Greentown Labs opening marks clean energy milestone
“We’re making a stand. We’re saying we built energ y 1.0, and we’ll build energ y 2.0.”
For the past six years, Katie Mehnert felt lost as she tried to build businesses tied to renewable energy in Houston.
The city’s sprawl made it hard to connect with other like-minded entrepreneurs, and existing startup incubators seemed more focused on oil and gas innovations.
She watched with some interest when Rice University announced its Ion startup hub but was floored after Greentown Labs — North America’s largest clean energy incubator — said it June that it would open its second U.S. location in the Loop.
She applied for her business, Ally Energy, a digital company aiming to diversify the traditional and clean energy workforce. It was accepted six weeks ago.
“I didn’t have a community,” Mehnert said. “I never felt a sense of community around clean energy and the energy transition until Greentown Labs came.”
Greentown Labs’ Houston office held its grand opening Thursday, marking a milestone in Houston’s slow but accelerating embrace of the clean energy industry. It’s the incubator’s first location outside of the Boston area.
Emily Reichert, CEO of Greentown Labs, and Mayor Sylvester Turner hope the opening will send a clear message: Houston, known as the energy capital of the world, is
ready to lead the energy transition.
“One thing is certain: In this city, we dream big and we make big things happen, or we go home,” Turner said Thursday. “And in Houston, we don’t go home. We simply expand and grow and lead the way. Today is an example of leading the way.”
Getting on board
Houston is best known for its oil and gas companies, refineries and petrochemical companies, which in recent years have largely downplayed if not ignored the transition to clean energy. But as climate change becomes an ever more urgent threat, and investors bring pressure on companies to adjust their businesses to a low carbon world, many are investing in new, cleaner technologies.
On Thursday, President Joe Biden announced at a virtual climate summit that the U.S. will strive to cut carbon emissions by as much as 52 percent of 2005’s emission levels by 2030.
Some oil and gas majors have already started projects aimed at curbing their carbon outflow. This week , for example, Exxon Mobil proposed a $100 billion hub in Houston to capture and store carbon dioxide emissions from the region’s industries. Chevron on Wednesday said is entering into a partnership with Toyota to develop hydrogen as a transportation fuel.
Chevron, the European oil majors Royal Dutch Shell and BP, the Australian mining conglomerate BHP and other sponsors provided funding to get Greentown Labs Houston off the ground.
Ajay Mehta, general manager of new energies research for Shell, said many of the ingredients to make Houston the energy transition capital of the world are already here, including a skilled workforce knowledgeable about energy, major companies that can help commercialize new technologies and lower costs — for workers and businesses. He said he hopes Greentown Labs will create another incentive for clean energy companies to consider locating and growing in Houston.
“I hope this starts creating that culture — developing an ecosystem in Houston that is much more welcoming to the green tech community,” Mehta said. “Here is a place we can assemble and come together, that connects industry and academic partners to solve this complex problem together.”
Concessions to COVID
COVID-19, however, has forced Greentown Labs to temporarily scale back some of its programs. In-person networking events, information fairs and panels — staples of its flagship location in Sommerville, Mass., outside Boston— have been put on hold.
But moving businesses into the space has not been delayed. Greentown Labs received its certificate of occupancy Monday, and on Tuesday startup Katz Water Technologies moved in its first prototype. The rest of the 30 inaugural companies will move into the 40,000-square-foot building over the next several weeks.
When all are moved in, the companies will work on projects ranging from nickel mining for lithium ion batteries to plantbased plastics to technology companies searching for efficiencies in the electrical grid. More than two-thirds of the building is dedicated to lab spaces for companies to fabricate prototypes.
CEO Reichert said the umbrella of businesses Greentown Labs supports is wide for a reason.
“The problem is really big,” Reichert said, referring to climate change. “If you look at all the issues involved with climate tech, you could spend a lifetime working on it. We need to do work across every sector of the economy.”
Wildcatting attitude
From her perspective, Mehnert with Ally Energy said Houston is ready to take on the challenge. It was wildcatters and mavericks who led the first energy revolution here, she said, and attitudes they brought and the innovations they forged can help pave Houston’s path to remain the energy capital of the world.
“We’re making a stand,” she said. “We’re saying we built energy 1.0, and we’ll build energy 2.0.”