February 4, 2020
​
Bloomberg's Energy Award Winners,
Top 10 Energy Predictions,
BlackRock and Climate Risk, &
Science of Forest Bathing 
​
QUICK STAT:

"60% of the trips for the world’s 30+ trillion passenger miles traveled each year are less than 5 miles." 
Barclays
  • However, 70% of these short urban trips still rely on inefficient,
    expensive automobiles. Solutions are are needed. To that end, $174B+ has been invested into mobility technology since 2009, with $27B invested in 2019. (Pitchbook)

NEWS TO KNOW:

Who's investing in these award-winning cleantech companies?
  • For some inspiration, and to stir your competition spirits...Let's look at the list in 2018 and in 2019 for Bloomberg's New Energy Pioneers Awards, which recognize innovators in the clean energy space. Here's a sampling of winners (BURN, Bidgely, Climeon, Greenlots, SaltX, CarbonCure, Metron, Sunfolding, Zero Mass Water) and their investors (Riot Ventures, Koch Industries, Statkraft Ventures, Pangaea Ventures, and BNP Paribas Private Equity). For more about each company or to see other investors, check out my summary here.

BlackRock throwing rocks at climate deniers? 
  • You may have heard of BlackRock, the world's largest financial asset manager. (Though admittedly, it may be confused with The BlackStone Group, world's largest alternative investment firm.) Their recent letter to CEOs states, "Climate change has become a defining factor in companies’ long-term prospects...The evidence on climate risk is compelling investors to reassess core assumptions about modern finance...In the near future – and sooner than most anticipate – there will be a significant reallocation of capital." Hooray for entrepreneurs in companies addressing climate change head on! But wait, hold that confetti. The next key questions are: "When?" and "How?" We've heard "calls to action" for years. It's now time for real action.

Top 10 prediction for 2020 — Energy, Sustainability, Vehicles
  • It's a new year, so it's time to get excited for 12 new world-changing months. That is, unless we succumb to the draining, blocking-and-tackling of the day-to-day grind that overtakes us like so many White Walkers in The Game of Thrones. #FightThePower. In that (blue icy) vein, here are BloombergNEF's top 10 predictions for the year. Examples include: "We expect the global solar market to grow about 14% in 2020 (new installed capacity), to 121-154 GW...Over $5 billion of deals will be announced in 2020 for renewables-plus-storage projects globally...By the end of 2020, there should be 10 million EVs on the road, up from just 1 million in 2015."

The science of forest bathing — This ain't tree hugging 
  • Having lived in Japan for three years, it's easy for me to love their practice of shinrin-yoku, or "forest bathing" (shinrin = “forest,” and yoku = “bath”). But hold up. Before you worry that I've been spending too much in a state with relaxed marijuana laws, let me explain. There is increasing peer-reviewed evidence that these longer, quiet walks in the woods can lead to reduction in blood sugar, adrenaline, and resting pulse, as well as increase levels of dopamine, human natural killer cell activity (fights cancer growth), and serum adiponectin (regulates glucose and fatty acid oxidation). To read more, here's my summary.


December 11, 2019
​
$420M for Cleantech VC,
Energy Storage Investors,
Great Depression in 2030, &
Top 20 Ways to Mitigate Climate Change 
​
QUICK STAT:

In 2030, we expect another Great Depression in the US.  
Per ITR Economics, economic research and consulting firm (est. 1948)
  • When the keynote speaker said this [paraphrased] at a recent Vistage leadership summit, I think I heard the metaphorical tires squealing as the speeding vehicle of growth-minded CEOs hit the mental brakes. What factors contribute to their bold prognostication? Changing US demographics, the costs of health care, US government entitlement programs, inflation, and US debt levels. Here's a blog that explores this prediction, and what entrepreneurs might do about it.

NEWS TO KNOW:

$420M for Cleantech VCs — Now longer a black sheep?
  • First, let's be clear. I'm not talking about the Chris Farley comedy Black Sheep from 1996. (But you should rewatch the trailer here for a 2:20 laugh.) I'm also not talking about the sci-fi horror film Black Sheep from 2006, wherein "genetically altered sheep prey on humans and turn their victims into undead, woolly killers." (But you might also want to watch this 1:55 trailer for looks of bewilderment). Instead, I'm talking about the new cleantech VC funds raised in the last few months: Renewal Funds $145M. ArcTerm Ventures $165M. Clean Energy Ventures $110M. Before all of us entrepreneurs get too excited about sending an email to these groups and receiving a $10M check in the mail (ha!), check out these four things to keep in mind: "Cleantech is back from the dead — Yep, it’s a Halloween leftover."

Energy storage FOMO — And, no, that's not a curse word
Climate change confusion — Top 30 solutions (ranked)
  • If you're like me, your often depressed or confused about what to do about climate change. Enter the book and nonprofit, Project Drawdown. Led by environmental entrepreneur Paul Hawken, this initiative ranks the top 80 climate change mitigation strategies based on their research and expert input. Is it perfect? No. Is it helpful? Yep. This blog and this one explore the rankings. Below are the top 30.
 
  1. Refrigerant Management
  2. Wind Turbines (Onshore)
  3. Reduced Food Waste
  4. Plant-Rich Diet (for humans, as in less meat)
  5. Tropical Forests
  6. Educating Girls
  7. Family Planning
  8. Solar Farms
  9. Silvopasture
  10. Rooftop Solar
  11. Regenerative Agriculture
  12. Temperate Forests
  13. Peatlands
  14. Tropical Staple Trees
  15. Afforestation
  16. Conservation Agriculture
  17. Tree Intercropping
  18. Geothermal
  19. Managed Grazing
  20. Nuclear
  21. Clean Cookstoves
  22. Wind Turbines (Offshore)
  23. ​Farmland Restoration
  24. Improved Rice Cultivation
  25. Concentrated Solar
  26. Electric Vehicles
  27. District Heating
  28. Multistrata Agroforestry
  29. Wave and Tidal
  30. Methane Digesters (Large)

Yale University's most popular course ever — Watch for free
  • One in four Yale students took this course. It made national headlines. And what was the title? "Psychology and the Good Life." What's the subject? Happiness. Why should you care? Because you want to create and lead a team of happier, more productive people. Because you'll have greater talent attraction and retention. Because it's the right thing to do. Here's a link to take the course for free: "The Science of Well-Being." Join the 400,000 who have already enrolled! This is one time where following the heard is the smart thing to do.​


October 29 2019
​
$9B for Solar Companies,
$1T for Carbon Recycling,
5 Jobs in $1T Circular Economy, 
Beating Lithium, & 1M Species Extinction​ 
​
QUICK STAT:

"Over 1,000,000 species now face extinction." 
Per the United Nations and 145 expert authors from 50 countries reviewing about 15,000 scientific and government sources 
  • This includes about 40% of amphibians, 33% of coral reefs, and 33% of all marine mammals. The main causes, in descending order, are: (1) changes in land and sea use, (2) direct exploitation of organisms, (3) climate change, (4) pollution, and (5) invasive species. (link) Ugh...Do these "doom and gloom" stats make you want to "party like it's 1999" while you still can (thanks, Prince), crawl into a fetal position in a dark room, or double down on fightin' the good fight? Perhaps a combination of all three.

NEWS TO KNOW:

MIT update — Long-duration energy storage
  • Here's a great article about the need and targets for non-lithium battery tech. While lithium-ion batteries make up 95%+ of all chemical energy storage deployed today, they can't go beyond a 4-hour discharge. And that won't solve the infamous "duck curve" nor multi-day or multi-month energy storage needed. "To be as cheap, reliable, and flexible as natural gas...battery systems would have to cost less than $10 per kilowatt-hour. Today’s best grid batteries, large lithium-ion systems, cost hundreds of dollars per kilowatt-hour. It could take decades even for that price to drop below $100." But long duration players like Form Energy, which has raised about $50 million in VC, think they can get there much sooner. [Or you could argue that batteries are already outcompeting natural gas as peakers.] But it ain't easy: To see the pitfalls to avoid when scaling storage startups, check out MIT's "Why bad things happen to clean-energy startups” or IronOak's "Energy Storage: 5 Failures, 10 Lessons Learned." Quack, quack, y'all.

Solar corporate funding up 34% — Open up the champagne?
  • This data from Mercom Capital Group (full report) covers venture capital, private equity, public markets, and debt financing around the world. The time period includes the first nine months of 2019 (total = $9 billion) vs. the same period for 2018 (total = $6.7 billion). This encompasses five IPOs, six solar securitization deals worth over $1 billion in aggregate, 57 solar M&A transactions, 15.9 GW of solar projects acquired, 60 investors funding large-scale project development, and $1 billion in VC funding across 88 VC investors. While $9B in 9 months, or $12 billion annualized, is nothing to sneeze at (uh, gross), it's a drop in the bucket relative to the $300+ billion invested in the new clean energy sector each year (Bloomberg NEF), with the majority of that going to new solar and wind project finance. Infrastructure = Scale. Learn more: Solar Industry.

$1 trillion for carbon recycling — Really?
  • Similar to trends in the mainstreaming of fusion investments (Don't believe me? Search for yourself), carbon capture and recycling appears to be moving from the sidelines towards the fairway for energy and infrastructure investors. Here's a report from VC data provider CB Insights on this market, which they deem to be $1 trillion And this is a super summary from Vox's David Roberts on the why, where, and how of carbon capture technologies. Why does it matter? "Even given optimistic assumptions about decarbonization, we’ll probably end up emitting a lot more than our carbon budget [to meet the Paris Agreement goals], so we’ll need to bury between 100 and 200 gigatons of CO2 to get back within it." So, the $10 trillion of investment projected by Bloomberg NEF in solar, wind, and batteries by 2050 is jaw dropping, it is not enough.

