Good Morning
More changes to the Green Bite this week. Queue theme song of the week.
The biggest change is to the Greendicator. Thanks for your feedback. We’ll now be including market and traditional energy indexes to benchmark against climate indices. Spoiler alert: it’s always either going to be a good week to buy clean ETFs or a good week to own clean ETFs.
Headline roundup:
Should the cobalt for EVs come from the Congo or the sea floor?
Should JFK Drive in SF Golden Gate Park go car-free forever? (You can also take action here if you’re so inclined)
Texas-focused geothermal trade group launches with big energy backers
The Greendicator
Not that this is not investment advice but it’s lookin’ like a mighty fine week to buy clean ETFs…
Top Deals of the Week
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Renewable energy developer Invenergy received a $3B equity investment from Blackstone Infrastructure Partners (BW)
Refurbished iPhone seller Back Market raised $510M at a $5.7B valuation in a funding round led by Sprints Capital (TC)
Supply chain sustainability company Assent Compliance raised $350M at a $1B+ valuation in a round led by Vista Equity Partners (TC)
Remilk, a 2.5-year-old, Rehovot, Israel-based dairy product substitute company, raised $120 million in Series B funding led by Hanaco Ventures. (PRN)
RoadRunner Recycling, a nearly eight-year-old, Pittsburgh, Pa.-based sustainable waste management company, has raised $70 million in Series D funding from the growth equity firm General Atlantic. (RC)
Hooray Foods, a Bay Area-based fake bacon startup, raised $2.7M in a strategic seed extension. New investors include the former Dunkin’ CEO David Hoffmann. (Better late than never on this one - love this concept. Find it in Whole Foods!) (FBN)
Polycarbin, a startup aiming to reduce plastic waste in life science and healthcare sectors, raised a $2M seed round from Ringbolt Capital and VoLo Earth Ventures (BW)
Green Theory
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Climanxiety
Sad, anxious, angry, powerless, helpless, and guilty: these emotions described young people’s feelings about climate change–each term resonating with over 50% of global respondents. Almost half said concern for climate impacted their daily function, and 3 in 4 participants think of the future as “frightening.” Maybe you’re shocked at the level of despair, or maybe you find hope in the solidarity it contains. Therapists are taking notice, and advertising their climate consciousness to attend to “eco-grieving” clients.
While 1.5°C of warming may come as soon as 2030, our most valuable resource, time, is running out. With that grim milestone, the tropics will stand on the brink of human livability, and species’ extinctions will accelerate as habitat vanishes. Daily life around the world will continue to defy the past, as wildfires become more prevalent and ice sheets less so.
On the domestic front, in spite of campaign promises to end new fossil fuel leasing of public lands, Biden initiated the largest deal in history. In the private sector, just a few dozen companies continue to facilitate the lion’s share of emissions, and those profiting are held up as heroes. One would forgive the worried 83% of 16-25-year-olds.
Nevertheless, we have to do something, because we can influence our fate. Both limiting warming and improving air quality are within our control, and we know 1.5°C is better than 2°C. On a systemic scale, that looks like regulation and reform. Collective actions can start small, but drive systemic change directly: from strikes and boycotts to political organizing and demonstration. Besides direct action, the climate movement needs innovators, educators, artists, and others of all kinds to solve the most pressing issue yet, part by part.
However the urgency of climate change makes you feel, finding hope is all the more challenging without joy. If we practice fulfilling those hopes through choices and actions that drive climate solutions, and sustain ourselves with joy, perhaps we can inspire a happy, calm, peaceful, confident, secure, absolved feeling in the next generation.