Live on Bloomberg TV

00:00What are you looking for in terms of the top areas that needinnovation and investment when it comes to climate and really no stopping this problem before it gets to be too before it turnsinto a disaster. Absolutely. Thanks so much for having me. Emily it's a pleasureto be here. I mean there's so many areas within climate that need investment. So we're really excited about areas that blendtypically climate experience with new technologies. So think about materials science artificial intelligence or softwaremeets forest science or water solutions. So at Earth Shot we have some really exciting technologies and we're seeing anamazing influx of talent from traditional technology like Google and Facebook. Meeting up with people who really know energymarkets water markets and mobility and building some really fascinating companies.So climate investments often take a long time to play out. I mean we've seen some and get investors get impatient and move onto other things. How patient are you willing to be. How long term is your time horizon.Well it's interesting you asked. I think the market has also just changed so dramatically in climate tech and early stageclimate investing in particular. So we're seeing a lot of momentum and interest in climate technology and the speed ofinnovation actually picking up pretty significantly. I think there are really three key trends driving this. We're seeingenormous market interest. So thousands of corporations now have actually made net zero pledges and are buying climatetechnology. That's a huge change in the private sector. We're seeing alignment from the policy space all the way from localstate national and international alignment around climate. And we're also just seeing this influx of talent where people areseeing it actually affect them in their backyards and affect them where they are. And so a lot of new tech coming into thisspace and all of these factors together are actually accelerating times to market accelerating technology's abilityto scale much more so than we've seen in the last decade or so that I've been investing in climate technology. Some of youroptions include John Doar of Kleiner Perkins Chris Cox the chief product officer at Facebook Emerson Collective which is ofcourse the fun started by Lorraine Pal Jobs. What kind of conversations have you had with folks like Lorraine about theirpriorities. We were fortunate to have in really a dream team of investors inthis fund who have a lot of experience with both investing and climate and also working at the community level to deploytechnologies in ways that are meaningful and can enable them to scale. Our investors are particularly interested in how do wefind founders and entrepreneurs who may have been overlooked who are doing some really interesting things that may not have had achance or had access to the same venture capital markets as others. It's something we're really known for. Elemental isbeing able to find entrepreneurs from from some of these really interesting communities who are really focused on solvingclimate in a more equitable way. So our investors are really excited about finding entrepreneurs in unexpected places andthen addressing climate in a way that is more equitable. We see climate change and social equity as completely interlinked andinterdependent part of the same challenge. Regulators in the United States and Europe are looking closely at ESG portfolioswere also expecting some action from the S.E.C. on this. I recently interviewed Al Gore and he raised a concern aboutgreenwashing. What's your take on greenwashing when it comes to climate investing. How big a challenge is this.Yeah I think Al Gore is right. I mean greenwashing is a real challenge especially from companies that are atrociously infossil fuel sectors. I think the best antidote to greenwashing is action and really good solutions that are better than thesolutions we see out there now using fossil fuels. I think solar is a great example. It's a better technology. It's cleaner it'scheaper. It makes more sense than the fossil fuel alternative. Same thing is true with electric buses. We investor an electrictruck and electric bus companies in the past and elemental. And these technologies are just better than the alternatives. So thegreenwashing is definitely a challenge. I think to the extent that we are creating better technologies that actually solveproblems are more enjoyable to drive or better for our communities. We can accelerate the pace of adoption even so.Meantime your fund is partly based in Hawaii. You are based in Honolulu. I'm from Hawaii. So I have to ask does being in Hawaiigive you some sort of edge or a more unique perspective than an investor in the middle of Silicon Valley.Yeah well we're here from your hometown so aloha. I think being in Hawaii gives us the two different advantages.One is that we actually see the impact of technologies in communities in real time. So Elemental started in Hawaii. It isnow a global organization. Earth Shot will be investing across the US and across the world. So we're by no means limited but itdoes give us unique perspective into what does it actually take to deploy technologies and scale them in the real world. There'salso a sense in which why in Alaska where we also have a strong partnership our early markets we're seeing some of the earlyimpacts of climate change and are places where we can actually roll out technology and learn things and get ahead of the curvebefore other geographies. So there are other wonderful geographies. Also.Test and send serve new technology. But we find that being in communities being really close to customers has an enormousadvantage for technology deployment and acceleration.

No schedule data available.

Emerson Collective Backs New Climate Technology Fund

Elemental Excelerator is spinning out a new venture capital fund, Earthshot Ventures, to support entrepreneurs tackling climate change. With backing from the Emerson Collective, John Doerr, Tom Steyer, and Microsoft, Earthshot Ventures Founder Dawn Lippert speaks with Emily Chang about the new fund and its top priorities. (Source: Bloomberg)