Top jobs in circular economy — Valued at, yes, again $1 trillion
  • First, who estimated this gigantic market size? Ellen MacArthur Foundation and, drum roll please, McKinsey & Co. (link) OK, so that's a confidence booster. As for the top jobs, here's the list from Greenbiz: (1) Product and packaging designer, (2) Circular investment specialist, (3) Customer service, beyond purchasing, (4) Reverse logistics manager, and (5) Product lifecycle manager. Examples of private capital funds focused on the circular economy include: Closed Loop Ventures in New York City and Circularity Capital out of Edinburgh, Scotland. As for public capital funds, here's a recent announcement from Blackrock for a $20 million circular economy fund, which is validating, albeit very tiny relative to their $6.8 trillion in total assets under management. I guess a drop in the bucket eventually fills up the bucket. But I'm not sure our natural capital stocks can wait that long.


October 15, 2019
​
$47T for Responsible Banking,
$450M for Non-EVs,
$37M for Energy Storage, &
[Weird] New Investment Sectors 
​
Renewable Energy, Mobility, and Cleantech News

Banks worth $47 trillion sign up for responsible banking
  • Recently, 130 banks, representing about one-third of the global industry, signed on to the United Nations Principles for Responsible Banking. The goal? To align banks' strategies with the Paris Agreement to address climate change, with the UN's 17 broader Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The need? It is estimated that addressing the SDGs could create $12 trillion in business savings and revenue per year, along with 380 million more jobs over the next ten years. Moreover, projections suggest that the world needs $60 trillion of investment from now until 2050 to reach the Paris Agreement. If that sounds like "more money than god," then we better start praying.

$37 million for long-duration energy storage
  • Hydrostor, a developer of Advanced Compressed Air Energy Storage (A-CAES), recently raised the capital from Meridiam, Canoe Financial, ArcTern Ventures, MaRS Catalyst Fund, and others.The company will use the capital to complete construction of a commercial reference facility and advance development on a 2-GW and 16-GWh pipeline in the USA, Canada, Chile, and Australia. Along with $110 million for Energy Vault and $40 million for Form Energy in August, this marks another sign of big money betting on long-duration energy storage in non-lithium solutions. 

$450 million for non-EV solution...compressed natural gas (gasp!)
  • This week, UPS announced it will invest $450 million to add 6,000 vehicles fueled by compressed natural gas (CNG), along with supporting infrastructure, starting in 2020. Now, before you shake your finger at them (like I thought about doing) for not choosing to order [100,000] EVs like Amazon recently did from Rivian, remember this: UPS is the largest transportation user of renewable natural gas (RNG), which comes from landfills, dairy farms, and other bio sources, which reduces life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions by 90% compared with conventional diesel. (Source: Transport Topics). It's unclear what portion of their natural gas use is CNG vs. RNG, but presumably it's mostly the former given the volumes required. Moreover, UPS has invested over $1 billion in the last decade to reduce its GHG emissions. They're not sexy red EVs, but that's some serious capital chasing climate goals on a very large scale. Nothing to scoff at...

Random Stuff
​
Emerging investment sectors: Insect-based food, blockchain real estate, cellular agriculture, and more
  • The investment database Pitchbook has just released a new feature called Emerging Spaces where they highlight up and coming niche investment sectors. Here are few that caught my eye, along with the number of companies and aggregate capital raised in parenthesis => Insect-based foods (118, $21M), carbon capture and removal (34, $2B), energy storage (34, $2.2B), smart grid (31, $691M),  blockchain real estate (80, $1B), lidar for automonoous vehicles (72, $2.3B), sustainable fashion (65, $750M), assistive tech to help those with disabilities (134, $828M), sleep tech (74, $1.1B), cellular agriculture (37, $2.5B), space tourism (21, $7.5B), clean meat (26, $500M), cannabis beverages (53, $306M), and other shocking niches. ​


October 1, 2019
​
100% Carbon-Free by 2050,
$17B for AgTech,
$350B for EV Co, &
Top 50 AI Co's
​
Renewable Energy, Mobility, and Cleantech News

100% Clean! 100% Confusing?
  • A few days ago, Duke Energy and the State of Virginia committed to be 100% carbon-free by 2050, while Unilever reported that 100% of its grid electricity purchases now come from renewable energy. (Thanks to Utility Dive and Environmental Leader.) And on The Interchange podcast, Stephen and Shayle (dear friends to us all) highlighted that over 300 cities, corporates, utilities, and states have pledge 100% renewable energy or 100% carbon-free by 2045 or 2050. So, let's hold hands and sign kum-ba-ya? Not yet. We're still not clear on whether these commitments have "teeth," interim milestones, or timelines that matter relative to our climate-warming trajectory based on historic and current emissions.

$17 billion for agriculture tech: Whoa, horsey!
  • Per Greenbiz and AgFunder, "Agtech venture investments mushroomed more than 40% in 2018 to $17 billion across 1,422 deals." What was once a giant, but boring, industry to tech investors is now increasingly, well, delicious. Why might this matter? About 30% of food is wasted globally (or 40% in the US, because we're #1!). Plus, if food waste were a country, it would be the 3rd largest producer of greenhouse gases, after China and the U.S. (World Resources Institute). 

$350 billion for electric "adventure" vehicles: Amazon goes big 
  • So far, over $1 billion has invested in electric vehicle company, Rivian. But they're just getting revved up, with plans "to launch in 2020 with battery range 400 miles and price below $90,000" (Greentech Media). Importantly, last week, one of its major investors, Amazon, ordered 100,000 electric delivery vans (Verge). How about a little boost to their valuation with a gargantuan order? Now that's what you call a strategic investment.

Random Stuff
​
Top 50 AI Companies: Wait, are they real?
  • Forbes has started producing an annual list on AI, because, well, we all love lists. It's called "AI 50: America’s Most Promising Artificial Intelligence Companies." While exciting, it's like a funny play on words: The most promising companies in the most over-promising sector. But I bite my tongue. Despite the hype vs. reality mismatch so far, these companies are raising serious money at big boy valuations (they are listed at that link), and investors smell opportunity...someday.


​September 16, 2019
​
$55M for flying taxis,
$4B for solar,
$40B for cooking, &
393 $1B unicorns (map)

Renewable Energy, Mobility, and Cleantech News

$55 million for a flying taxi? For real, man
  • Straight out of the Jestons? Kind of. Total capital raised? $93M. And the major investors? The Chinese company that owns Volvo and Lotus, Zhejiang Geely Holding Group. Daimler. Intel. Serious names for sure. With an estimated valuation of $200M+ and plans for commercialization within "3 years," let's hope that humans can get comfortable with autonomous and electric helicopters. What can we say? Traffic jams must be a real pain point. More from TechCrunch and Ingrid Lunden (@ingridlunden). 

$40 billion market: Cooking fuel starting to heat up?
  • (Terrible pun. You're welcome.) Here Bloomberg interviews the CEO of KOKO Networks, which employees 600 people and delivers "non-polluting bioethanol cooking technology" in Africa, lowering costs by 40% relative to charcoal. So, you're thinking..."Africa and biofuels? No way is there a good for-profit, investor-worthy business there." You could be right, but that's what smart business folks said about solar 10+ years ago before it became a trillion-dollar market.

Natural gas plants losers 90% of the time: So says new report
  • Natural gas is super cheap, and the US is the world leader. Yeah! Oh, wait. New analysis from RMI (summarized by Utility Dive) shows that "Clean energy portfolios, defined as an optimized combination of wind, solar, storage and demand-side management, are cheaper than 90% of the 88 gas-fired projects proposed across the U.S." Moreover, natural gas infrastructure is not air tight. A 2018 study shows that leaks were 60% higher than once thought. Given methane's 34x impact on climate change, relative to carbon dioxide, this likely means that natural gas is not the clean bridge fuel that we were once told during our bedtime stories.

Goldman Sachs loves clean power: $4 billion of fresh dolla, dolla, bills ya'll
  • Goldman Sachs Renewable Power has already deployed $1.4 billion into distributed generation solar assets in the U.S. With $1.9 billion of new equity capital, plus debt, they'll have solar developers and asset owners forming a line around the block, seeking a piece of their $4 billion war chest. On a similar note, solar developer Urban Grid recently raised $100 million from Crayhill Capital Management, which is providing bridge capital solutions for solar development portfolios. For now, it looks like the soon-to-decline U.S. Investment Tax Credits and increased reliance on merchant power prices as project revenue are not slowing down investors. (PV Tech)

Random Stuff
​
Do you like unicorns? Map time, my friends.
  • Check out this cool visual of the world's 393 private companies valued at over $1 billion. Thanks, CB Insights. You're my hero.


