On October 29th, CleanTech Alliance President & CEO Mel Clark gave a presentation to the Montreal Chamber of Commerce about the CleanTech Alliance and the cleantech ecosystem for the Western US in general.
Ms. Clark talked about the various programs and initiatives the Alliance supports, including the Cascadia CleanTech Accelerator and touched on some of the federal and state grant funding we’ve received like the DOE EPIC grant and WA Department of Commerce’s Innovation Cluster Accelerator Program.
Ms. Clark touched on the importance of advocacy and talked about the state’s Clean Energy Fund, Clean Energy Transformation Act, Low Carbon Fuel Standard, and Washington’s Cap and Invest program, in addition to similar legislation in California and Oregon, as well as the advocacy efforts of our Idaho chapter.
She also talked about how Washington state and the Northwest in general has a rich clean energy ecosystem thanks to a plethora of research institutions like universities and National Labs, and access to abundant hydropower and a highly-educated workforce.
Ms. Clark capped off the event by talking about the following quote from Sironix Renewables CEO Christoph Krumm and plugging our upcoming events.
“There’s a whole [cleantech] ecosystem in Washington that’s been put together already that we’re looking to build and grow with. The CleanTech Alliance has put together the full supply chain picture…and makes networking amongst those [industry verticals] very easy. It’s a big reason why we’re committed to staying in Washington.”
-Christoph Krumm, CEO of Sironix Renewables
Overall, it was a great opportunity to grow the Alliance’s reach internationally and to support CleanTech Alliance member Melissa Issom and the Quebec Government. The CleanTech Alliance is grateful for the opportunity to present and we look forward to deepening our ties with Canada and expanding our international presence.