More green for Greentown Labs
Clean-energy incubator gets corporate boost
As Houston, the world’s longtime energy capital, tries to maintain its crown during the transition from fossil fuels to cleaner energy, Greentown Labs is offering an increasingly stronger push.
The Houston home of the Massachusetts-based clean-energy incubator gained more corporate support last week and now has lined up more than 20 partners and 16 inaugural startups working to make the city a clean-energy hub.
Five corporate partners, CenterPoint Energy, Gexa Energy, EIV Capital, Wells Fargo and Williams, joined Greentown Labs Houston on Tuesday.
The incubator plans to open this spring in a former Midtown Fiesta store with about 40,000 square feet, large enough for 50 early-stage companies. For local entrepreneurs, Greentown Labs will provide fundraising and networking connections, and office and lab space. For corporate partners, it’s a chance to get in on the
ground floor of green energy innovations as the world shifts from fossil fuels to renewables.
The lab, which will focus on climate-related technology on the road to commercialization, including carbon capture, hydrogen fuel technology and battery storage, shows that Houston isn’t just an oil and gas town anymore but a city eyeing the next big thing in clean energy. The lab is the first big tenant in the city’s Innovation District, the
Rice University-designed zone expected serve as a gathering place for entrepreneurs, large companies looking for new technologies, financiers and academics.
Greentown Labs set a fundraising goal of $7.5 million — later increased to $10 million — to renovate the former grocery store and to cover three years of operations.
“I’d say the response has been overwhelming,” said Greentown Labs CEO Emily Reichert.
Several companies have signed on as partners, contributing money and expertise, including Chevron, Shell and BHP. Others, such as the law firm Vinson & Elkins, have agreed to provide free or reducedcost services. Greentown Labs, a private company that relies on membership fees and corporate partnerships for revenue, wouldn’t say how much each partner is contributing.
The lab grew from a small group of startups a decade ago near the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. The Massachusetts lab helped launch 280 companies.
In Houston, one of the latest young companies to sign on is Black Mountain Metals, a Fort Worth-based owner of a nickel and copper
mine in Australia. The company, which spent $15 million to buy the onceshuttered mine and invested $60 million into operations, is scheduled to produce its first batch of nickel concentrate this spring for use in lithium batteries, President and COO Ashley ZumwaltForbes said.
Zumwalt-Forbes, a petroleum engineer who worked for Exxon Mobil in Houston until 2015, said she became familiar with Greentown Labs when she was a graduate business student at Harvard. She is drawn to the social promise of the lab in Houston and networking with other entrepreneurs engaged in disruption and innovation.
“I want to be surrounded by people who see like I do,” she said.
Ennuity Holdings, which sells long-term solar energy contracts, also has signed on with the Houston lab. The retail electricity provider got its initial financial backing from angel investors, typically wealthy individuals who provide funding for startups in exchange for an ownership stake. Now it wants to raise more funds so it can launch its service in Texas.
Ennuity gets its power from solar farms and is aimed at customers who can’t install panels where they live, CEO Nisha Desai said. Desai said she was drawn to Greentown Labs for the help it provides with raising funds from investors.
Another company, Quantum New Energy, signed on to Greentown Labs Houston to develop an electricity shopping site. The service will provide smart meter data to help consumers determine if they’re wasting electricity or if it’s time for them to buy more efficient water heater or update an air conditioning system. Quantum would receive commissions from retail electric providers selling plans on the site.
The company initially planned to market its services through presentations at libraries and to community groups, CEO Patricia Vega said. As the coronavirus pandemic spread, however, Greentown Labs suggested alternative sales channels, including through employers who have pledged to reduce their carbon footprint. The service then becomes an employee benefit, said Vega, an energy veteran who spent her career with oil and gas companies.
Greentown Labs Houston is the highest-profile tenant in the 16-acre Innovation District under development by the Rice Management Co. which manages the university’s $6.5 billion endowment and $957 million of debt.
The center of the project is the Ion, an office and collaboration hub in the former Midtown Sears store that will offer shared workspaces, prototyping and maker resources, classrooms and event space. Microsoft and Chevron have announced they’ll open offices in the 288,000-square-foot building that is expected to open during the second half of the year, said Sam Dike, manager of strategic initiatives for Rice Management Co.