascency inthe space in terms of the value chain and the uncertainty this administrationbrings is, makes it really hard to set up the right value chains for creatingthe impact that's needed for our economy to transition off of fossil fuelsand onto more cleaner energy sources. Yeah, we're certainly living ininteresting times, but also I would point out that quite a few innovativetech companies were started in periods of downturn and recession,so it's not all doom and gloom.
I just wondered as well, I think I'mright in saying that you have day jobs. This actually isn't your mainjob running DC Climate Week. Just tell us a little bitabout what you're working on. I'm one of the co-founders ofa company called Gridvolve. We help independent system operatorsas well as power gen companies navigate their strategy and innovation andensure that they are deploying net new technologies that help with resiliency,reliability, and ultimately sustainability for the grid and some of the pieces. Why I'm really excited about DC ClimateWeek in this role is because we get to.
Build a better and more cohesive ecosystemhere in DC that can help bridge some of the knowledge gaps where if you'reat sitting at a large organization, sometimes you're not as in touch withthe technology and innovation that's happening at the forefront that maybeARPA E has funded at the very beginning, or maybe they've received a siber andit's coming online, but things are moving so much faster that typicallywhat would've taken 20 years previously. Now it's down to five years or threeyears as we're seeing the cost curves of long duration energy storage,battery storage come online faster.
That's something that now the ISOs,the independent system operators and other power generation companiesare really having to look at and make sure that they're planning for. To meet the needs of the grid. And I think one more piece that's reallyimportant that we're looking at for the future of DC Climate Week, but alsowhat I sit and spend a lot of time with in my day job is how AI is affecting. The future of the grid, butthen also broadly speaking climate based initiatives. So there's a lot of talk about the energyinsensitivity of ai, which is there. It's creating a massive load demand.
And so we have to meet that with thepower gen. But the other pieces that it's. Ultimately unlocking is more efficiency. So able to do long range transmissionplanning for the grid much faster shorten interconnection queue timesto actually gain these efficiencies in massive amount of productivity. And that's not just happening on thegrid, but I've talked with so many different founders and organizations thatare applying net new AI mapping tools for, helping with nature-based solutionsto accelerate and come up with even faster, better ways to sequester carbon,to map migratory patterns of birds and understand how nature is adapting tothis net new reality as climate has, is changing and how we can think about thebetter future that we want to create.
So that's where I sit day today, really at the intersection of strategy, technology,innovation for the energy sector. In a world long ago, both C'Pher and Iactually worked at the same organization. So we used to work at this I say ideatoss, precede incubator called Seed Spot. And it was actually myfirst job out of college. And so it's been really cool tosee our relationship continue to thrive beyond that role at. Seat spot at, but we're all, we'restill in very similar spheres. C'Pher is very much on like theutility grid innovation side of things. I'm more a little bit broader swath.
My background's at in venture capital andI do a lot of like climate tech investing. So investing in entrepreneurs thatare trying to build this feature that we all want to live in. And while the grid is definitely acomponent, but we also think about circular economy, deep decarbonizationof steel and cement as well. And many other a adaptation,for example, and resilience too. My. My passion areas is at the intersection ofentrepreneurship actually, and community. And so entrepreneurship is this focusof supporting and doing everything I can to make these entrepreneurs and makean impact on the world because all of the world's progress depends on theseunreasonable visions for a better future.
And then also on the side I, outside ofDC Client Week, and when the Inflation Reduction Act got passed in DC I justfelt like no one was celebrating. And I decided, I was like, let's justtext some friends and grab some drinks and celebrate this amazing accomplishmentfrom the policy front of things. And Steve Row is one of the firstpeople that have joined that group, and that group's evolved now to a monthlyclimate professional meetup in d. C the organization's called Climate dcand so I'm also a founder of Climate DC and we're closely working with DCClient week of how do we make sure this week long activation also becomes ayear long activation for our partners.
But everyone else in the DC area,it's been a ton of fun to continue building community, but also besupporting the entrepreneurs that are really moving this world forward. Fantastic. Yeah, getting everybody involved isso important, and that brings me on to challenges, so I. I can hear fromboth of you working in different parts of the ecosystem, but you are bothfacing a certain amount of frustration. I just wonder what some of the bigchallenges are at the moment for the organizations that you are talking to. People are realizing that there's alot more patient capital needed for companies that are working on climate.