​July 23, 2019
​
Private Equity & Batteries,
Who's Investing in Storage?
11 Tips for Better Sales Writing,
How to Learn Faster 

​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

ENERGY STORAGE
Private Equity Jumps In:
"Several Hundred Million Dollar" Acquisition
  • Last week, Energy Capital Partners (ECP) acquired Convergent Energy + Power, an energy storage developer with lots of activity up in Ontario, eh. With 300+ early stage battery companies valued at about $6M on average (Angellist), a PE-sized investment in the sector is kind of a big deal. And to have that PE firm be ECP, with $16B+ raised to date, makes it an even bigger validation of the sector. Now...minor detail: Can energy storage infrastructure, with the nascency of its revenue contracts and to-be-tested performance and warranties over the long term, deliver PE-style financial returns? -- Source: Utility Dive (HJ Mai)

ENERGY STORAGE
Who's Investing?
Names and Lessons Learned
  • Who's leading the way so far in this trend towards $620B invested in the battery sector by 2040 (Bloomberg)? In my recent article at Renewable Energy World, I highlight sample investors in various battery categories: M&A, flow, long duration (non-flow), solid state, and Chinese companies. I also list six lessons learned from past battery failures. After reading it, let's see if you're a glass half full or half empty kind of person. Anybody feel like "going after Moby Dick in a rowboat and taking the tartar sauce with you?” (Zig Ziglar) 
​
PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
SALES
11 Tips for Writing Better: 
Your Headline is Everything
  • If you want people to read your emails, blogs, reports, or podcast notes, instead of yawning and moving on, then this short article is worth a scan (Allison Davis via Inc.com). Consider a quote from the advertising guru David Ogilvy: "Five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy...[so]...unless your headline sells your product, you have wasted 90% of your [time, money]." ​

LEARNING NEW STUFF
And the Award for Coolest Dude in the World Goes to...
Josh Waitzkin
  • Before you read on, first stand up, take the "Superman/woman" pose, and inhale deeply. OK, now prepare to feel inadequate. This guy is an "8-time US National Chess Champion, a 2-time World Champion in Tai Chi Chuan Push Hands, the 1st Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Black Belt under 9-time World Champion Marcelo Garcia," as well as a father and husband. I mention him because of the title of his interview on the Tim Ferriss Show: How to Cram 2 Months of Learning into 1 Day. Since we're falling behind if we're not learning something new, perhaps give it a listen on your vacation drive this summer.


​July 9, 2019
​
2 GW of Coal to Close,
Battery Unicorn,
Revenue Royalty Notes, &
Summer Fridays Good for Business
​

​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

ENERGY STORAGE
New Lithium Tech Becomes a Unicorn:
Former Tesla Employee #7 Drives Company to $1 Billion Valuation
  • Off of most people's radars, Sila Nanotechnologies uses silicon instead of graphite to boost battery density by 20%. They've raised about $300M to date with their April 2019 Series E of $170M led by Daimler, along with investors such as Sutter Hill Ventures, Matrix Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners, and Next47 (Source: Pitchbook). For more, here's a great headline about the team and tech from Inc. — "This Company's Magic Powder Makes Your Phone Run Longer." Or check out an interview with the founder from the good folks at Powerhouse. Now finally, close your eyes and picture a battery transforming into a rainbow-colored unicorn. [Apparently, I'm exposed to too many fantasy stories with my seven-year-old daughter.]
 
COAL
Major Plant Shutdowns by End of Year:
Equal to 1/23rd of Illinois Peak Power Capacity
  • The Illinois Pollution Control Board (IPCB) recently issued two decisions that will force Vistra, an NRG subsidiary, to close 2 GW of coal power plants within about six months. The ruling was based on factors relating to air pollution, water pollution, and climate change. Along similar lines, Bloomberg projects that coal's portion of the global power mix will fall from 37% today to 12% in 2050. As a boy from Kentucky, I know what coal means to small towns. But maybe it's time to ramp up training and change policy to support solar jobs there instead.
​
PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
ALTERNATIVE FINANCE STRUCTURES
Revenue Royalty Notes: 
Can't Pick Between Equity and Debt? Try a Mix
  • If you’re an investor that likes the predictability of debt (check), but loves the upside potential of equity investments (yep), then Revenue Royalty Notes might be worth exploring. Why might investors like Royalty Notes? (1) Higher current income expected relative to most debt products, (2) More equity-like IRR potential, (3) about 1-8% of revenue (not profit) paid to you monthly or quarterly, (4) Less uncertainty and more seniority than equity investments, and more. Entrepreneurs, with profitable businesses, also like them for these reasons: (1) Alignment of incentives — “If I do better, then you do, too (at the same time)," (2) No pressure to meet fixed debt payment schedules — “It’s easier for me to predict my success in terms of years, not months,” (3) Capped upside for investors — “If I succeed, then I am thrilled to pay you more than senior debt would earn, but I’m happy to keep more of the upside,” and more. To dig deeper, check out my blog: Royalty Notes: A Debt + Equity Fusion?
 
VACATION
Summer Fridays (Off) — More than Cold Beer:
Can Downtime Improve Work time?
  • If you're an employee, the answer is clearly, "Hell, yes!" If you're an entrepreneur, you (we) are probably tempted to just keep pushing ahead with no breaks because our timeline is "yesterday." If you're an investor or business owner, you may be skeptical — "How do my teams get more done if they work less in the summer?" This Forbes article explains some of the benefits: Increased morale, Stronger trust, Higher retention, More loyalty, Greater productivity. Sound like an experiment worth trying?


​June 18, 2019
​
Big Oil's Cleantech Investments,
Solar Transaction Platform Financed,
Decision Fatigue, &
Free Text-to-Audio App
​

​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

BIG OIL
Conventional Energy Majors Investing in Clean Energy:
Are They For Real This Time?
  • Consider this quote from a Goldman Sachs natural resource executive: “I’ve probably spent more time talking with oil company executives about the energy shift and renewables in the last 2 years than the previous 23 put together.” Curious yet? In my recent blog, To Be Bearish or Bullish: Big Oil & Gas Investing Billions in New Energies, I cover (1) investments of the top four companies putting their money where their mouth is, (2) reasons that this time is different than the same trend 10+ years ago, (3) who the winners and losers might be whether you're an investor or entrepreneur, and (4) how to convert gasoline into high grade cobalt in your backyard. (Pop quiz: Which one of those statements doesn't belong?) 
 
SOLAR FINANCE
Why Small Size Matters:
The Sleeping Giant of Commercial & Industrial (C&I) Aggregation
  • C&I solar consumption should be easy "like a mutual fund or bond purchase," according to LevelTen, a renewable energy aggregation and transaction platform, which raised $20M in its Series B last week. With over $1B in renewables processed for Fortune 500 companies, they are charting a path much different than the historical "large project + large utility buyer model." The key seems to be software (vs. high legal fees), transparency (vs. opaque bilateral agreements), and customization (e.g., project risk, price, location). Sounds like a recipe for success in other niche plays, too. -- Source: Greentech Media (Emma Foehringer Merchant)
​
PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
BETTER DECISION MAKING
We Think Too Much: 
Infographic for Managing 36,000 Decisions per Day
  • Research says that we make 10,000 to 40,000 decisions each day. (I must be asleep at the wheel because I'm unaware of 95% of them.) That excess leads to a decrease in critical thinking. Our brains are simultaneously exhausted while being asked to run never ending sprints. This infographic from HubSpot and Mint provides 9 tips for getting a handle on decision fatigue. My tip #10 would be this: Be boring. Wear the same clothes and eat the same foods more often. Relish in routine so you have bandwidth for the few exciting (big) decisions.
 
LIFE CHANGING APP
Text-to-Speech Magic:
Addressing Dyslexia, ADD, ADHD, or Time Management with "Speechify"
  • You gotta watch this video of Speechify's founder telling his story. Challenged by his own dyslexia, he taught himself to code and built his own app to convert any text online into the voice -- sped up or normal speed -- of an American, British, male, female, or Dothraki. (I exaggerate slightly.) I want the kind of testimonials he gets: "It's only been five minutes [using your app], but I think I love you." Powered by AI and a 20-something who cares about building something that matters to millions. This is the kind of entrepreneurship I want to teach the next generation.​


​June 4, 2019

$18 Trillion in Value from Sensors?,
Solar Roofs (not Tesla),
Digital Minimalism, &
"I Will Teach You To Be Rich" Book
​

​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

INTERNET OF THINGS
Low Cost Sensors:
High Value Solutions
  • According to the World Economic Forum, there is $18 trillion of value to unlock in the "industrial sector by applying industrial technologies." One way to to do that is with more and better sensors, plus systems to make sense of all that new data. (Insert obvious slap on the forehead.) In the words of Uptake Technologies' President, most "industries are data-rich and insight-poor...with less than 1% of data being used...One customer prospect is installing 120,000 sensors, but they don't use any of the data from 30,000 existing sensors today." His company uses machine learning and predictive analytics to manage maintenance on things like locomotives. (Probably not what you were thinking.) So, here's a fun follow up question: What "boring" industry [that most professionals ignore] is the next sleeping giant ready to be awakened with cheap sensors and new analytical abilities?  | Source: BloombergNEF (Richard Stubbe)
 
SOLAR ROOFS
Watch Out Tesla:
A Big A** Roofing Giant Likes Solar Shingles, Too
  • There is no doubt: Tesla is a marketing machine and a real visionary. And when Elon announced their solar shingles in late 2016, homeowners and solar players were in awe. "When can I get them? Oh, but how much do they cost? Wait, it's 2019, where is the product?" Enter Standard Industries — the world’s [largest] roofing manufacturer — and its subsidiary GAF, with "certified roofing contractors in all 50 states, installing 1.5 million roofs each year." With customer acquisition costs being the most expensive portion of a residential solar, GAF expects to crush this line item by gaining customers that are already seeking them out for a new roof. Could a GAF colony on Mars be next? Lots of roofs, I'm sure...  | Source: Greentech Media (Emma Foehringer Merchant)
​
PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
PERSONAL FINANCE
Book Worth Reading: 
"I Will Teach You To Be Rich"
  • I know, I know. It sounds like overpromising. Or maybe super cheesy. But the author, Ramit Sethi, is an in-your-face, contrarian who writes about personal finance for those of us in our twenties, thirties, and forties. He argues for spending plenty of cash on things you love ("Gasp," says this son of a CPA!), and instead of eating sauce-less spaghetti to save money (#FriendinCollege), it's better to find new ways to earn more money (and create value for more customers) as the path to "financial freedom." In this podcast with Tim Ferris, Ramit talks about his recently released updated version of his NYT bestseller I Will Teach You To Be Rich, including ways to automate your finances and other topics to geek out on. Needles to say, this will be my favorite gift for cousins in their 20's as they graduate from college and enter the real world. ("Oh thanks, Chris, I...uh...really love this book on finance. Yeah. You sure are the funnest cousin!)
 
