Future of sustainable transportation #76
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📚 Worth Reading
In order to collectively work toward climate goals, we as consumers and organizations have to consider how we consume, how much we consume (e.g., fashion, plastic), how we recycle, and how we get from place A to place B. Of course, that are other major areas such as energy source, conservation, education, etc. What does it take to make transportation more climate friendly? We have seen a lot of moves on EV (electrical vehicle). EV comes with its adoption barriers - supply of batteries, EV charging stations, and price reductions. EV is not and can’t be the only solution. With a new wave of interest in electrification, renewable energy, and hydrogen fuel, cities potentially have more innovation opportunities when it comes to making transportation infrastructure and public transit more climate friendly. This article shows some examples from around the world.
Two days ago, McKinsey has published an analysis on “making sustainability a priority in transport infrastructure.” Governments, policy makers, and private sectors have major responsibilities in determining what the future of transport look like in the next 20+ years. See some of the sustainability dimensions below from the report.
🚀 Funding and Congrats!
Energize Ventures raised a $330 million Fund II which will focus on renewables, mobility, climate tech and a few other categories.
Spudsy, a Los Angeles-based brand that upcycles imperfect sweet potatoes and turns them into plant-based snacks, closed Series A funding.
EnviroScience Consultants, Inc., a New York-based environmental consulting firm received a growth investment from Evolution Capital Partners.
Quincus, a Singapore-based provider of an enterprise class global supply chain management platform, closed an undisclosed Series B fundraise.
💡 Startup Spotlight
Re-Nuble - an MWBE-certified, for-profit social enterprise and agricultural technology company that uses organic cycling science™ technology to transform unrecoverable vegetative food byproducts into a platform of sustainable technologies for indoor farms.
👀 Quick Hits
Animal extinction - one of the most explosive period. Just one data point: “Nearly three billion birds have been lost in North America since 1970, diminishing the pollination of food crops.”
The infrastructure bill and other major spending bills in the U.S. are complex and confusing. Reuters published an analysis that states “language in the bill meant to streamline the federal permitting process could short-circuit key tenets of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), making it more difficult to file and win legal challenges to block projects, critics say.”
Scientists say that the earth is dimming due to climate change.
Scientists say that people under the age of 40 will see more extreme weather events in the future. Recently, CNBC, a major financial news outlet in the U.S., reported that the U.S. government is looking at how climate change will affect personal finances. This relates to impact on short term earnings, retirement savings, and impact of climate changes on overall earnings of an individual.
🎧 Podcast
Nicole Doucet of Open Water: climate-friendly bottled water
Hetal Parekh of EnerYields: financing green building projects
Abby Lyall of Big Idea Ventures: investing in foodtech
The Understory Podcast is also available on SoundCloud, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, and Google Podcasts.
⚙️ Jobs
Find and share your open positions on the Understory Slack channel.
🆕 Director of Innovation at Bidgely
🆕 Multiple VC roles at Revaia
🆕 Senior Software Engineer at Gaiascope
🆕 Climate Change and Sustainability - Manager at EY
🆕 Product Lead, Sustainability at JLL
Regional Sustainability Value Practice Lead at Google
Project Leader/Principal, Climate & Sustainability at BCG
Multiple roles at Sway, seaweed bioplastic company.
Climate and Net Zero Specialist at Citibank
Sustainability Tech Investment Principal at G-Force
Account Manager at Climate Neutral
Multiple Roles at TheRealReal
Vice President of Operations at LimeLoop
Head of Marketing at ZigZag Global
VP / Director of Marketing at Cloverly
Software Engineer at Joulea
Multiple Roles at Patch
Sustainability Communications Specialist - CSR at Thermo Fisher
Director of Sustainability at MassMutual
Head of Sustainability Underwriting at Zurich North America
Senior Product Manager, Re-commerce at REI
Senior Legislative Counsel at Earthjustice
Marketing Associate at Big Idea Ventures
Head of Product, Bus Dev Director, Engineers at Nitricity
Developer roles at Gybe
🗓 Events
October 21: Startups Driving Sustainability - October Showcase (REGISTER NOW!)
October 28-30: Sustainable Fashion Week Atlanta (TICKETS AVAILABLE!)
December 1: Startups Driving Sustainability - December Showcase
📧 Stay in Touch!
You don’t have to wait for our weekly newsletter for all the latest content. Join us on Slack or follow along on LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter to see real-time updates.
And as you plan your week ahead, we challenge you to commit to one sustainable swap. Drop a comment about the one change you will make to be more sustainable, and we will post our favorites to our Saturday #LiveSustainably! series.
Until next week!