It doesn't really fit the venture capitalmodel very well, only because, like typically the venture capital model is. They wanna make a returnin 10 years, right? Which is a very fast growth period. But some of these technologies need alot of capital to start get over the first of a kind financing gap and so on. And so I think there's a littlebit of a reckoning happening in the venture capital industry of is climateactually a venture capital asset class? And is it more of a projectfinance, debt financing asset class? Meanwhile, AI is taking stormand all these apps are getting ex extreme users, right?
And so there's a little bit of tensionin the industry in terms of where does climate fit in the financing ecosystem. Yeah. Organizations are facing a massive amountof uncertainty due to policy, but also supply chain constraints that are really. Coming together to affect their businessmodels in a way that we've not foreseen in years at a time where load growth isskyrocketing and then the future demand for energy is only growing faster. So the foundational challengeof uncertainty is something business leaders from for profit. Nonprofit.
And even community-based organizations arenot sure how to respond when there is so much uncertainty in the world around them. When you have supply chain constraintsfor critical minerals being threatened that are the foundational levelfor the electric vehicles for long duration battery storages and others,this is a huge, huge challenge for business leaders to actively plan for. So if we can bring individuals together. My, my concept and one of the piecesthat we work on both at DC Climate Week, but also in my day-to-day job,is bringing individuals together from disparate fields to talk about how weovercome this uncertainty and create opportunities of more certainty tothen address the challenges that we're seeing in this current day and time.
I can just imagine the strain on peopleat the moment and it's so important to have this outlet where you can talkto others within the community and the ecosystem and also just bounce ideasaround, but let's move on to success. So I'm sure there are somecompanies and organizations that you've come across where you'vethought, wow, that's incredible. Just tell us about some of thesuccess stories that you've heard. Yeah, I would say at least recentlythe, some of the biggest successes are in alternative what I wouldcall alternative clean firm power. So there's been a lot of funding andprogress on the geothermal front.
I. F VO is a companythat's doing really well. They've gotten a contract with Ibelieve Google and then also Zenz Car is another company in the geothermal space. Qua Energy is more deep geothermal,but basically what these orgs are trying to do is like, how dowe tap into the heat below us? That's. All the time and how do we have thathave help use that heat to power big, massive loads on the grid. So that's been a reallygreat success story for sure. And then I would say on the other side ofthings there's this company called Ravel that I am personally such a big fan of.
They are on the circulareconomy side of things. They actually are recyclingtextiles which is a huge problem. There's just a lot of waste fromtextiles as fast fashion increases, but it's really hard to recycle them,especially the blended fibers that is, 80% polyester, 20% elastene. It's really comfortable. And it's a huge hit on the market,but it's really hard to split apart those fibers and recycle. It takes a lot of energy. Or if you mechanically recycleit then it also takes it devalues the actual fibers and the thread. And so they found a really amazingprocess to purify recycled textiles.
And they're doing it at a verynice clip in terms of a scale that is at price parity for Virgin. Polyester, for example. So suppliers can buy straight from thisrecycler instead of virgin at almost close to prosper parity, which is a very sortof big key for what I look at when I'm evaluating what's happening out there iscan you compete on the economic level? Once you can compete on the economiclevel, that's where true scale happens. And so when I think of like successes,I always think of like, how are these industries and these technologies.
Trying to lever the change butnot have a green premium compared to the incumbents on the market. And so those are at least twoexamples that come top of mind. How about you, C'Pher. One of the companies that I've recentlyseen that I'm really excited about and they're scaling up really quicklyis a company called gridstrong.ai. They're focusing on a really uniqueproblem that plagues majority of power generation organizations aswell as ISOs, which is the time for interconnection queue and doingthose interconnection studies. So by leveraging.
Ai the, their tool enables the time todecrease from months and months to a much shorter time period to actuallyconduct that interconnection study. And it's usually a very intense study, butif we can leverage the efficiencies gained by AI to shorten the interconnection queueto actually demonstrate the affordability. Rate payers, aka to the homeowners andeveryone else that's connecting to the grid we're gonna be able to unlock thenext new wave of affordable clean energy. So that's one company thatI'm really excited about. It's at the earliest it'sat a relatively early stage.
