Entrepreneurs for Impact (EFI): Climate Tech CEOs & VCs

My guest today is Bret Kugelmass, Founder and CEO of Last Energy. In addition, Bret is… The podcast host at Titans of Nuclear Managing Director at The Energy Impact Center Former CEO of Airphrame, a drone company that he sold to a Fortune 500 buyer A graduate of the Stanford School of Engineering Last Energy is a VC-backed full-service developer of small modular nuclear power projects with the goal of transforming the nuclear power industry by dramatically reducing the time and cost of construction. Their mission is to decarbonize global energy production and increase access to clean, affordable power. They are targeting 2025 for its first units, which require around $200 million to build, and they are investigating 800 other potential sites to deploy the units across Europe. In this episode, we talked about: The three most common misperceptions about nuclear energy What he learned from 800 interviews with nuclear energy experts Common mistakes made by 50 next-gen nuclear startups The outsized role that construction finance plans in the overall cost of nuclear power Last Energy’s initial contracts to build small modular nuclear reactors in the UK, Poland, and Romania What he means by this quote: “We’re innovative in the way that we are not trying to be overly innovative. We don't reinvent the reactor core, the physics, the chemistry, the materials.” How to avoid multiplying risks The role of business model vs. tech innovation to get clean energy to market The distinction between corporate and project finance for their go-to-market strategy And lots more Hope you enjoy it! And give Bret and Last Energy a shout-out on LinkedIn, Slack, or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people. --- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Here's our weekly newsletter — A 3-minute summary of climate tech startups, better habits, and deep work trends: https://entrepreneursforimpact.substack.com Our main program is a Climate CEO Mastermind peer group community: https://entrepreneursforimpact.com Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

In this newsletter-turned-podcast episode from Entrepreneurs for Impact, I cover the following: Climate Startups & Investment 🦄 How many climate tech unicorns are there? 🙋‍♂️ How do I transition to a job in climate tech? 🏎️ The lies about electric vehicles 💥 2.8 billion reasons that fusion should matter to you. 🚫 This is why $4,000,000,000 at two firms is not enough. 🍺 If you stop drinking in 2050, does it matter? [climate goals] Better Habits & Deep Work 😲 Choose pronoia over paranoia ⛅ A free therapy lesson from Stutz 📊 What’s your Positive Intelligence Quotient (PQ)? [Take this test] 🤔 “Hard choices, easy life. Easy choices, hard life.” Enjoy! Ping me on LinkedIn to let me know what you think about it. https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopherwedding ------- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Here's our weekly newsletter — A 3-minute summary of climate tech startups, better habits, and deep work trends: https://entrepreneursforimpact.substack.com Our main program is a Climate CEO Mastermind peer group community: https://entrepreneursforimpact.com Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

My guest today is Su Sanni, Founder of Dollaride, a mobility company for communities underserved by public transit. In addition, Su is also: Venture Partner with Republic Fellow with Visible Hands Former Cofounder and CEO of WeDidIt, an online fundraising platform for nonprofits In this episode, we talked about: What a transit desert is and how it costs us billions of dollars in lost productivity annually The $10M award that Dollaride won from the state of New York Their solid customer traction with over 15,000 riders in just one year How his solution relates to the micromobility field more broadly His origin story and the inspiration for this business How their business is evolving from an Uber-like tech platform to an asset-financing model to make EV purchases easier The process by which they retrofit commercial vehicles from ICE to EV Why it’s so important that he walks his kids to school And lots more Hope you enjoy it. And give Su a shout-out on LinkedIn, Slack, or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people. --- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Our two offerings include: Climate CEO Mastermind Peer Groups — Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Newsletter — A 3-minute weekly summary of climate tech, startups, better habits, and deep work. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

