How to get a job investing millions in planet-saving tech
The climate tech investing space is growing fast. Curious about how to get involved? Venture firm Lowercarbon Capital "backs kickass companies that make real money slashing CO2 emissions, sucking carbon out of the sky, and buying us time to unf**k the planet." Learn how VCs are enabling jobs of the future to advance ideas like 100% beef that never had hooves, fully electric passenger planes, kelp-farming, carbon-sinking robots, and a fungus that eats carbon and pays farmers. Do these sound like technologies of the future or what? Well, guess what? This future is here. And climate-tech investor Mia Diawara shares what it's like at one of the hottest VC firms in climate investing — and how this engineer, poet and professional dancer found her way to one of the most exciting planet-saving careers.
Degrees: Real talk about planet-saving careers · Mia Diawara, Yesh Pavlik Slenk
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Show Notes
Mia Diawara is a partner at Lowercarbon Capital, where she invests in ambitious teams building needle-moving climate tech — always with her eye on equity and inclusion. Before Lowercarbon, Mia spearheaded decarbonization strategy across a portfolio of more than $90 billion in assets at TPG and advised companies across industries at Bain & Company. Previously, she assessed climate policy and market-based climate solutions at NRDC and RMI, respectively.
Mia is also a poet and dancer who has performed professionally with the San Francisco Bay Area Theater Company. She chairs the Nominating & Governance Committee on the board of Robert Moses’ Kin—a San Francisco-based dance company.
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Resources
- The Climate Draft, a member-supported coalition of climate tech startups and VCs on a mission to collectively bring more top talent, investment, and commercial opportunities into the space
- LowerCarbon Capital’s extensive jobs board
- Clean Up on Aisle Earth — LowerCarbon Capital cofounder Chris Sacca’s blog post on raising $350 million to invest in carbon removal. This is worth a read to learn about the ethos of this forward-thinking company.
- Twitter Space conversation about investing in climate tech
- Carbon capture startups received a record $882 million in VC investments, Protocol, 9/16/2022
- An Inconvenient Truth – the trailer
- On the fact that climate change disproportionately affects the global south: Temperatures in the Sahel region of West Africa will rise 1.5 times faster than the global average, according to this article by the Brookings Institution.
- TPG’s Rise Climate fund
- NRDC
- RMI
- The LowerCarbon Capital portfolio companies mentioned in this episode, and others, including:
Carbon Engineering- Living Carbon
- Running Tide
- Zanskar
- Coda
- Pakistan floods: A health crisis of epic proportions, Al Jazeera, 9/13/2022
- Pakistan’s Deadly Floods Pose Urgent Questions On Preparedess and Response, Center for Strategic & International Studies
- Jackson, Miss. residents struggle with basic needs as the water crisis disrupts life, NPR, 10/1/2022
Giveaway
To win a copy of Speed & Scale, rate and review Degrees: Real talk about planet-saving careers on Apple Podcasts, Podchaser or Spotify. Take a screenshot of your review and share it with us on Instagram @environmental_defense_fund. Use the hashtag #DegreesPodcast. We’re giving away up to five books per episode!
Who makes Degrees?
Yesh Pavlik Slenk is Degrees’ host. Amy Morse is our producer. Podcast Allies is our production company. Tressa Versteeg is senior producer; Rye Taylor is our audio engineer; Elaine Grant is CEO of Podcast Allies and Tina Bassir is project manager. Our music is Shame, Shame, Shame from Yesh’s favorite band, Lake Street Dive. Degrees: Real talk about planet-saving careers is presented by Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).
How to find Yesh
Follow Yesh on Twitter at @yeshsays, and stay up to date with us on Instagram @environmental_defense_fund.
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