Another company, and thisis an organization that's a partner of DC Climate Week. And Kieran, the CEO ofArcadia is a board member. So I'm really excited about the successof Arcadia and the innovation that's been happening with their technology platformto help corporations and enterprises more effectively plan their energy costsand demand, and make sure that it's coming from clean clean sources as well. And this is a really, I think, a powerfulstory for DC itself too, because it does take place at the intersection of policy,technology, and those overlapping aspects. I. Are where companiesin DC can really shine.
So Washington DC is a policy town. Energy sector is a policy reallypolicy driven industry given the how public utilities are defined. You also have the, you have FERC and youhave NERC and you have all these other regulatory and, monitoring bodies thatmake sure that rate payers are being protected and that we're building themost sustainable grid that we can in the most cost efficient way as possible. And so having Arcadia based here in DCis a really powerful example of what can happen when you can harness andunderstand policy, but also understand how to build a technology company.
And so at. DC Climate Week. I know we're gonna be hearing,Kieran is one of the speakers that's gonna help kick us off for the week. And we'll be hearing quite a bitmore about the success of Arcadia. Guys, I think you've created somethingincredible that will have a real lasting impact and all my word. Was it needed. So the chance to meet up withlike-minded people to talk to, listen to experts, to workshop, to maybe comeup with some new innovative ideas. Just incredible. And I wish you every successbut I want to find out as well what you think the future holds.
What will be the lastingimpact that you hope for? Yeah, I think DC Climate Week. Is really coming at this from aumbrella perspective of how do we build a bigger tent, make a bigger pie. And so the, we're looking totransform DC into a bigger, a broader, a more collaborative communitythat addresses climate action. We know that look in a recent studydone by George Mason University in Yale over 70% of the population in the USbelieves that climate change is real. It is a bipartisan issue. It is a issue that is fundamental forour generation and future generations to address, and by bringing all thedifferent policy makers, stakeholders.
International development banks and otherorganizations that are based here in DC Together, we hope to harness that energyto find un unlikely allyship amongst both sides of the aisle amongst for-profitsand nonprofits coming together to address what is largely the most pressing issue inthe world today, which is climate change. And as we look forward. We hope that DC Climate Weekbecomes the this first one. The first of many, and built forthe community by the community. And this first year by being all volunteerled with great partners, we know that this can be self-sustaining for years and yearsto come to support what we all need, hope.
There's so much talent within theclimate arena, something we're hosting during DC Climb Week is the nationaljob Fair with Clean Energy for America. We have over a thousand people signedup amazing booths of folks that want to hire this incredible talent. And CFO mentioned this, but justthe broadening of the tent, right? We need more and more people coming in andbringing their talent to the climate arena because this problem is massive and ittouches every single industry out there. So my, vision if everything goesto plan, is that there's just so many more people engaged.
And there's just more, more connectionsand more vision and more co cohesiveness towards the vision that we're all tryingto build, which is ultimately a world we all want to thrive in and live togetherin harmony but also sustainably with the earth's natural resources as well. And so this is just a small sliverof the amazing work of all the client weeks around the world. New York City Climate Week, SanFrancisco Climate Week, London Climate Week, there's so many out there. And so we're just part of thisbroader movement of bringing together cohesiveness and a larger umbrellafor this, these activations to happen.
And we are absolutely humbledby all the support, all the sold out events moving forward. And we're excited for allthe conversations to come. I think just listening to youboth is inspiring and a big thank you to all of the co-organizers. 'cause I know there's a bigteam behind DC Climate Week. It's incredible what you've achievedand I'm looking forward to seeing just what happens and also the impact. Now, if you'd like to meet ourteam Tech for Climate Action. We'll be there on Tuesday. That's Policy Day at the MartinLuther King Memorial Library. If you enjoyed this video or podcast, ifyou are listening to my dul set tones, please hit subscribe, and tell a friend.
We'll be back soon, but for now,I'd just say a big thank you to Vid and to Sifa from DC Climate Week. Thank you, Ralph. This was fun. Thank you.
