Climate Rising

As bonus episode of Climate Rising, we feature a conversation among Tata Power CEO Dr. Praveer Sinha, Harvard Business School Professor Vikram Gandhi, and HBS Chief Marketing and Communications Officer Brian Kenny  that explores how India’s largest private power company is navigating its net-zero commitment while supporting a rapidly growing economy. With energy demand projected to quadruple by 2047, Tata Power has committed to phasing down coal and expanding renewables, distributed generation, and smart grid investments. This conversation, based on the HBS case “Tata Power and India’s Energy Transition” and originally recorded for the HBS Cold Call podcast, explores how Tata Power balances profitability and purpose, the role of technology and grid modernization, and how energy transition in the Global South differs from the Global North. Dr. Sinha also shares insights on employee reskilling, engaging customers as “prosumers,” and why long-term vision is critical to executing a climate-aligned business strategy. This episode is part of Climate Rising’s Global South series, which features companies and organizations at the intersection of business and climate in India and Brazil. Explore more episodes at climaterising.org.

Parth Jindal, Managing Director of JSW Cement, and Prabod Acharya, Chief Sustainability Officer, delve into JSW Group's ambitious climate strategy. They discuss the importance of decarbonizing steel amidst India's rising demand, exploring innovative practices like industrial symbiosis and green investments. The duo highlights concrete steps such as hydrogen pilots, carbon capture, and renewable energy implementation. They also address policy challenges and the need for cost-effective, sustainable solutions in a rapidly evolving economic landscape.

Galen Nelson, Chief Climate Officer at the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, shares his journey in climate innovation. He highlights how MassCEC accelerates clean tech through grants and strategic investments to tackle market failures. Galen discusses exciting projects like low-carbon cement and advanced glazing technologies. The conversation also covers how MassCEC adapts to shifting federal policies and the importance of a unique public-private model in fostering innovation and resilience in the climate sector.

Jonathan Schrag, Deputy Climate Chief for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, joins Climate Rising to discuss how the state is tackling emissions, electrifying infrastructure, and responding to a shifting federal policy landscape. Jonathan shares how Massachusetts’ newly created Climate Office coordinates across agencies—from housing to public health to corrections—to embed climate action into all corners of state government. He discusses the state’s emissions targets, the role of local municipalities in building codes and EV infrastructure, and the growing headwinds from federal rollbacks, tariffs, and canceled clean energy grants. He also reflects on market uncertainty, offshore wind, geothermal pilots, and the promise of small modular nuclear reactors.

Hui Wen Chan, Senior Director of Sustainability at Crusoe and HBS alum, dives into how AI is skyrocketing energy demands and the innovative strategies Crusoe employs to combat this. She discusses using stranded energy, repurposed EV batteries, and advanced cooling technologies to create eco-friendly data centers. Hui highlights the importance of modularity, location-based energy sourcing, and how various clients align climate goals with their computing strategies. She also shares insights from her career path and offers tips for those looking to merge AI with sustainability.

Danielle Rapson, Co-founder and COO of Mantle, shares her journey from HBS to pioneering innovative molten-borate carbon capture technology. She explains how Mantle's approach stands out from traditional methods, particularly its efficiency through high-temperature steam reuse. Danielle discusses their projects in the pulp and paper and oil refining sectors, highlighting the impact of policy incentives like 45Q and Canada’s carbon tax. She also delves into the challenges of scaling carbon capture solutions and the growing interest from industries, particularly oil and gas.

Eric Adamson, Robotics Executive at Oishii and co-founder of Tortuga AgTech, joins Climate Rising to share how automation and AI are transforming fruit farming. Eric explains how his team designed a strawberry-harvesting robot capable of operating in outdoor tunnels and vertical farms, bringing operational efficiency, labor savings, and climate resilience to high-value crops. He discusses why harvest is the hardest—and most impactful—problem in agriculture to automate, what it took to move from lab demo to field-scale deployment, and how they integrated custom robotics and 17 on-device AI models to achieve 97% picking accuracy. Eric also shares his climate thesis on why controlled environments reduce emissions, waste, and chemical use, and how UV-powered robots and environmental buffering help adapt to floods, fungi, and labor volatility. This episode is part of our alumni series, which also features Danielle Colson of Mantel, a carbon-capture climate-tech start-up, and Hui Wen Chan of Crusoe, which uses stranded energy to power AI data centers. Explore the full series at climaterising.org

Brian Marrs, Senior Director of Energy and Carbon Removal at Microsoft, and Greg Adams, CFO of Chestnut Carbon, delve into massive carbon removal strategies. They discuss a groundbreaking 25-year deal aiming to deliver 7 million tons of carbon credits, alongside Microsoft's ambitious carbon-negative goals. Brian shares insights on utilizing the Climate Innovation Fund to foster decarbonized markets. Meanwhile, Greg elaborates on integrating afforestation with private equity to ensure integrity in carbon credits, plus advice for those aspiring to enter the carbon sector.

Ashley Fill, Global Director of Sustainability at P&G Home Care joins Climate Rising to discuss how consumer behavior and innovative technologies can reduce household carbon and water footprints. Ashley shares how life cycle assessments reveal that 87% of the emissions in P&G’s Home Care portfolio come from product use, particularly dishwashing. She describes how their products are engineered to deliver superior performance while reducing water and energy. Ashley also discusses P&G’s partnerships with appliance manufacturers, NGOs, and coalitions like the 50L Home Coalition to encourage sustainable home practices. She reflects on regional water use trends, behavior change challenges, and how P&G ensures credible sustainability claims. Ashley also shares career advice for those entering sustainability roles in consumer goods

ClimateAi co-founder and CEO Himanshu Gupta explains how his company uses machine learning to forecast extreme weather and help businesses adapt to climate volatility. Himanshu shares his journey from rural India to co-founding ClimateAi while he was an MBA student. He describes how ClimateAi's "biophysics-driven AI" combines limited weather and crop yield data to inform procurement, logistics, and planting decisions for a quarter of the top 200 food and beverage companies. He also shares examples of government partnerships focused on food security and national supply chain resilience and offers insight on the future of adaptation technologies and enterprise AI. Finally, Himanshu gives advice to those looking to work at the intersection of AI and resilience in the food and agriculture industry. This episode is a part of our series on Climate Resilience, which also features Sarah Russell, Managing Director at Google X; Jacqueline Novogratz, CEO of Acumen; and Alex Berkowitz, CEO of Coastal Protection Services. Visit climaterising.org to explore the entire series!