This week in cleantech and renewable energy news, Greentown Labs and its’ hometown are celebrated as a potential future hub of innovation while two of our member companies are highlighted for their social impact. In other news, an update on the state of the cleantech industry in Boston is posted, along with the projected growth of the U.S. energy storage market. What news have you been reading this week? Share with us @GreentownLabs!
BostInno – Dear Greentech Startups, You May Want to Bookmark This Handy List of Resources
- This week, Greentown Labs was selected as one of ten handy resources curated for Massachusetts cleantech startups. Alongside many of our industry friends, Greentown was featured as a strong supporter of startups through access to our office space, lab space, machine shop and other valuable resources.
“In a Boston Business Journal article, a Brookings Institution report showed Boston as the third-strongest metro area for green tech investing between 2011 and 2016—$2.9 billion, about 9 percent of the nation’s investment. Greentech in the state booming too, with 81 percent growth since 2010 and over 100,000 employed in the sector.”
Fast Company- This city is angling to build the East Coast’s next innovation hub
- Somerville, Massachusetts – the hometown of Greentown Labs – has a strong history of being an industrial area. Through precise planning and redevelopment of the area, including a new train station, Union Square may be the next tech hotspot on the northeast.
“Because of its sheer size, much of Union’s tech burst can be directly attributed to Greentown. Just seven years old, Greentown has gone from having one employee (Reichert) to providing space for more than 450, with an in-house machine shop, electronics shop, wet lab, and more. So far, it’s pulled in $350 million in funding. One of the startups it nurtured, RightHand Robotics, with its roots at MIT and Harvard, spun out of the incubator to take over the 24,000-square-foot site of Union Square’s former post office..”
BostInno – A Closer Look at Our 50 on Fire Winners in Social Impact
- Two of our member companies were recently selected as BostInno’s 50 on Fire winners in the Social Impact category: Upstream and Resonant Energy.
“Resonant Energy is a startup that brings solar power access to nonprofits and lower-income single-family homes. What started with a community project to solar power a church in Dorchester five years ago is now a company that’s eight-member strong and looking onto a million dollar funding round next year.”
“Upstream is a public benefit corporation and a Greentown Labs member with the mission “to create economic forces that drive environmental good.” Its platform creates customizable and scalable machine learning platform that utilizes remotely sensed data to empower public, corporate and non-profit sector actors to make more informed water use, management and conservation decisions. The platform analyzes 100,000s of satellite imagery tiles on a weekly basis.”
BostInno – The State of Clean Energy Innovation in Boston
- A MassCEC report shows that the cleantech industry has been growing behind the scenes thanks to ambitious goals set by the Commonwealth. Boston area startups are focused on solving hard engineering problems that require innovating environmentally and financially-stable solutions.
“The 2017 Massachusetts Clean Energy Industry Report – an annual accounting of the sector’s activity – showed that the clean energy sector continued to report sustained growth, expanding to more than 109,000 jobs between 2016 and 2017.
The industry contributes $11.4 billion to Massachusetts’ Gross State Product and represents a 2.3 percent share of the entire Massachusetts economy. It also grew by 4 percent since the 2016 report and by 81 percent – 49,000 more workers – since 2010.”
Solar Power World – Global Market Insights says the U.S. energy storage market will grow to $4 billion by 2024
- In the next 6 years, the energy storage market value is projected to grow exponentially. A primary driver in the growth of the market size is the growing regulatory focus on minimizing or eliminating carbon emissions.
“The U.S. residential energy storage market will witness robust expansion on account of increasing penetration of solar PV levels along with introduction of supportive policies and energy storage subsidies. California and Hawaii constitute the sizeable proportion of the overall residential energy storage sector in the country with fresh participation anticipated from Arizona and Massachusetts in the near term. The industry growth is further stimulated by growing implementation of time-of-use rates by utilities coupled with reduction in net metering compensation.”
Thanks for reading the entire post – come back next week for more cleantech news!