Welcome back to Tech for ClimateAction TV with me, Ralph Cochrane. Now, if you're listening to this as apodcast, you might like to know that you can also see our guests, and of course,me in the studio, on our YouTube channel. Or if you are watching the video,you might like to know that you can listen to this on all yourfavorite podcast platforms, including Spotify, apple, and Amazon. Now onto this week's episode,we are covering DC Climate Week. It's something we're really excited about. This is the first time it's happened andwith over a hundred events, it promises to be something pretty spectacular.
If you are interested in all thingsclimate, tech, policy, nature, water. All of it, you can see and hear fromsome of the experts in the DC area. And I'm delighted to welcometwo of the co-organizers of DC Climate Week, C'Pher and Vid. Welcome. We're excited to be here. Thanks for having us. Now, I should also say that Tomand Simon from the Tech for Climate Action Team have helped to organizethe policy day at DC Climate Week, but Sifa, tell us a little bit aboutthe background and also when is it. DC Climate Week is April28th through May 2nd, 2025. We started with an idea about ninemonths ago and built the movement to get to where we are today with over ahundred events happening, thousands of attendees all happening here in C'Pher.
All of you have done an incredible job. I just wonder, what's thestory behind DC Climate Week? Why now, and why are you doing this? DC's the center of policy, and wealso have a large funding atmosphere here, and we have some of theworld's most renowned international development banks, nonprofits, NGOs,that are at the tip of the spear for climate action and sustainabilityand environmental sustainability. And so it just made sense. We said, let's bringthe community together. Let's validate this by talking withindividuals that are running incubators. Accelerators are also working in theinternational development space to make a DC Climate Week happen here, and itreally is about shining the spotlight.
On all of the organizations from thelocal groups like Casey Trees to the internationally renowned groups likeWRI and World Wildlife Fund and other groups that are based in here in C'Pher. We wanted to give a stage for all ofthese amazing experts especially at a time when we know that climate actionis really gaining a lot of momentum. Very true. And we are really excitedto be supporting you. I noticed as well that theorganization is quite clever. There's a hub each day, and I thinkthe idea is that any of the events that are taking place take you about.
Less than 10 minutes to walkto, so that's also a great idea. But coming to you vid, what highlightsare you really looking forward to? Monday, our hub's gonna beclimate, tech and innovation. And that day is gonna be at thenew Bloomberg Center which is the old museum for all anyone that'sbeen in the DC area for a while. And those are gonna be some reallyhigh packed, sessions, essentially. Some sessions might include lightningtalks with hard tech founders, for example, but also financing mechanismsfor early stage startups and the whole sort of climate technology sphere.
The next day on Tuesday, the. Our main hub is gonna be at the MLKlibrary, and that's gonna be really focused on policy and advocacy andwe're, we'll definitely chat more about this, but we've partnering with a groupcalled Climate Tech for Action, and they are an amazing group and, part of thereason why we're on this podcast today. So we're just huge fans of the workthey're doing and we're really looking forward to continuing the partnership. They are experts on the policy side ofthings and we wanted to combine forces. And then on Wednesday we have climateFinance and economy and that will be focused at International Square.
And then on Thursday we'llhave Nature Day and Friday actually, we'll have two events. One will be called mobility and waterand the other urban development as well. It's gonna be a jam packedschedule during that week. But really these hub events aremeant to be like the cornerstone of here's what's happening this day. But also there's so many other participantevents happening throughout the week. So there's hub programmingand then participating events. And these are a hundred plus eventsthat are grassroots organized by other organizations and so on.
Moving forward. It's just incredible howmany events there are. But let's give a quickshout out to the website. So if people wanna findout more, where do they go? Just go to C'Pher climate week.com. There's gonna be two call to actions rightnow, which is view events or at an event. And then also in the about page, it justshares more about who's behind the scenes. Me and Cfer are only a small sliverof the amazing volunteers that are putting this all together. So dcclimateweek.comlimateweek.comis the best way to start. And just talking to youboth before we came on air.
I know that some of the events,in fact many of the events are already oversubscribed. There's been an incrediblereaction to DC Climate Week. Just tell us a little bit abouthow you are managing the demand. Yeah, we're really inspired by themomentum the community already has to support climate initiatives. Each day is actually alreadyoversubscribed at each of the hub locations and how we in ensuredinclusivity for each of the days. Is by having a lottery system tomake sure that we have a broad swath representative of the DCcommunity attending each of the days. So there's still time to attend.