My guest today is Sandeep Nijhawan, the Cofounder and CEO of Electra. Electra is decarbonizing ironmaking for green steel production using intermittent renewable energy and low-grade iron ores, and producing higher-quality steel at the same time. Backed by $85M of VC and corporate VC capital, they will do all this at zero cost premium to existing steel manufacturing. In addition, Sandeep is the former: President of AquaHydrex, which was focused on developing a novel electrolyzer for the hydrogen economy Operating Partner for True North Venture Partners President of Staq Energy, a distributed energy storage solutions developer In this episode, we talked about: Their new partnership with Nucor, the largest steel manufacturer in the U.S. How he transitioned from a PhD in mechanical engineering to leading energy tech startups Why his “midlife crisis” led to the clarity to build novel energy solutions among small teams of bonafide geeks The importance of producing green steel at 60 degrees Celsius instead of 1,600 degrees How they balanced strategic and financial investors, ignoring conventional wisdom in the process The ways in which steel plants can get access to their solution as an OpEx, instead of just as a CapEx The prioritization of self, family, and team – not the reverse order – and this is anti-selfish Perspectives on really knowing the “why” in order to allow the “how” to be easier And lots more Hope you enjoy. And give Sandeep and Electra a shout-out on LinkedIn, Slack, or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people. --- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Our two offerings include: Climate CEO Mastermind Peer Groups — Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Newsletter — A 3-minute weekly summary of climate tech, startups, better habits, and deep work. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

In this newsletter-turned-podcast episode from Entrepreneurs for Impact, I cover the following: 💰 $64B of new cash for climate in 2022 📰 New carbon removal buyer's guide ☁️ TPG invests $300M into carbon credit platform 🤔 Pain + reflection = progress ⛰️ 75 Hard vs. 60 Medium 🥇 Here’s what this VC looks for in a climate tech startup 📰 News flash: Climate is about people, not just startup exits 🙋‍♂️ Want a job in climate tech? 📈 Price’s Law: The square root of people 👵 Retire far earlier than age 65 Enjoy! Ping me on LinkedIn to let me know what you think about it. https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopherwedding ------- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Here's our weekly newsletter — A 3-minute summary of climate tech startups, better habits, and deep work trends: https://entrepreneursforimpact.substack.com Our main program is a Climate CEO Mastermind peer group community: https://entrepreneursforimpact.com Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

My guest today is Jake Susman, Cofounder and CEO of Ambient Fuels. Ambient Fuels is a pure-play developer of green hydrogen projects, guiding heavy industry through the great green upgrade. In addition, he is the: Executive Advisory Board Member at Activate Capital Board member of Urban Resiliency Advisory Board with the Partnership Fund for New York City Board Member at SolarKal, the largest commercial solar marketplace in the U.S. Board President & Co-Founder at Cleantech Leaders Roundtable In this episode, we talked about: How Ambient Fuel was focused on green hydrogen before the Inflation Reduction Act made it super attractive to be in this sector The kinds of sectors that Ambient helps the most – e.g., refining, chemical, and fertilizers His prior development firm, Own Energy, and its origin as one of the earliest VC-funded renewable energy project developers, which was later purchased by EDF The genesis of his entrepreneurial journey via “el jefe” at AES in Spain Why timing can be so important in determining whether a deal gets done, or dies on the vine The fact that not all investor capital is created equal and a gross analogy with fast food Why premortem analysis exercises can help reduce future startup failure risks His commitment to meditation 4x per week and sweating in some kind of physical activity every day And lots more Hope you enjoy it. And give Jake and Ambient fuels a shout-out on LinkedIn, Slack, or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people. --- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Our two offerings include: Climate CEO Mastermind Peer Groups — Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Newsletter — A 3-minute weekly summary of climate tech, startups, better habits, and deep work. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

My guest today is Joseph McMillin, Cofounder and CEO of Atlas Organics. Atlas Organics is a national leader in organic waste recycling. Their key partner is Generate Capital, a multi-billion-dollar sustainable infrastructure investor. Joseph is also a member of the Climate Mastermind peer groups we run at Entrepreneurs for Impact with three dozen growth-stage CEOs and investors tackling climate change. In this episode, we talked about the following: His purchase of an old school bus, which he renovated and drove across the country during Covid, with his wife, young son, and four dogs (woah!) The importance of his earliest investors – such as Closed Loop and Gratitude Railroad – having confidence that he and his partner would land on the right business model to scale organic waste recycling Their evolution from collecting food waste in a truck to doing public-private partnerships to handle cities’ waste and buying existing organic waste processing facilities across the country How his projects earn revenue, and which revenue sources are contracted versus the spot market The role of city and state mandates and voluntary targets in driving greater organic waste recycling How their talent and operational processes have been influenced by books, such as Mastering the Rockefeller Habits: What You Must Do to Increase the Value of Your Growing Firm, as well as the interview practices described in topgrading His ideal morning routine of exercise, journaling, meditation, and reflection – if he’s able to get up at 4:45 am And lots more Hope you enjoy. And give Joseph a shout-out on LinkedIn, Slack, or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people. --- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Our two offerings include: Climate CEO Mastermind Peer Groups — Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Newsletter — A 3-minute weekly summary of climate tech, startups, better habits, and deep work. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