TIME MANAGEMENT
How to Live Well in a High Tech World:
By Using Less Technology
  • Wise words taken from the page of author Cal Newport. After his thought provoking book on focused work without distractions, Deep Work, he's back with a new one: Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World. Quotes about the book: "You’re not the user, you’re the product. Hang up, log off, and tune in to a different way to be in the world." - Seth Godin. “Newport is making a bid to be the Marie Kondo of technology: Someone with an actual plan for helping you realize the digital pursuits that do, and don’t, bring value to your life.” - Ezra Klein (Vox Founder). I'd normally encourage you to check him out on social media, but as a digital minimalist, he's not there.


May 23, 2019

Defining Impact Investment,
Utilities + DERs Love/Hate Tango,
Privilege vs. Burden,
​& Parkinson's Law of Efficiency
​

​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

IMPACT INVESTING
What does it really mean anyway?
ESG vs. SRI vs. Impact vs. Treehugging
  • I recently moderated a conference panel on impact investing, and realized that even savvy folks steeped in clean energy or sustainability or finance don't agree on the definitions for this sector, which is simultaneously a meaningless buzzword and an investment trend that is not going away. Here's a blog I wrote to explore 5 ways to define it, and to discuss research on whether ESG or impact investing requires a sacrifice in financial returns (spoiler alert: No) -- Impact Investing: What does it really mean anyway? 
 
DERs (Distributed Energy Resources)
Should utilities hate or love these "little" players?
Acquire, partner, or be disrupted
  • The mainstreaming of 5 types of DERs -- distributed solar, combined heat and power, smart thermostats, electric vehicles, and battery storage -- could squash power demand by the early 2020s, according to GTM Research from last year. (Wait, hasn't that already happened?) In this great article from Utility Dive (Herman Trabish), Boston Consulting Group explores the pros and cons for utilities' choices to buy, hire, or be beaten down by DER providers in the years ahead. Per Raj Prabhu, CEO of Mercom, "For utilities who see themselves as behind the curve, M&A might be a faster way to catch up [than pilots]." And for DER providers, an exit to a utility can be appealing due to synergies that go beyond just the buyers' financial returns.

​
PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
REFRAMING
"Get to" vs. "Have to": 
The Difference is Bigger than You Might Think
  • Blogger, entrepreneur, and author Seth Godin highlights this unconscious choice we make in a recent post. Do we "have to" go to work? Or do we "get to" go to work doing things we love that matter to us, our kids, and our community? I catch myself saying the former to my kids sometimes, and try to remind myself that being an investment banker and professor focused on clean energy finance, corporate sustainability strategy, and green real estate is a privilege, not a burden. (Though working at night sometimes while the rest of the family plays can less than awesome.) So, what words do you use? As entrepreneur and writer Derek Sivers puts it: "If you're answer is not, 'Hell yes!,' then it should be, 'No.'"  
 
TIME EFFICIENCY
Parkinson's Law:
Why Constraints are Important in Getting S**t Done
  • Coined by British historian Cyril Northcote Parkinson in the 1950's, this law of human nature (?) goes like this: "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." If you allot one week for a task, then it takes one week. If you, instead, allow only two days, it often gets done in this much shorter time period. Here's a good summary of how to put this law into practice personally and professionally, from a smart young Malaysian blogger, Dean Yeong.  ​​



April 16, 2019

5G & Autonomous Vehicles,
Home Batteries & Big Boy Pants,
​Happiness Project, &
Top Podcasts of 2019


​​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

TRANSPORTATION TECH
5G Big Deal for Autonomous Vehicles (AV):
Boost Safety and Functionality 
  • Most AV processing power today is actually within the vehicles, but in the future it could be in that magical "cloud," allowing for AVs to talk to each other and coordinate for reducing traffic congestion. Here's the gist: AV reaction time with 4G vs. 5G: 26 vs. 10 milliseconds. So, a 61% reduction. That means smarter AVs could make crucial last minute decisions to, say, avoid hitting the pedestrian that crossed the road while staring at their Facebook feed. This is not just great for that one person, but also for the whole industry. The perhaps unfair spotlight of attention on AVs is a indeed a giant spotlight on steriods. The AV rollout needs to be near perfect because mistakes make for great clickbait, according to some journalists and general haters of change. That said, the ramifications of "Oh wait, the network is down" would become much more than an inconvenience.   | Source: Greenbiz (Katie Fehrenbacher)
 
HOME ENERGY STORAGE
A Record-Breaking Year:
Residential Batteries More Than a "Toy"
  • Today home batteries are purchased for backup power, energy arbitrage, and solar PV self-consumption. (Oh yeah, and for eco- bragging rights, too.)  But this market is on a rocket ship from niche to mainstream. In Q3 last year, more battery capacity was installed in the residential sector than either the commercial or utility scale sectors. Bigger picture: Experts suggest that by 2021, 50% of all US battery capacity additions will come from behind-the-meter, customer-sited installations. Plus, FERC 841, which will let batteries participate in wholesale energy markets, thus finding new sources of revenue to improve battery ROI, will begin going into effect this year. | Source: Energy Storage News (Andy Colthorpe)

​
PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
HAPPINESS
Can Being Happy Be a Year-Long, Measurable Project?
This Author Sold 2 Million Copies Describing Just That
  • I've just finished reading The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. While it sounds like a gimmick, I found it to be full of practical advice and tips, especially if you like to measure things. For example, research suggests that a hug lasting more than six seconds starts to release oxytocin, also known as the "love hormone," which has been shown to boost trust, mitigate depression, and reduce stress hormones cortisol and norepinephrine. (So, yes I'm advocating for counting while hugging your loved ones.) Or in another example, she describes Benjamin Franklin's daily happiness practice as the most important thing she discovered in her 365 days of research and experimentation. "He identified 13 virtues he wanted to cultivate, then made himself a chart with those virtues plotted against the days of the week. Each day, he’d score himself on whether he lived up to his goals." If you like spreadsheets, well...Super Type A meets the softer self development world. So, tag, you're it.
 
PODCASTS
Top Choices for 2019:
Transform "Lost Time" to "Learning Time"



March 19, 2019

5 Energy Storage Failures (and 10 Lessons),
Solar Bubble ,
27,000 New Skills, &
Best Business Books of 2018


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

ENERGY STORAGE
5 Battery Company Failures:
10 Lessons to Learn 
SOLAR FINANCE
Are We in a Utility-Scale Bubble?
Lots of Capital is "Chasing the Car"
  • And as the Southern saying goes, sometimes that dog catches the car, and it doesn't end well for the dog. [Disclaimer: The dog is purely an analogy. We love investors who in no way resemble canines.] This article by Greentech Media (Emma Foehringer Merchant) explores the unpopular possibility of overpriced utility-scale solar projects. Consider this: The yields on big renewable energy projects continue to fall as more and more capital seeks to invest in these projects. Today we're maybe at 5% to 9% unlevered IRRs depending on the size, risk, geography, and offtaker. At the same time, interest rates are rising. At some point, the spread between risk-free returns and project finance returns may not be enough to merit the risk, however small it is.

​
​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
LEARNING NEW STUFF
27,000 Skills: 
Pandora's Box of New Online Short Classes
  • If you or your kids are bored or unchallenged at work or school, here's a solution: Sign up at Skillshare to pick from 27,000 new skills to choose from, with over 4 million students learning for the cost of a few lattes. Or for that matter, check out 9 other companies with similar micro-classes, such as Udemy or Coursera. I've both created courses and signed up for them. Now it's my kids' turn to do the same. (Or no allowance.)
 
BOOKS
Need New Tools or Some Inspiration?
The Best Business Books of 2018



February 5, 2019

Cleantech Startup Funding,
NREL on storage ROI,
Altruism vs. Genes, &
Zen Tidying


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

CLEANTECH FUNDING
Where's All the Money?
VC vs. Strategic vs. Accelerator
  • Pardon the interruption: The funeral for cleantech investing has been interrupted by...[insert the cacophony of clanging cymbals and off-tone Peruvian pan flute]...energy storage, strategic investors, breakoff VC startups, and accelerators. Shout outs to Total, Shell, Wells Fargo, Congruent Ventures, Greentown Labs, Elemental Excelerator, Powerhouse, and many others. Check out the two graphs below from Wood McKenzie and the Brookings Institution. Check out this supporting graph to make the point.  | Source: Greentech Media (Eric Wesoff)
 
ENERGY STORAGE 
Positive Battery ROI for 5 Million Businesses:
NREL report
  • Batteries are expected to receive $620B of investment between now and 2040, according to Bloomberg. But, as William Gibson said, "The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed." The map below gives an indication of this uneven battery profitability for commercial and industrial customers, assuming that demand charge reduction is the main value driver. Check out this map of the US to see where the opportunities are.  | Source: National Renewable Energy Laboratory

​
​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
DOING THE RIGHT THING
Why Some are Altruistic: 
Is Kindness a Choice or a Biological Determination?
  • This TED Radio Hour, called "Wired for Altruism" on NPR, explores the drivers for kindness, and the takeaways are both depressing and inspiring. Consider these nuggets: A key difference between extreme altruists and psychopaths is the size and performance of their amygdala, two almond-shaped parts of a brain's temporal lobes. (Did we have a choice in the size of our brainy parts?) And 50% of our behavior is determined by our physiology. (Am I inherently flawed?) But humankind's concern for the welfare of strangers across the city or around the world is perhaps higher than ever before. Here is a transcript of this radio interview with Abigail Marsh, a professor of psychology and neuroscience.
 