Not only the hub events, but those ahundred plus events that are happening by participating organizations. And some of the pieces that Iwanted to highlight of not only at the hub locations, but at thoseparticipating events is we have. Everything from panel discussionsto tours, to hikes to nature walks. Some of the ones that I'm personallyreally excited about, we have the Daikin Sustainability and InnovationCenter right on Pennsylvania Avenue. They're opening up their innovation centerhosting tours to really get a behind the scenes look of how heat pumps work.
They have ones that are focused on theinnovation side of heat pumps and some of the other technologies that they produce,but they also have policy focused tours to talk about how policies have changednot only in DC and the US but globally. Another event that I'm really excitedabout, and this is the architecture and design nerd in me we have,american Institute for Architects. They're actually hosting a hard hattour of their new newly renovated headquarters, which was I believeit was designed to the 1970s, and they've renovated it to be net zero.
And so that's a really cool behind thescenes look where they actually bringing in the architecture firm, the engineeringfirm, to walk through and get a, a. Behind the scenes look of how a1970s building was then rehabbed, renovated, and made to meet the needsof the, current current situation. There's amazing org called Compost Crew. They have actually a pilot with DCgovernment to get compost from households. And then there's actually a tourof their facility of what happens to the compost when you're, you'vesubmitted it essentially and they pick it up from your doorstep.
Which I think will be really fun. There's another communitycalled up Top Acres. They actually are creating urbanfarms on the top of roofs in DC and they're hosting a happy hour as wellas an urban farming event as well. And then there's. Also a partner of ours, golden Triangle. They're doing basically it'sone of the first LEED cities in the world that they've created. And they're doing a block sort oftour of everything they've done. You'll go through pollination gardens,but also look at LEED buildings and so on. So anyway, what we're really trying todo with these events, it's, yes, we have these hub programming focus areas with.
Panels and really greatdiscussions and amazing speakers. But we'll also have these side activationevents that get the people outside and activate in the local community,which we think is really important. I totally agree. Vid, it is fantastic thatyou are involving the local community and it seems like. All levels of organizationin DC are getting involved. I wanna come on to something calledlead, which if you are not from the US you might not be familiar with. This is the leadership inenergy and environmental design. It is a global standard in greenbuilding certifications and C'Pher.
I know you've got an interestin this area, but just tell us a little bit about what's goingon in DC when it comes to lead. So DC itself was the first leadcertified city globally, and then you have the individual businessimprovement districts that vid was mentioning, like Golden Triangle. They just received platinum leadcertification for the commitment to be really environmentally friendly. Interestingly, DC has the most,profitable or highest rewarding? Solar renewable energy credits forhomeowners that put solar on the roofs. From a policy perspective, theyhave climate ready DC initiative.
They have wildlife plans. DC has 38% canopy tree coverwhich is really high for, as a urban area, as DC actually is. And that's due to a lot of thework of part our partners like Casey Trees that are gonna bespeaking and having some pop-up exhibits throughout DC Climate Week. From an innovation and technologyside, I think we're still at the early curve in DC itself, but ona. More macro scale in the us. I'm sure we've all seen this reportthat for the first time ever renewables out were a higher contributing factorto the US grid than than fossil fuels. Just this spring.
And so that's a really importantkind of tipping point where you're starting to see the economic case. It's not just about green premiumsanymore, but now we're seeing the true economic benefit of net newtechnologies on the renewable side. And then more investmentin some of the longer. Term technologies that are coming online? Yeah, I, first of all, I thinkwhat's really important is to discuss like what a unique place DC is. There's the global influence with theworld banks and so on, but there's also national influence here in the us. Being the capital of the United States.
And then there's that local influencetoo, like the local DC government and the amazing initiativesthat they have going on as well. At the end of the day, I think we wantto be in a world right where we do not depend on policy for these solutions. To win outright on theeconomic case, right? And so the cost curve of solar, forexample, is, has been dramatic in the last decade, and the deploymentof solar has been astronomical compared to other new generationpower sources on the grid in the us. As well as batteries. The long duration energy storage isstill a little bit away, but it's coming.
