Bigger Than Us

Vince Beiser is an award-winning journalist and author of “The World in a Grain: The Story of Sand and How It Transformed Civilization.” The book has been translated into five languages, was a finalist for a PEN America award and a California Book Award, and spawned a TEDx talk. Vince is currently at work on a new book, “Power Metal”, about how the materials we need for digital technology and renewable energy are causing environmental havoc, political upheaval, mayhem and murder—and how we can do better.Vince has reported from over 100 countries, states, provinces, kingdoms, occupied territories, no man’s lands and disaster zones. He has exposed conditions in California’s harshest prisons, trained with troops bound for Iraq, ridden with the first responders to natural disasters, and hunted down other stories from around the world for publications including Wired, The Atlantic, Harper’s, Time, The Guardian, Mother Jones, Playboy, Rolling Stone, The Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times.Vince’s work has been honored by Investigative Reporters and Editors, the Society of Professional Journalists, the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the Columbia, Medill and Missouri Graduate Schools of Journalism, and many other institutions. He has three times been part of a team that won the National Magazine Award for General Excellence, and shared in an Emmy for his work with the PBS TV series SoCal Connected. He is also a grantee of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting.⁠https://vincebeiser.com/⁠⁠https://nexuspmg.com/

Steve Oldham is a prominent entrepreneur and carbon removal advocate. He currently serves as CEO of Captura where he is leading the commercialization of Direct Ocean Capture – a climate solution that combines innovative technology with the natural carbon removal powers of the ocean to remove CO2 from the atmosphere at scale.Steve’s career has focused on bringing ground-breaking technologies to market in a variety of domains, including robotics, aerospace, and climate. Steve was previously CEO of leading Direct Air Capture (DAC) company, Carbon Engineering, where he grew the company from ~15 to ~150 people, and established the partnership with Occidental that led to their acquisition of Carbon Engineering in November 2023.Steve also served as Senior Vice President, Strategic Business Development for MDA, a leading Canadian technology firm. At MDA, Steve held a variety of senior executive positions across Canada and the US, covering General Management, Business Development, and Strategy, and secured financing from Government and commercial sources for a variety of complex technologies, including several large satellite programs.⁠https://capturacorp.com/⁠⁠https://nexuspmg.com/⁠

Riggs Eckelberry is a nationally-renowned entrepreneur who deploys his personal Break To Build™ process to help rebuild the water industry, which has reached a critical breaking point in recent years despite being essential to the planet's survival. As the founding CEO of OriginClear, Riggs has developed innovative solutions to help businesses face rising water bills by tapping into new investment markets. He is even pioneering the development of "water stablecoins,” a cryptocurrency backed by water-assets. With a diverse background in nonprofit management, oceangoing navigation, and technology disruption, Riggs is uniquely qualified to bring change to an outdated and overrun industry. ⁠https://www.originclear.com/⁠⁠https://www.nexuspmg.com/⁠

Curtis has been CEO of Hydrostor since its inception and has led the company through technology development into commercial operations. Prior to Hydrostor, Curtis was Sr. Manager in Deloitte’s Corporate Strategy Consulting Practice where he advised and consulted for some of the top energy companies globally. He has also held positions at nuclear generator Bruce Power and wind developer Environmental Electric Company.⁠https://www.hydrostor.ca/⁠⁠https://nexuspmg.com/

Chief Farming Officer, Co-Founder, Carlo Mondavi is a fourth-generation winegrower who has dedicated his life to permaculture, biodynamic and regenerative farming practices, along with a hands-off winemaking approach in the cellar. In 2016, Carlo founded the Monarch Challenge, an effort focused on elevating farming by eliminating herbicides and powerful chemicals from farms in Sonoma, Napa and beyond. The Monarch Challenge led Carlo to meeting his fellow co-founders; it is the origin and namesake behind Monarch Tractor.⁠https://www.monarchtractor.com/carlo-mondavi⁠⁠https://nexuspmg.com/