CREATING ORDER
From the Shakers to the Japanese:
"Cleanliness as Godliness"
  • In case you haven't been to a thrift store this month to ask why there's a dramatic increase in donations, I'll tell you. It's because of the new Netflix show "Tidying Up with Marie Kondo." I'm not making this up (story about the correlation). Actually, we've gotten the same deep organizing inspiration in my own home. Responding to my joy in this process, our 13-year-old boy says, "Dad, that's kind of depressing." As in, "Dad, can I show you some real reasons to be excited — duh, basketball, fishing, ice cream, Sci-Fi books." From another commentator on this trend: Maybe it would be better if we just bought less to begin with, instead of having to put dozens of bags of stuff into the trash or the give-away pile.​



January 15, 2019

​5 Transportation Tech Trends,
Record Low Solar+Storage Prices,
AI Trends in 2019, &
Warren Buffett on "Saying No"


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

TRANSPORTATION TECH
5 Trends for 2019:
"Shifting Techtonic Plates"
  • Told in series of short videos, this article talks about today's "once-in-a-lifetime" moment of disrupting mobility with the confluence of EV mainstreaming, the inevitability of AV (autonomous vehicles), high tech connectivity, ride sharing, predicting the future (potholes), and riding on stainless steel robotic versions of Daenerys's Game of Thrones dragons. Who's ready to give up the car? (I exaggerate slightly.)   | Source: Greenbiz (Katie Fehrenbacher)
 
SOLAR+STORAGE
Record Low Prices:
But We Need to Move to Hawaii
  • Seven solar+storage PPAs, with prices from 8-12 c/kWh, now await approval by Hawaii's public utility commission. These are lower than the current 15 c/kWh power from conventional energy, per Hawaiian Electric Company. Plus, these new prices represent a 42% decrease for solar+storage since 2016. If approved, the 262 megawatts of solar and 1,048 megawatt-hours of storage capacity would double the entire U.S. installed base for solar+storage. The red carpet is being laid for dispatchable renewable energy on scale   | Source: Greentech Media (Emma Foehringer Merchant)
​

​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
FOCUS 
"Saying No" is the Most Important Thing: 
Per Warren Buffett
  • This is great, and painfully difficult, advice. In this AMAZING article -- the best 12 minutes you'll "spend" today -- we see Buffett's 3-step approach to getting focused. In essence, "20% of our priorities typically account for 80% of our results," so convert most of your "goals" into an "avoid at all cost" list. Salient quote: "Behind Buffett’s jovial demeanor is the most stone-cold, ruthless prioritizer (in a good way) in the world." Can I get an amen!   | Source: Accelerated Intelligence (Michael Simmons)
 
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI)
$15.7 Trillion to the 2030 Economy:
6 Trends from PwC
  • The world's most popular smart-sounding acronym (followed in close second place by IoT) may be more than just hype. Of the 1,000 companies surveyed by PwC, all currently implementing AI at some level, 20% expect to use AI enterprise-wide this year. Of the six trends highlighted in the article, here are two related and scary headers: "Data: Locate and label to teach the machines" and "Trust: Make AI responsible in all its dimensions." Hopefully, we ensure trust before we teach them too much. I machine learning is "AI that is working in the world today," then I want to know what it's learning.   | Source: PwC



January 8, 2019

​​3 Utility Trends for 2019, 
Most Popular Stories from 2018,
Zen Monastery Living, &
Billionaire Howard Marks


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

30,000 FOOT VIEW
3 Trends to Watch:
Energy Transformation 2019
  • There's nothing like a New Year to generate oodles of lists. In that tradition, here are a few megatrends to watch in the power sector: (1) Forget federal clean energy policy. Instead, watch as more states set headline-grabbing policies for low carbon. Peer pressure, here we come. (2) Utilities will reconsider load growth planning. No more ignoring storage, solar, demand response, or non-wires alternatives in favor of building big power plants. Watch out, Goliath. David is growing up. (3) Smart, cost effective energy storage will break out, with the 2019 U.S. market expected to reach almost $1B, up about 2x from 2018. | Source: Greentech Media (Julian Spector)
 
TOP 10 STORIES
Most Popular Articles on Clean Economy:
#Greenbiz
  • In case you're too busy with your many New Year's resolutions, Greenbiz has curated 10 clean economy stories worth reading from 2018. Topics include the "top 30 under 30" innovators in green business, predictions that natural gas will putter out on its trajectory of world dominance, solutions to the global 1.6 billions tons of annual food waste, and big commitments to the circular economy so that sharks, not plastics, remain our biggest fear when swimming in oceans. | Source: Greenbiz (Holly Secon)
​

​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
INVESTING 
Insights from Billionaire Investor Howard Marks: 
New Book, Podcast
  • During last week's one-day, New Year's marathon trip to the beach with three sleepy kids (#NotZen), I listened to James Altucher's podcast about Howard Marks' new book Mastering the Market Cycle: Getting the Odds on Your Side. Named one of the Best Business Books of 2018 by Business Insider, this Co-Chairman of Oaktree Capital Management ($120B in assets under management) talks largely about understanding psychology as a key to earning strong financial returns in various market cycles. So if you ever doubted the benefits of those psychology degrees or soft, squishy, non-Excel skills, you might want to think again.
 
ZEN READING
Surprise, Zen Might Not Be So Zen:
1 Year in a Japanese Monastery
  • Over the holiday, I read Eat Sleep Sit: My Year at Japan's Most Rigorous Zen Temple by Kaoru Nonomura. It is his firsthand account of living at the preeminent Japanese Buddhist training center, Eiheiji. If you thought Zen was all about peace and tranquility, then the severity of their diet, punishment, schedule, and training will shock you. Many trainees developed beriberi, an ailment resulting from insufficient vitamin B1. #QuestionYourAssumptions  As a guy who has studied in three monasteries, I think I'll pass on this one. That said, it's a great read, with plenty of food for thought, such as this one: "Think of the mind of a fish that swims in a small pool." Deep, man. So deep. [insert stereotypical herbed-up surfer voice]​



December 18, 2018

​​Smart Transportation, 
Private Equity Term Sheets, &
"Hamilton Grit"


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

TRANSPORTATION INNOVATION
Scooters, EVs, Autonomous, Oh My!
Challenges Brewing for Single-Driver Vehicles
  • OK, raise your hand if you think driving is a waste of time, money, land, and fuel, while also occasionally dangerous. (Text and drive much?) I'm actually raising both of my hands now (but I'm not driving). Look, I agree that driving can be fun sometimes: A 3-week family road trip in Arizona (check), circling Iceland's ring road (check), heading into deep wilderness for backpacking (check). But for day-to-day transport, I would gladly hand over my keys if convenience and costs were non-issues. I like the way Lyft's CEO puts it, "Eventually, the majority of miles traveled in the United States will be on a network like Lyft. You’ll be subscribing to a Lyft transportation plan similar to how you have a music program, maybe Spotify, or a minutes plan like you have on AT&T or Verizon." (But hopefully with WAY better customer service.) Based on CB Insights' recent report -- "Disrupting The Car: How Shared Cars, Bikes, & Scooters Are Reshaping Transportation And Cannibalizing Car Ownership" -- it seems that the roadway is being paved for that kind of future. (Yep, awful puns.) 
 
MICRO TRANSPORTATION
eScooters Worth Billions:
Silly or Stupendous?
  • Recently, I wrote about how investing in scooter companies worth billions of dollars was, uh, kind of wacky. I mean, many cities hate them, they're sometimes deemed to be illegal, the business plans seems to lack any IP or real barriers to entry, and the tech (electric scooters) seems cool but not revolutionary. (By the way, that sounds like a certain transportation company starting with a "U".) However, with recent Wall Street Journal reports of Uber's potential value at $120B, combined with the fact that most US trips occur within 0-5 miles, it may be time to reconsider my initial dismissals. [Cringe.]
​

​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
PRIVATE EQUITY
Term Sheets: 
Typical Terms and Conditions 
GRIT
The 7-Year "Overnight Success":
The Hamilton Story
  • Sometimes lessons come from the most surprising places. My son is currently practicing a speech -- out loud, over and over -- about Lin-Manuel Miranda, author of the Grammy-, Tony Award-, and Pulitzer Prize-winning Broadway blockbuster Hamilton. Fun fact: It took him seven years to write the play. And today, it's an explosive success, combining two shockingly different cultures (wig-wearing white folks + funky rap). Plus, this artist's net worth is now estimated at $40M. So, if you're still waiting for that big win...Just keep working and waiting longer. Heck, maybe you should even be singing along the way.