And the cost curve is also goingon a very similar trajectory with solar, but of course, there's upand coming technologies that need some support, like waste to valueinitiatives, for example, or geothermal. Or critical minerals for batteries too. There's just still a lot of nascency inthe space in terms of the value chain and the uncertainty this administrationbrings is, makes it really hard to set up the right value chains for creatingthe impact that's needed for our economy to transition off of fossil fuelsand onto more cleaner energy sources. Yeah, we're certainly living ininteresting times, but also I would point out that quite a few innovativetech companies were started in periods of downturn and recession,so it's not all doom and gloom.
I just wondered as well, I think I'mright in saying that you have day jobs. This actually isn't your mainjob running DC Climate Week. Just tell us a little bitabout what you're working on. I'm one of the co-founders ofa company called Gridvolve. We help independent system operatorsas well as power gen companies navigate their strategy and innovation andensure that they are deploying net new technologies that help with resiliency,reliability, and ultimately sustainability for the grid and some of the pieces. Why I'm really excited about DC ClimateWeek in this role is because we get to.
Build a better and more cohesive ecosystemhere in DC that can help bridge some of the knowledge gaps where if you'reat sitting at a large organization, sometimes you're not as in touch withthe technology and innovation that's happening at the forefront that maybeARPA E has funded at the very beginning, or maybe they've received a siber andit's coming online, but things are moving so much faster that typicallywhat would've taken 20 years previously. Now it's down to five years or threeyears as we're seeing the cost curves of long duration energy storage,battery storage come online faster.
That's something that now the ISOs,the independent system operators and other power generation companiesare really having to look at and make sure that they're planning for. To meet the needs of the grid. And I think one more piece that's reallyimportant that we're looking at for the future of DC Climate Week, but alsowhat I sit and spend a lot of time with in my day job is how AI is affecting. The future of the grid, butthen also broadly speaking climate based initiatives. So there's a lot of talk about the energyinsensitivity of ai, which is there. It's creating a massive load demand.
And so we have to meet that with thepower gen. But the other pieces that it's. Ultimately unlocking is more efficiency. So able to do long range transmissionplanning for the grid much faster shorten interconnection queue timesto actually gain these efficiencies in massive amount of productivity. And that's not just happening on thegrid, but I've talked with so many different founders and organizations thatare applying net new AI mapping tools for, helping with nature-based solutionsto accelerate and come up with even faster, better ways to sequester carbon,to map migratory patterns of birds and understand how nature is adapting tothis net new reality as climate has, is changing and how we can think about thebetter future that we want to create.
So that's where I sit day today, really at the intersection of strategy, technology,innovation for the energy sector. In a world long ago, both C'Pher and Iactually worked at the same organization. So we used to work at this I say ideatoss, precede incubator called Seed Spot. And it was actually myfirst job out of college. And so it's been really cool tosee our relationship continue to thrive beyond that role at. Seat spot at, but we're all, we'restill in very similar spheres. C'Pher is very much on like theutility grid innovation side of things. I'm more a little bit broader swath.
My background's at in venture capital andI do a lot of like climate tech investing. So investing in entrepreneurs thatare trying to build this feature that we all want to live in. And while the grid is definitely acomponent, but we also think about circular economy, deep decarbonizationof steel and cement as well. And many other a adaptation,for example, and resilience too. My. My passion areas is at the intersection ofentrepreneurship actually, and community. And so entrepreneurship is this focusof supporting and doing everything I can to make these entrepreneurs and makean impact on the world because all of the world's progress depends on theseunreasonable visions for a better future.
And then also on the side I, outside ofDC Client Week, and when the Inflation Reduction Act got passed in DC I justfelt like no one was celebrating. And I decided, I was like, let's justtext some friends and grab some drinks and celebrate this amazing accomplishmentfrom the policy front of things. And Steve Row is one of the firstpeople that have joined that group, and that group's evolved now to a monthlyclimate professional meetup in d. C the organization's called Climate dcand so I'm also a founder of Climate DC and we're closely working with DCClient week of how do we make sure this week long activation also becomes ayear long activation for our partners.
