Climate Week NYC is the largest annual climate event of its kind, bringing together some 400 events and activities across New York City. This year’s theme was, “We Can. We Will.”  

Members of ARPA-E’s leadership and Technology-to-Market (T2M) team spoke during events throughout Climate Week NYC to discuss ARPA-E’s mission as a disruptive and impactful early-stage energy R&D agency. They shared how the transformational energy technologies ARPA-E supports can help achieve our nation’s climate goals.

ARPA-E Director Evelyn Wang spoke at multiple events during Climate Week NYC. These included a panel during Equal Ventures’ Climate Capital Summit, a fireside chat with journalist turned venture capitalist Molly Wood at the Activate Climate Showcase, and a panel at the Newlab Climate Festival.

Equal Ventures, a VC focused on deploying technology that disrupts legacy industries, hosted the Climate Capital Summit on Wednesday, September 20. Equal Ventures brought together top climate leaders for a series of conversations around the full climate capital stack. Dir. Wang discussed incumbents’ response to climate technology.

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Dir. Wang speaking on a panel at Equal Ventures’ Climate Capital Summit. 

Also on Wednesday, Activate hosted a demo hall displaying hard technology solutions to the climate crisis. Activate is an organization that partners with U.S.-based funders and research institutions to support research. During her fireside chat, Dir. Wang and Ms. Wood examined hard technology solutions to the climate crisis. Dir. Wang highlighted how ARPA-E performers’ technology can impact the building, generation, and transportation sectors. T2M Advisor Sam Wurzel and ARPA-E Fellow Dr. Julia Greenwald hosted an ARPA-E booth at Activate’s demo hall. Dir. Wang and Dr. Daniel Cunningham, Acting Deputy Director for Technology, both took a tour of the demo hall and technologies spanning a wide range of technical areas.

Several ARPA-E selectees also hosted booths at the demo hall, including:

• AeroShield, a spinoff from FOCUS selectee Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
• Innate Energy, a spinoff from DAYS selectee Columbia University,
• Still Bright, a spinoff from Biomining Exploratory Topic selectee Columbia University,
• Osmoses, a SEED Exploratory Topic selectee,
• SiTration, a SEED Exploratory Topic selectee, and
• Carbon to Stone, a spinoff from OPEN 2021 awardee Cornell University.

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Dir. Wang and Molly Wood during a fireside chat at the Activate Demo Hall. 

Dir. Wang touring the Activate Demo Hall.

T2M Advisor Sam Wurzel and Fellow Dr. Julia Greenwald at the ARPA-E booth at the Activate Demo Hall.

Program Director Dr. Simon Freeman (right) with Propeller VC principal and former ARPA-E fellow Dr. Jake Russell (center) at the Activate Demo Hall.

On Thursday, September 21, Dir. Wang and members of the ARPA-E leadership and T2M team attended New Climate Futures, an event hosted by Newlab. Newlab scales and commercializes emerging technologies and companies. Dir. Wang spoke on a panel that examined stacking diverse capital sources to scale climate technologies. Additionally, Program Directors Dr. Simon Freeman, Dr. Doug Wicks, Dr. Jenifer Shafer, and Acting Deputy Director of Commercialization (DDC) Jonathan Glass all spoke at various roundtable discussions during the event.

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Dir. Wang speaking on a panel at New Climate Futures. 

Program Director Dr. Simon Freeman spoke at an ocean climate innovation roundtable.

Acting DDC Jonathan Glass and other members of the grid resilience and energy equity roundtable.

New Climate Futures also featured technology demonstrations. Many ARPA-E selectee held demos, including:

• Thea Energy, a spinoff from BETHE selectee Princeton University,
• ASCEND selectee Wright Electric,
• DexMat, a spinoff from OPEN 2018 selectee Rice University,
• SEED Exploratory Topic selectee Electrified Thermal Solutions,
• SCALEUP 2021 selectee InventWood,
• MINER selectee Travertine Technologies,
• Blaze Energy, a spinoff from OPEN 2018 selectee Colorado School of Mines, and
• Urban Electric Power, a spinoff from GRIDS selectee CUNY Energy Institute

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Program Director Dr. Peter de Bock with ARPA-E selectee Wright Electric’s team at their New Climate Futures demo.

Dir. Wang with ARPA-E selectees Travertine Technologies, DexMat, and Urban Electric Power at their New Climate Futures demos.

Climate Week NYC was a great opportunity for the ARPA-E team to highlight the disruptive, transformational, and impactful technologies ARPA-E supports.