December 5, 2018

$240M for EV Chargers,
620B for Energy Storage,
Giving Tuesday. vs. Cyber Monday, &
2-hour Job Search


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

EV CHARGING
ChargePoint Raises $240M:
57,000 EV Chargers Globally
  • ChargePoint has raised over $500M since its founding in 2007. The latest round was a Series H, and 18 months ago their Series G added $125M. (Gulp) This year, competitors such as Volta raised $35M from GE Ventures, Invenergy, and others, while Ample raised $31M from Shell Ventures and others. This is all very exciting; maybe it's time for the champagne. However...The implied exit valuation needed to achieve the high equity multiple return expectations of VC investors make me want to find some anti-stress herbs. (The Chinese kind...what kind were you thinking?) Plus, many utilities, motivated by the increased revenue they'd see, want to invest and own EV charging themselves -- $700M+ example here (Greenbiz).With their cost of capital being far lower than VC firms, one might conjure up the image of Goliath trying to sit on top of David. | Source: VentureBeat (Paul Sawers)
 
ENERGY STORAGE INVESTMENT
Battery Sector to See $620B by 2040:
Bloomberg Sees Big Growth
  • That's $620B of new investment over the next 22 years, globally. That's nothing to sneeze at. This is partly driven by their expectations that large-scale lithium-ion storage costs fall another 52% by 2030, on top of their 79%+ cost decline since 2010. The problem is that today, most batteries only get paid for 1-2 types of benefits they create, yet they are capable of up to 13 benefits (see graphic from RMI). When more of these revenue sources can be realized, we are likely to see the pace of this $620B really take off. |Source: Bloomberg NEF (Veronika Henze)
​

​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
OUR SPENDING PRIORITIES
Cyber Monday vs. Giving Tuesday: 
Which Won?
  • Nothing says America like newly concocted holidays. (How about Jan. 1, National Hangover Day, or Jan. 3, National Fruitcake Toss Day?) I'll give you one guess re: which holiday took in more money last week...The loser took in just 5% as much as the winner. Americans spent $7.9B on Cyber Monday, but gave just $380M on Giving Tuesday. As they say, Christmas is the giving season. Skepticism aside, charitable giving in the U.S. reached an all-time high last year at $410B.  |  Sources: Fast Company (Ben Paynter)  |  CNET (Ben Fox Rubin, Carrie Mihalcik)
 
JOB HUNTING
The "Two Hour" Job Search:
Tips to Boost Your Odds of Success
  • Outside of IronOak, my work as a professor at UNC and Duke University gives me a chance to talk about career paths a lot. One of my most frequent recommendations is this book from fellow Duke colleague Steve Dalton: The 2-Hour Job Search. If you're a frequent reader of the newsletter, you'll see a theme: My other love is the 4-Hour Work Week. Both are, let's say, indicative vs. literal. Here's a blog about how it works. [Guidance for] a new job could be a great Christmas gift.



October 9, 2018

C&I Solar Fragmentation,
Home Storage ROI,
7 Questions for Evaluating Companies, &
Impossible Meat


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

SOLAR
Don't Believe the Hype:
Solar is Alive and Poised for Growth  
ENERGY STORAGE 
Residential Sector > Utility Sector:
You Thought Bigger was Always Better
  • New Q2 2018 data is in from GTM Research: Residential MW of energy storage exceeded big utility scale installs. Surprising, but the latter is pretty lumpy, with a much larger pipeline. Still, the meteoric growth in behind-the-meter battery installs ain't nothing to sneeze at. They made up 75% of Q2 capacity. For more on energy storage finance, check out our primer here. | Source -- Energy Storage News (Andy Calthorpe)​

​
​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
PRODUCTIVITY
Want to Get More Done Tomorrow? 
21 Apps for Business 
  • If you spent the Labor Day weekend thinking, "How do I accomplish more each day?" -- then you might need help. Or a reconsideration of the quote at the start of this newsletter (less = more). In any case, here are 21 apps to help you get an external brain (Evernote), manage projects visually (Trello), accept payments (Square), keep track of your peeps (Insightly), track time (Toggl), and get a full-body deep tissue massage after every long day. I exaggerate slightly, but I can dream.  |  Source -- The Simple Dollar (Saundra Latham)
 
TAKING A RISK
Nike Takes a Stand:
Or is it a Kneel
  • You might recall stories from months ago about Colin Kaepernick, an NFL quarterback who (respectfully) took a knee to ironically take a stand against police brutality. And then was arguably blacklisted by the league. (Despite the political spin, this was never about disrespect to the U.S. flag. #DontBeFooled) And now Nike is putting their values out front, despite some haters on Twitter -- "Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything." #JustDoIt  By the way, it appears to be a good business decision, too. Perhaps $43M of media exposure so far.  |  Source -- Bloomberg (Eben Novy-Williams)



September 18, 2018

Bloomberg on Transportation Electrification,
Tracking US Climate Goals,
Power of Subconscious, &
3 Billion New Consumers


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

CLIMATE CHANGE POLICY
Cities and States Leading the Way:
Achieving Majority of 2025 Targets 
  • A new report led by California Gov. Jerry Brown and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg shows that we might not all be doomed to a future of dangerous wildfires and record hurricanes. (Slight exaggeration, but that describes my last 30 days. Thank you, Oregon and North Carolina.) Entitled "Fulfilling America’s Pledge: by the America’s Pledge initiative," analysis shows that activity outside of the federal government is expected to cut emissions by 17% below 2005 levels by 2025, about 63% of the way to the goals of 26-28%. | Source: Smart Cities Dive (Chris Teale)
 
SMART TRANSPORTATION
It's Electrifying:
Increasing Agreement on Significant Disruption
  • Electric vehicles on on the rise: 1M sold by 2016, 4M on the road now, and the next 1M are expected to rev up by Q1 2019. Rabid environmentalists like EIA, BP, and OPEC have revised their future projections for EV sales upward by 5.5x, 2.9x, and 5.5x respectively. (Yep, sarcasm.) Expect similar innovation in trucking, shipping, and flying. (Jetsons, here we come?) | Source: Bloomberg New Energy Finance (Michael Liebreich)

​
​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
​
GLOBAL DEMOGRAPHICS
The Rise of 3 Billion New Consumers: 
Doing Well, Doing Good
  • When thinking about how to make an impact and how to build a business, ask yourself this, "With 3 to 5 billion consumers coming online in the next [6] years, what do they need?" And let's not this mess up. The answer could be the difference between a place we want to leave our kids, or, well, not so much. Think regenerative real estate and zero-pollution energy, not expensive toys for adults or mind-numbing time in front of screens. | Source: Peter Diamandis, Co-Founder, Human Longevity, Inc., Founder, XPRIZE
 
DECISION MAKING
Go Unconscious:
Write Down Questions at Night
  • You've all heard that the subconscious mind is much more powerful than our conscious mind. (Or at least that's we all want to believe when we're stuck in a rut or can't do the simple addition of double-digit numbers quickly.) A case in point, on a daily basis, Reid Hoffman writes down problems that he wants his mind to work on overnight, like while he's asleep. Given his role as co-founder of LinkedIn (sold for $26B) and executive VP at Paypal (sold for $1.5B), maybe he's onto something.​



September 11, 2018

Residential Solar's Signal v. Noise,
New Leader in Energy Storage,
Best Biz Apps, &
#JustDoIt (kneelin')


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

SOLAR
Don't Believe the Hype:
Solar is Alive and Poised for Growth 
ENERGY STORAGE 
Residential Sector > Utility Sector:
You Thought Bigger was Always Better
  • New Q2 2018 data is in from GTM Research: Residential MW of energy storage exceeded big utility scale installs. Surprising, but the latter is pretty lumpy, with a much larger pipeline. Still, the meteoric growth in behind-the-meter battery installs ain't nothing to sneeze at. They made up 75% of Q2 capacity. For more on energy storage finance, check out IronOak's primer here. | Source -- Energy Storage News (Andy Calthorpe)

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​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
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PRODUCTIVITY
Want to Get More Done Tomorrow? 
21 Apps for Business 
  • If you spent the Labor Day weekend thinking, "How do I accomplish more each day?" -- then you might need help. Or a reconsideration of the quote at the start of this newsletter (less = more). In any case, here are 21 apps to help you get an external brain (Evernote), manage projects visually (Trello), accept payments (Square), keep track of your peeps (Insightly), track time (Toggl), and get a full-body deep tissue massage after every long day. I exaggerate slightly, but I can dream.  |  Source -- The Simple Dollar (Saundra Latham)
 
TAKING A RISK
Nike Takes a Stand:
Or is it a Kneel
  • You might recall stories from months ago about Colin Kaepernick, an NFL quarterback who (respectfully) took a knee to ironically take a stand against police brutality. And then was arguably blacklisted by the league. (Despite the political spin, this was never about disrespect to the U.S. flag. #DontBeFooled) And now Nike is putting their values out front, despite some haters on Twitter -- "Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything." #JustDoIt  By the way, it appears to be a good business decision, too. Perhaps $43M of media exposure so far.  |  Source -- Bloomberg (Eben Novy-Williams)



September 4, 2018

100% Carbon-Free in California,
100,000+ Home Batteries,
VC on Time Management, &
27 Years of Silence


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

CLIMATE CHANGE LEGISLATION
California to Set the New Normal:
No Carbon Emissions from Electricity Post 2045
  • California senate bill (SB) 100 has been approved by the Senate and State Assembly and soon goes to the Governor for signature. The likely outcome:The renewable energy mandate goes to 60% of all power sales by 2030, and to 100% zero-carbon electricity by 2045. For those ostriches (climate haters) with their heads in the sand, let's note that California is the world’s 5th largest economy. Also, policy purists beware: This is not 100% renewable energy; it's 100% carbon-free. That means nuclear counts. (Gulp.)  |  Source -- Greentech Media (Julian Spector)
 
ENERGY STORAGE MILESTONE
Germany Hits 100,000 Home Battery Installs:
Reminiscent of the Year 2010?
  • Eight years ago, Germany was by far the world leader in solar installation, with about 3x the solar MW as the #2 country, Spain. While China and the US now dominate the top country rankings, there might be foreshadowing of the future.Today Germany leads the world instead in home battery installations, recently hitting 100,000 installs since 2013, with another 100,000 to be added in the next two years. Will the rest of the world follow Germany's lead again? With a 50%+ drop in battery prices since 2013, and another 20-40% price drop expected by 2020, the answer is probably, "Auf jedenfall!" (God bless, Google Translate.) | Source -- Energy Storage News (Andy Colthorpe)
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​PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
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TIME MANAGEMENT
Managers vs. Makers: 
Not All Calendars Should Look the Same
  • If you hate meetings, here's some advice from a good source: Paul Graham, venture capitalist, founder of Y Combinator, and "hacker philosopher." If you're a Maker (e.g., creating software, investments, new tech, new content), then your calendar needs to show big blocks of [3-5] hour chunks of "CPU-intensive" time and focus. If you're a Manager, you gotta give these Makers their time, outside of meetings, to create real value, not just skim the surface. So...what does your calendar look like? Are you a Maker or Manager? Here is his essay on the topic. For more, you can also read this other book:Deep Work by Cal Newport  
 
ALONE TIME
No, That's Not a Parental Warning to a Child:
It' about a Present-Day Hermit in Maine
  • On our recent vacation to Redwood National Forest, my wife (lovingly) forced me to read a non-business book. (But I still stayed in the non-fiction category, of course.) The result: The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit by Michael Finkel. It's the account of a 20-year old that went off to live alone in the woods, saying only one word ("Hi") for a 27-year period of isolation. Did he trespass and steal to survive? Yep. 1,000 times. But it's more about the benefits of silence and alone time in an increasingly noisy and crowded world. I'm not advocating that you join the ranks of the 4 million Sadhus (holy ascetics) living in India (with fabulous hair styles), but research suggests that more silence might just make us smarter.