But everyone else in the DC area,it's been a ton of fun to continue building community, but also besupporting the entrepreneurs that are really moving this world forward. Fantastic. Yeah, getting everybody involved isso important, and that brings me on to challenges, so I. I can hear fromboth of you working in different parts of the ecosystem, but you are bothfacing a certain amount of frustration. I just wonder what some of the bigchallenges are at the moment for the organizations that you are talking to. People are realizing that there's alot more patient capital needed for companies that are working on climate.
It doesn't really fit the venture capitalmodel very well, only because, like typically the venture capital model is. They wanna make a returnin 10 years, right? Which is a very fast growth period. But some of these technologies need alot of capital to start get over the first of a kind financing gap and so on. And so I think there's a littlebit of a reckoning happening in the venture capital industry of is climateactually a venture capital asset class? And is it more of a projectfinance, debt financing asset class? Meanwhile, AI is taking stormand all these apps are getting ex extreme users, right?
And so there's a little bit of tensionin the industry in terms of where does climate fit in the financing ecosystem. Yeah. Organizations are facing a massive amountof uncertainty due to policy, but also supply chain constraints that are really. Coming together to affect their businessmodels in a way that we've not foreseen in years at a time where load growth isskyrocketing and then the future demand for energy is only growing faster. So the foundational challengeof uncertainty is something business leaders from for profit. Nonprofit.
And even community-based organizations arenot sure how to respond when there is so much uncertainty in the world around them. When you have supply chain constraintsfor critical minerals being threatened that are the foundational levelfor the electric vehicles for long duration battery storages and others,this is a huge, huge challenge for business leaders to actively plan for. So if we can bring individuals together. My, my concept and one of the piecesthat we work on both at DC Climate Week, but also in my day-to-day job,is bringing individuals together from disparate fields to talk about how weovercome this uncertainty and create opportunities of more certainty tothen address the challenges that we're seeing in this current day and time.
I can just imagine the strain on peopleat the moment and it's so important to have this outlet where you can talkto others within the community and the ecosystem and also just bounce ideasaround, but let's move on to success. So I'm sure there are somecompanies and organizations that you've come across where you'vethought, wow, that's incredible. Just tell us about some of thesuccess stories that you've heard. Yeah, I would say at least recentlythe, some of the biggest successes are in alternative what I wouldcall alternative clean firm power. So there's been a lot of funding andprogress on the geothermal front.
I. F VO is a companythat's doing really well. They've gotten a contract with Ibelieve Google and then also Zenz Car is another company in the geothermal space. Qua Energy is more deep geothermal,but basically what these orgs are trying to do is like, how dowe tap into the heat below us? That's. All the time and how do we have thathave help use that heat to power big, massive loads on the grid. So that's been a reallygreat success story for sure. And then I would say on the other side ofthings there's this company called Ravel that I am personally such a big fan of.
They are on the circulareconomy side of things. They actually are recyclingtextiles which is a huge problem. There's just a lot of waste fromtextiles as fast fashion increases, but it's really hard to recycle them,especially the blended fibers that is, 80% polyester, 20% elastene. It's really comfortable. And it's a huge hit on the market,but it's really hard to split apart those fibers and recycle. It takes a lot of energy. Or if you mechanically recycleit then it also takes it devalues the actual fibers and the thread. And so they found a really amazingprocess to purify recycled textiles.
And they're doing it at a verynice clip in terms of a scale that is at price parity for Virgin. Polyester, for example. So suppliers can buy straight from thisrecycler instead of virgin at almost close to prosper parity, which is a very sortof big key for what I look at when I'm evaluating what's happening out there iscan you compete on the economic level? Once you can compete on the economiclevel, that's where true scale happens. And so when I think of like successes,I always think of like, how are these industries and these technologies.
Trying to lever the change butnot have a green premium compared to the incumbents on the market. And so those are at least twoexamples that come top of mind. How about you, C'Pher. One of the companies that I've recentlyseen that I'm really excited about and they're scaling up really quicklyis a company called gridstrong.ai. They're focusing on a really uniqueproblem that plagues majority of power generation organizations aswell as ISOs, which is the time for interconnection queue and doingthose interconnection studies. So by leveraging.
Ai the, their tool enables the time todecrease from months and months to a much shorter time period to actuallyconduct that interconnection study. And it's usually a very intense study, butif we can leverage the efficiencies gained by AI to shorten the interconnection queueto actually demonstrate the affordability. Rate payers, aka to the homeowners andeveryone else that's connecting to the grid we're gonna be able to unlock thenext new wave of affordable clean energy. So that's one company thatI'm really excited about. It's at the earliest it'sat a relatively early stage.