My guest is Alex Roetter, General Partner at Moxxie Ventures, Founder of Terraset, and former Head of Engineering at Twitter. In addition, he came up with this great idea around which we teamed up together to launch Terraset, an anti-GHG 501(c)(3) for advanced market commitments in the carbon removal industry (CDR). In this episode, we talked about the following: How philanthropy only provides 2% of its donations to tackle climate change, and only 3.8% of that small number goes to carbon dioxide removal (CDR) Why advanced market commitments (or AMCs) can help create market validation for CDR companies so they can get their projects financed How Terraset is similar and different from the $925M Frontier Fund, which includes partners such as Stripe, Shopify, Alphabet, Meta, and McKinsey The ways that Terraset makes it easier for donors to find trusted CDR projects to support, and receive a tax deduction in the U.S. The preseed and seed VC funding he provides at Moxxie Ventures, which focused on climate tech, as well as health tech, AI, and more Examples of the cool portfolio companies they’ve funded, such as BasiGo, an EV bus company in Nairobi Mistakes he has seen CEOs, including himself, make and how to avoid them Why environmental and social co-benefits in climate tech financing matter And lots more Hope you enjoy it! And give Alex a shout-out on LinkedIn, Slack, or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people. --- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Our two offerings include: Climate CEO Mastermind Peer Groups — Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Newsletter — A 3-minute weekly summary of climate tech, startups, better habits, and deep work. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

In this newsletter-turned-podcast episode from Entrepreneurs for Impact, I cover the following: 💵 New “Climate Finance Tracker” 🤬 To all the carbon tech haters 😮 A new tablet to kill your pen and paper 👂 We have 2 ears and 1 mouth for a reason 🚀 We launched a new anti-GHG NGO called Terraset 💰 15 money-winning climate tech pitch decks 🤔 Are you becoming better or bitter? 😵 Beware of “Thinkwashing” Enjoy!  Ping me on LinkedIn to let me know what you think about it. https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopherwedding ------- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Here's our weekly newsletter — A 3-minute summary of climate tech startups, better habits, and deep work trends: https://entrepreneursforimpact.substack.com Our main program is a Climate CEO Mastermind peer group community: https://entrepreneursforimpact.com Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

My guest today is Howard Fischer, the Chief Evangelist at Gratitude Railroad and CEO of Basso Capital Management. Gratitude Railroad's mission is to support investors in moving capital from traditional finance to impact investments that create deep social and environmental impact, without compromising financial returns. His bio on the GR website is delightful in its brevity and insight into who he is. And I quote: “Uphill over downhill; Snow over sand; Read over watch; Trees over skyscrapers; Pizza over steak; Conversation over gossip; Disagree over agree; Instinct over spreadsheets; Relationship over contract.” In this episode, we talked about: His 40 years in hedge funds How his rebirth in 2013 while not religious was like a metaphorical move from Gordon Gekko to Dalai Lama His financial reckoning during the 2008 financial crisis when his hedge fund went from $3B to $300M The risks in wearing the golden handcuffs of fat paychecks from big-brand employers How philanthropy is broken and government is not a great problem solver Why we have to move more profit-driven capital to the climate sector Examples of the climate investments they’ve made at Gratitude Railroad, including a focus on organic waste management His theme of “Free the Money” and related investments in Climate First Bank and First Women’s Bank Why we can’t ask people to eat their broccoli (sorry, you have to listen to understand what this means) Some of his favorite books, such as The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World, Soulcraft: Crossing into the Mysteries of Nature and Psyche, and The Nutmeg’s Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis And lots more Hope you enjoy. And give Howard a shout-out on LinkedIn or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people. --- Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential. Learn more: Climate CEO Mastermind Peer Groups — Our invite-only cohorts of 12 executives catalyze personal development and business growth via monthly meetings, annual retreats, and 1:1 coaching and strategy calls. Today’s highly curated Mastermind members represent over $8B in market cap or assets under management. Newsletter — A 3-minute weekly summary of climate tech, startups, better habits, and deep work. Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 3x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 60,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.