August 7, 2018

50-State Solar Market,
EV vs. Oil Demand (Calculator),
11 Smart Home Devices, &
Home vs. Stock Investment


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

SOLAR EXPANSION
Illinois Ain't California:
But It's Getting Attention from National Solar Players
  • The headline is the smallest part of this story: Vivint, the national residential solar player, announced plans to open up its services in Illinois. But the bigger picture is that cheap solar power is slowly converting the U.S. from a 10-state market to a 50-state market. This infographic from the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) shows the top 10 U.S. states as of early 2017. Note two things: (1) The #10 state, New York, had just 5% of the solar capacity as the #1 state, California. #LongTail, (2) Illinois today ranks #35 out of 50. #Don'tBlink | Source: Solar Power World (Kelsey Misbrener)
 
ELECTRIC VEHICLE IMPACTS
Should Oil Giants Worry?
Here's a Calculator
  • UK think tank Carbon Tracker’s new EV Oil Displacement Tool lets users "experiment with three key variables to see how different future scenarios could play out." Is 2030 peak oil? Will the gradual rise of EVs allow oil majors to pivot their Titanics gradually? This 2-minute video talks you through it. (And, yes, the British accent gives me much greater confidence that their projections are accurate.) | Source: InsideEVs (Evannex / Charles Morris)
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PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
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SMART HOME DEVICES
11 of the Best Choices: 
Cleverness vs. Silliness
  • Who can argue with smarter homes after we've seen how much smarter (more distracted?) we've all become with smart phones. (Yep, raise those hands.) In this list-blog, peruse 11 ways to spend a few hundred bucks, reduce power consumption, and maybe even have your privacy stolen. As one product notes, with its smart product, you can now "order a pizza and create a shopping to-do list -- without ever leaving your couch." That's what we all need -- another reason to not get off the couch. And I think I could have done those things with a phone, pencil, and paper, too. #RedefineSmart | Source: Hubspot (Caroline Forsey)
 
NON-BUSINESS INVESTMENTS
Your Home vs. Public Stocks:
Which Performs Better?
  • If you want to geek out on personal finance, this well known blogger drops the mic by tearing down another author's assertions -- about consistent 8% annual appreciation in home values -- with phrases like "[this] is pure unadulterated bullshit. And it’s dangerous bullshit." He has inserted a helpful graph showing how investment in public equities has compared historically to investments in your home equity. #DamnStatistics | Source: Get Rich Slowly (JD Roth)



July  17, 2018

$5.6 Trillion Invested,
Buzzwords that Matter,
Decision Making Admonition, &
Kids Need More Chores


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

INVESTMENT IN RENEWABLE ENERGY
Clean Energy Ain't Niche:
$5.6 Trillion Invested Since 2007
  • OK, I'll say it. This article (and related survey) is the most important thing you should read this week. (Aside from the texts your parents send you.) Here are some more fun excerpts: Renewable energy investment is expected to reach $11.5 trillion by 2050 (Bloomberg). A recent survey institutional investors showed that 89% expect to increase their investments in renewable energy by 2x by 2030, assuming appropriate policy (ACORE). But the deals that got us to this point in the clean energy sector may not be the deals that get us to the new trillions of dollars of investment. On your mark, get set, innovate!  |  Source: Utility Dive (Herman Trabish)
 
EMERGING TRENDS
Get Ready for Buzzword Explosion:
AI, Blockchain, Big Data, Vomit
  • But seriously, CB Insights – the "VC research firm with a personality the size of Andre the Giant" – recently delivered a worthwhile webinar on emerging trends in energy. In addition to the aforementioned over-hyped words, I'll add "cybersecurity" and "microgrids." That said, the reason that buzzwords get to this frenetic state is that there can be big opportunities, if you get beyond the fluff and copycats. The webinar slides profile 14 companies in these sectors. Fun stat: The number of news articles with both "energy" and AI" has risen from about 10 in 2014 to 500+ (est) this year.
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PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
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DECISION MAKING
This S#*t is Not for Sissies:
You Gotta Choose
  • In her book, You Are a Badass, author Jen Sincero notes that indecision is also a bad decision. People are often "so afraid that if they pick one thing, they'll miss out on another, so they choose to do nothing, or try to do everything, which are both excellent ways to miss out on all of it." A book with such a great title is worth a read. More tidbits include: "Stop talking about how busy you are." #NoOneCares #WhinyPants #FirstWorldProblem and "When you take the leap and believe in the not-yet-seen, you aren't supposed to know how to make it happen." #RemoveTheBlinders 
 
PARENTING
It's Time for the Hammock and a Cold One:
Watch the Kids "Benefit" from Chores
  • I'm guilty of giving my kids lots of chores. And loving it. Accordingly, they call me "Obsidian," as in a very hard stone. I think it's affectionate, but I don't care. Research suggests that doing chores helps kids maintain better relationships with family and friends, delay gratification, build skills (power tools!), be more dependable, meet career goals, and find purpose through challenge. Some studies even showed that chores, relative to higher IQ, provided a greater boost to achieving success as adults. But there's no allowance for those chores. (I don't get paid for our yard work.) Instead, that allowance is for learning how to spend, save, and donate money.  |  Source: Wired (Laura Grace Weldon)​



July  10, 2018

$400M for E-Scooters,
$55M for Indoor Farming,
100 Billionth of a Second, &
Affordable vs. Awesome


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

TRANSPORTATION INNOVATION
Giving (to) the Bird:
Scooter Startup Raises $400M in 4 Months
  • "Last mile" electric scooter startup Bird has raised $100M and now $300M in break-neck speed (but be careful riding), putting the company's valuation at $2B. (Gulp.) If you're curious how thousands of grown ups are supposed to ride scooters with serious faces and no helmets, here's the how-to guide in a few pictures. Investors include multi-billion-dollar VC legends like Sequoia Capital and Accel. While there is no doubt that transportation sucks in most cities (technical engineering term), recent headlines suggest that cities are not super stoked about this scooter explosion. | Source: Business Insider (Rachel Sandler)
 
AGRICULTURE
Betting (on) the Farm:
Indoor Ag Startup Raises $55M
  • Brightfarms just raised $55M in its Series D, increasing its total funding to $112M. The capital will help the company grow more leafy greens and herbs near cities (vs. far away farms) using LED lights (vs. the sun), smart irrigation (vs. dumb), no pesticides (but they're so tasty), and no E.coli (the bar has become low). Reducing food transportation costs, capitalizing on the local food movement, and lengthening food's shelf life, the company received investment from Cox, Catalyst, NGEN, and WP. But does indoor farming reduce energy use relative to land-based farming? Does it contribute to climate change solutions? The debate continues here. | Source: Wall Street Journal (Jennifer Smith)
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PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
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COST OF LIVING
$120,000 is Not Enough: 
Affordable vs. Awesome in San Fran
  • A family making about $120,000 per year can now qualify for low-income housing in San Francisco, according the the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. On one hand, yikes! On the other hand, the median home price there is about $950,000. Also, yikes. #WeLoveRTPandNC  #ThereIsLifeOutsideOfCA  | Source: Fortune (Natasha Bach)
 
EFFICIENCY
100 Billionths of a Second:
Google and Stanford Redefine Time
  • Of all left-brained professionals, it used to be that physicists were most frequently linked with existential debates. But today, finance professionals may be taking their place. (If you're picturing The Wolf of Wall Street, hang on, stay with me.) With high-frequency traders (of public equities) now making up more than 50% of all daily trades, the finance sector has "easily become the most obsessed with time." Now scientists can track time at 100 billionth of a second, "roughly the time it takes light to travel one foot." Beyond the ability to buy and sell stocks more quickly, what might this innovation mean for optimization in other fields? Or is it just a more precise way for me to remind my kids that they are over their "tablet time" limit? | Source: New York Time (John Markoff)



July  3, 2018

4 Takeaways from Energy Investor Conference,
$40M for "Ice" Energy Storage,
10 Business Podcasts, &
180 Hours of Silence


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

INVESTOR CONFERENCE
4 Key Takeaways from Boston:
What Energy Financiers Are Thinking About
  • I recently spoke on a panel about energy storage investments at the SuperReturn Energy conference for private equity and venture capital investors. Here's a blog I wrote about my highlights. It covers the following 4 themes: (1) Natural gas confusion, (2) $1T is tough to invest, (3) Over- or under-estimating new tech adoption (to S-curve, or not), and (4) ESG is not for sissies. 
 