Another company, and thisis an organization that's a partner of DC Climate Week. And Kieran, the CEO ofArcadia is a board member. So I'm really excited about the successof Arcadia and the innovation that's been happening with their technology platformto help corporations and enterprises more effectively plan their energy costsand demand, and make sure that it's coming from clean clean sources as well. And this is a really, I think, a powerfulstory for DC itself too, because it does take place at the intersection of policy,technology, and those overlapping aspects. I. Are where companiesin DC can really shine.
So Washington DC is a policy town. Energy sector is a policy reallypolicy driven industry given the how public utilities are defined. You also have the, you have FERC and youhave NERC and you have all these other regulatory and, monitoring bodies thatmake sure that rate payers are being protected and that we're building themost sustainable grid that we can in the most cost efficient way as possible. And so having Arcadia based here in DCis a really powerful example of what can happen when you can harness andunderstand policy, but also understand how to build a technology company.
And so at. DC Climate Week. I know we're gonna be hearing,Kieran is one of the speakers that's gonna help kick us off for the week. And we'll be hearing quite a bitmore about the success of Arcadia. Guys, I think you've created somethingincredible that will have a real lasting impact and all my word. Was it needed. So the chance to meet up withlike-minded people to talk to, listen to experts, to workshop, to maybe comeup with some new innovative ideas. Just incredible. And I wish you every successbut I want to find out as well what you think the future holds.
What will be the lastingimpact that you hope for? Yeah, I think DC Climate Week. Is really coming at this from aumbrella perspective of how do we build a bigger tent, make a bigger pie. And so the, we're looking totransform DC into a bigger, a broader, a more collaborative communitythat addresses climate action. We know that look in a recent studydone by George Mason University in Yale over 70% of the population in the USbelieves that climate change is real. It is a bipartisan issue. It is a issue that is fundamental forour generation and future generations to address, and by bringing all thedifferent policy makers, stakeholders.
International development banks and otherorganizations that are based here in DC Together, we hope to harness that energyto find un unlikely allyship amongst both sides of the aisle amongst for-profitsand nonprofits coming together to address what is largely the most pressing issue inthe world today, which is climate change. And as we look forward. We hope that DC Climate Weekbecomes the this first one. The first of many, and built forthe community by the community. And this first year by being all volunteerled with great partners, we know that this can be self-sustaining for years and yearsto come to support what we all need, hope.
There's so much talent within theclimate arena, something we're hosting during DC Climb Week is the nationaljob Fair with Clean Energy for America. We have over a thousand people signedup amazing booths of folks that want to hire this incredible talent. And CFO mentioned this, but justthe broadening of the tent, right? We need more and more people coming in andbringing their talent to the climate arena because this problem is massive and ittouches every single industry out there. So my, vision if everything goesto plan, is that there's just so many more people engaged.
And there's just more, more connectionsand more vision and more co cohesiveness towards the vision that we're all tryingto build, which is ultimately a world we all want to thrive in and live togetherin harmony but also sustainably with the earth's natural resources as well. And so this is just a small sliverof the amazing work of all the client weeks around the world. New York City Climate Week, SanFrancisco Climate Week, London Climate Week, there's so many out there. And so we're just part of thisbroader movement of bringing together cohesiveness and a larger umbrellafor this, these activations to happen.
And we are absolutely humbledby all the support, all the sold out events moving forward. And we're excited for allthe conversations to come. I think just listening to youboth is inspiring and a big thank you to all of the co-organizers. 'cause I know there's a bigteam behind DC Climate Week. It's incredible what you've achievedand I'm looking forward to seeing just what happens and also the impact. Now, if you'd like to meet ourteam Tech for Climate Action. We'll be there on Tuesday. That's Policy Day at the MartinLuther King Memorial Library. If you enjoyed this video or podcast, ifyou are listening to my dul set tones, please hit subscribe, and tell a friend.
We'll be back soon, but for now,I'd just say a big thank you to Vid and to Sifa from DC Climate Week. Thank you, Ralph. This was fun. Thank you.