Rebecca is the founder and CEO of Glacier, a recycling startup building AI and robotics to help recyclers, brands, governments, and other stakeholders measure and improve recovery rates for their highest-priority recycled commodities. Glacier works with several innovative recyclers across the US, major brands including Amazon, Colgate-Palmolive, Coca-Cola, and AB InBev, and municipal and government agencies including the City of Phoenix and Michigan Department of Environment.Glacier's circularity work has been featured in several leading publications, including CBS, NBC, Fortune, Axios, and TechCrunch.Rebecca is a Waste360 40 Under 40 winner. Prior to founding Glacier, Rebecca was a consultant at Bain & Company and advisor to several early- and growth-stage startups. She is also a mentor for the Google Circular Economy Accelerator.⁠https://endwaste.io/⁠⁠https://nexuspmg.com/⁠

Nick Myers is the co-founder and CEO of Phoenix Tailings, a company building a sustainable future by refining metals from mining waste with zero direct carbon emissions or toxic byproducts.Before founding Phoenix Tailings, Nick worked in Venture Capital at Techstars and was the Director of Finance and Partnerships for Meenta, a medical diagnostic testing startup. He also co-founded Huntington Angels, a strategic angel investment group where he now serves as the lead outside adviser.Nick was also a founding member of Tengu, an early Web3 startup that created one of the first stable coins. At Tengu, Nick briefed the IMF about decentralized finance and cryptocurrencies' impact on the world economy.Nick has a Bachelor's Degree from Saint Michael's College, where he was a starting pitcher for the college's baseball team. He also has an MBA from Northeastern University.⁠https://www.phoenixtailings.com/⁠⁠https://nexuspmg.com/

Sharina Perry is a serial entrepreneur with a long history of starting and growing new ventures. Sharina perfected a patent-pending plastic alternative formulated into compounded plant- based resins using crops farmers plant in regular crop rotations. Utopia PlastixTM helps solve the problem of plastic waste, carbon emissions and promoting agriculture. Utopia's compounded plant resin allows manufacturers to use their current equipment as they produce the sustainable, alternative plastic products that the world is demanding. Sharina founded Utopia Genetics to distribute products made with Utopia Plastix, as well as Utopia Solutions that makes Utopia PlastixTM. Sharina says she invented Utopia PlastixTM to create solutions, not problems.https://utopiaplastix.com/https://www.nexuspmg.com/

Joshua is a certified Data Scientist and the Founder & CEO of SparkCharge. His experience in entrepreneurship and startups spans over 6 years and he is a dynamic figure in the cleantech community. Joshua is also the most recent winner of the world’s largest pitch competition, 43North. Joshua holds a B.A. in Economics and a Masters Degree in Information Management and Data Science from Syracuse University.https://www.sparkcharge.io/https://nexuspmg.com/

Anoosheh Oskouian is the President and Chief Executive Officer of Ship & Shore Environmental, Inc. she directs the corporate strategy for marketing and product development with her team of sales engineers, design engineers, project managers, fabricators, service technicians and other support staff to design, fabricate, install and commission state-of-the-art air pollution abatement equipment.Her reputation in this industry has been proven through the many years of excellent rapport that she has developed with her clients. By studying each application carefully, she understands what data is critical to anticipate their needs for today and in the near future. Each engineering solution is custom designed to not only help a client meet their environmental obligations, but also contemplates how each facility’s unique manufacturing practices and requirements will be integrated into the design and operation of the best pollution abatement solution. Her in-depth process knowledge and expertise provide the foundation for designing superior, innovative, efficient equipment and reliable technologies that help industry to collect and destroy air pollution emissions.For many years she has served, and continues to serve, as an advocate for manufacturers through active participation on several boards and committees i.e. BACT (Best Available Control Technology) committee member for the SCAQMD (South Coast Air Quality District), board member of Western Region SPI (Society of Plastics Industry), Expanded Polystyrene (EPS) group, board member of WPA (Western Plastics Association) and FBF (Film & Bag Federation). Board and committee participation along with planning of meeting agendas and annual conferences has enabled her to develop close relationships among the membership of these trade organizations. As a member of the Society of Plastics Industry she has served on the Public Policy Committee and Environmental Council and has met with legislators and testified at government hearings on behalf of industry.https://shipandshore.com/https://www.nexuspmg.com/