ENERGY STORAGE FINANCING
$40M Raised for Ice Energy Storage:
What the Hell is That?
  • A $2B infrastructure fund manager (Argo) invested $40M for residential and commercial installations of "ice batteries" by Ice Energy (yep, that's the company name). Importantly, the goal is for this investment to eventually reach hundreds of millions of dollars, like most infrastructure investments. The systems can use cheap electricity during off peak hours to convert water to ice, and then blow air over that ice during peak hours to produce cool air. That's a massive oversimplification, but that may be exactly the point. Simple sells. Simple scales. (Sounds like a good meditation mantra for us bankers.) | Source: Greentech Media (Julian Spector)
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PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
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PODCASTS
Too Busy to Read: 
10 Podcasts about Business and Entrepreneurship
  • If you'd like to be productive 100% of the time and never relax...uh...I mean satisfy your passion to know everything in your field, then here are 10 ways to do that. Commuting by train? Cleaning the kitchen? Doing physical therapy to fix your aging body? (Yep, it's personal, baby.) No problem: You can enjoy a podcast during all of these "wasteful" uses of time. | Source: Entrepreneurs' Organization via Inc.com
 
SELF-REFLECTION
180 Hours of Silence:
Going Crazy on 10-Day Retreat?
  • If you do an online search for 10-day silent Vipassana retreats, you'll find search results asking whether they are the purview of cults, what in the heck you do for 10 days without talking, or how you will feel like dissolving into pure matter on day 11. You might even magically begin smelling Patchouli while a white-bearded yogi appears outside your door. Or you'll find serious professionals who want some balance to their constant "on" status and try out one of India's oldest mediation practices, seeking to "see things as they really are." (I think I'm in that bucket, but remain Patchouli-free for now.) For a thoughtful recount of 180 hours of silence, here's a good blog from James Allworth via Medium.com. #CountMeIn​



June 26, 2018

Fate of Natural Gas,
S-curve Growth for EV,
9,000 Year Cooking, &
Decision Making Guide


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

NATURAL GAS
A Fate in Question:
Temporary Giant?
  • With "centuries" of cheap available natural gas, it seems to be the new normal, displacing coal as the leading source of U.S. power generation and lowering carbon emissions in the process. However, GE has laid off 12,000 workers in its power generation business, and now Siemens is considering selling off its natural gas turbine business, whose Q2 revenue was down to $114M from $438M in Q2 2017. With 157 GW of renewables added vs. just 70 GW of conventional power (per Bloomberg) in 2017, plus the increasing feasibility of energy storage to outcompete gas peakers, executives may be seeing the writing (4-letter words) on the wall. | Source: Greentech Media (Stephen Lacey)
 
EV + STORAGE ADOPTION
Watch Those Curves:
Growth Ain't Linear
  • When experts predict battery or EV growth, sometimes the projections show straight-line linear growth. But historically, most new tech has followed S-curves, with slow progress then massive step changes to wide-scale market penetration. See graph via NYT / HBR. It's like Bill Gates says: "We tend to overestimate the impact of new tech in the near term (hype), and underestimate its impact in the long term (oh s#*t)." The question is this: When does this "near term" end? Here's a snapshot of all the EV models expected to be available by 2020. #NotaNiche,Baby
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PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
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TRADITION
9,000-Year-Old Roots: 
What Fermentation Means
  • Did you have any coffee, yogurt, chocolate, wine, or cheese in the last 24 hours? I hope so. They make life worth living. But did you know that they all tie back to fermentation's earliest known use in turning Chinese rice into alcohol 9,000 year ago? So what is happening? In this "art of controlled decay," enzymes from molds, yeasts, and bacteria convert sugar into alcohol and protein into amino acids, thereby preserving food for months or years into the future. So, if you want to put on your metaphorical hipster hat and grow that cool mustache, then get your own fermentation groove on by making homemade kombucha or kimchi. | Source: Matt Goulding (Rice, Noodle, Fish)
 
DECISION MAKING
The Ultimate Guide:
How To Manage 35,000 Conscious Decisions Each Day
  • Research highlighted in Forbes suggests that 98% of organizations are not great at decision-making. Yet a Nobel Prize winner tells us that we think we're more rational than we are. (Are you now pointing your fingers at others? I am.) So, if you want to change that, and geek out on strategic analysis methods for better decisions, then this Hubspot resource is a must read. My mouth is still agape as I digest its orderly matrices, multi-branching trees, and pithy quotes. (Grain of salt: Keep in mind that my wife tells me I dream in Microsoft Excel.) ​

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June 12, 2018

​New Resi Solar App,
Low Interest Rates + Renewables,
$1M + 1-Person Businesses, &
We're 99% Unconscious​


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

SOLAR
Peer Pressure is Great:
If We're Talking about Residential Solar Sales
  • A California startup, OhmHome, has recently launched Nextdoor Solar, an app that helps homeowners in 30 U.S. solar markets see which homes near them have solar, who installed it, and sometimes the price, too. Its foundation rests on two pieces of research: Work at Yale University shows that the presence of solar on your neighbors' rooftop is one of the greatest influences on whether you choose to go solar. (Thank you to the Joneses.) And NREL reports that local installers can help consumers save 10% on solar systems relative to big national companies, but it can be hard to research local installers. So, "think global, buy local"? | Source: Solar Industry (Betsy Lillian)
 
RENEWABLES FINANCE
Clean Energy as Low Risk:
Billions of Dollars with Better Debt Terms?
  • You've all heard (or maybe still worry) about the incorrectly assumed correlation between clean energy investments and below market returns. (This is a recurring nightmare for me: It usually involves me talking to mainstream investors about my work as a clean energy investment banker, and then watching them give me a look like I'm holding a sick puppy, apparently uninformed of the $1T+ invested in the sector in the last four years.) Now, for a change of pace, a new $1.4B credit facility for CMS Energy, the parent company of Consumers Energy, will deliver more favorable interest rates if/when the company reduces its exposure to conventional energy and increases its ownership of renewable energy. | Source: Utility Dive (Robert Walton)
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PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
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STARTUPS
1-Person Businesses: 
With $1M+ in Revenue
  • It's hard to deny the appeal of this combo: Your own business. No employees. Tons of control. Oodles of disposable cash. However, I bet that your BS meter is going off right now. But rest assured: This micro-entrepreneurship can be a reality, with potential blueprints detailed here: The Million-Dollar, One-Person Business by Elaine Pofeldt (@ElainePofeldt). It sounds a lot like the book that set me on my entrepreneurial path almost a decade ago: The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich. If you can get past the doubt factor, these paths present new possibilities for work-life balance and personally impactful careers. | Source: Tim Ferriss podcast
 
DECISION MAKING
99% of Mental Activity is Just Autopilot:
Now what?
  • If you're amazed (or frightened) that you can drive 70 mph for hours on a crowded interstate without even thinking about it, well, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Research shows that the the vast majority of cognitive activity is unconscious. If that's true, then what do we do about it? One answer is to follow "Slight Edge" principles and set up daily habits that we know inch us closer to our goals, without the need for constant conscious decision making. Another option is to choose some form of daily meditation, but I know this sounds cliche. And as someone who has lived in Buddhist monasteries, I also know it's a habit hard to maintain consistently without the presence of daily bells or folks in robes. Big picture: In order to avoid losing control in a future world full of artificial intelligence, then we might want to start making more "automatically smart" choices today. | Source: New York Times

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June 5, 2018

​​Battery Investment,
Report: Corporate Innovation,
"Math More Better", &
Report: Internet Trends


​CLEAN ENERGY FINANCE

ENERGY STORAGE
Investors Hungry:
Headlines Worth Reading
  • If you haven't yet fallen into the deep, dark canyon between the current hype and the future reality of a giant battery market ($100B to be invested by 2030), then here are some headlines to note: German startup Sonnen (residential storage) recently raised $71M to bring its total capital raised to $180M. BP just invested $20M in Israeli startup StoreDot (new lithium chemistry planning to achieve 5-minute, 300-mile charging). And EDF plans to invest $10B in the batteries by 2035. Other stats: SunPower is now seeing a 30% attachment rate in recent sales (i.e., solar + storage). For more, check out the battery finance primer from IronOak: Cheat Sheet on Financing Storage Finance | Read more about these headlines: Greentech Media (Julian Spector)
 
CORPORATE INNOVATION
Survey of 667 Executives:
Disruption vs. Incrementalism
  • Since I've just referenced the painfully overused words "innovation" and "disruption," I hope you're still reading this blurb. Here are 3 takeaways: (1) Do what you say: 85% of surveyed executives say innovation is very important, but 78% focus on incremental changes. (2) Take risks: 35% of companies with the highest financial performance were first movers and 2x as likely to seek risks. (3) Partner, instead of building, to speed up the process: 60% say it takes a year or more to create new products. | Source: CB Insights
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PRODUCTIVITY, BUSINESS TIPS, TRIVIA
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TEACHING
"More Better Math": 
School vs. Fun vs. Practical
  • My 6th grader was recently working on extra credit: 8th grade homework on quadratic formulas. He asked for help. We learned it. He felt excited. BUT...This skill is not as relevant as learning probabilities (decision making), statistics (sports fans), or finance (saving for what matters). As pithy wordsmith Seth Godin puts it: "Every day we spend teaching hand factoring of binomials to non-math majors is another day we raise mathematically illiterate kids."  | Source: Seth Godin
 
INTERNET TRENDS
Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers' Report:
6 Slides
  • If you want to see the future, listen to successful VCs. (Or throw a dart. Sometimes the odds of success are the same.) In this case, Kleiner Perkins, with $10B raised across 20 funds, is carefully watching Internet trends: Daily time online = Up 2x since 2009 (now 6 hours/day). Daily minutes of video viewed on mobile = Up 6x since 2012. Privacy paradox = Our data laws are "43 years out of date." Daily time spent on social media = Up 1.5x since 2012. On a different note, this TED Radio Hour ("Attention Please") podcast talks about the importance to our brain and creativity of being bored and having downtime. Where's the right balance? Maybe a meditation app could tell us.  | Source: Hubspot (Amanda Zantal-Wiener)
Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
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