Author: Marc Stuart

A couple weeks ago, I took the liberty on this blog to write a open letter in support of my good friend, Christiana Figueres to be the next Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC.

While that selection process is ongoing for another couple weeks it appears, it’s been inspiring in its own right to see the grass roots Facebook upwelling for this truly remarkable woman. When everybody from market profiteers to left of left civil society to diplomats and bureaucrats trying to do implausible jobs in impossible situations are all consistently singing your praises, it has to mean something.

In any event, I was recently passed along a note from one of the creators of that testimonial FB page. I’m taking some liberties and copying it below because its quite inspiring in its own right. Eugene, I look forward to our paths crossing at some point soon – you have a great head on your shoulders.

Eugene Jinyoung Nho

I’m a college student who, like many others, has long felt
passionate about tackling the climate change problem. To that end, I
have been learning about climate change policy at school and involved
myself in various sustainability initiatives. Last December at COP15,
however, amid much frustration, I realized that as much as my small
contribution might be valuable in the long run, what we needed the
most at this moment to have a realistic shot at solving the climate
crisis was a strong and effective leadership in the UNFCCC that could
bring nations together.

I chose to start the campaign to reach out to youth and
civil society in support of Chirstiana because I have been truly
inspired by her. There is no question about her incredible
professional achievement and qualifications, but what really inspired
me was the genuine care she showed for youth and civil society. I met
Christiana as a youth delegate at COP15. In the midst of the craziness
of the COP second week, she still spent an hour with students to help
us understand the issues and hear our thoughts. She is the kind of
person who replies to a random student’s email asking about the Clean
Development Mechanism with loads of helpful information and guidance
faster than the student himself. It was after talking with my friends
who received help from her similarly that I realized my case was not
an isolated incident. How far she went to help each of us was
incredible, and I believe it shows her dedication to youth development
and her belief in the significance of a sound civil society.

The Facebook group in support of Christiana has attracted
almost 2,500 members within a month since its start in mid March.
Hundreds of people have left messages of support, encouragement and
endorsement on the page. As the creator of the page, it was
extraordinary to watch the group grow—reaching out to people from all
walks of life from all corners of the world. Students from the U.S.
and Latin America joined the group at first, but since then, students,
youth activists and civil society members from all around the world
have joined in.

One particular quote I found inspiring was from a student
at Norwalk Community College. He said, “Christiana’s inspiring talk to
over 400 students energized and mobilized our campus in a way that had
seemed impossible before… At every step of their struggle to make the
building green, Christiana was there offering astute advice and
support.” This is exactly how my friends and I felt about her enduring
help and support in our research endeavors. It takes true passion and
dedication in the cause of fighting climate change to help people you
barely know on a daily basis, and that is why I find Christiana simply
inspiring.

The most incredible aspect has been the way this movement reached out
to people around the world like a wild fire. People say the best
innovations don’t need any additional effort to make them work because
those innovations have a way of getting work done themselves. The
youth/civil society movement to support Christiana happened in a
similar way. The way it spread through different social networks and
across different continents—with little effort from the center—has
been truly remarkable, and I believe it is the testimony to the
respect and hope people have for Christiana.

Last week, I had a chance to speak with Dr. Nafis Sadik,
whose work in organizing Cairo Conference in 1994 marked a milestone
in the empowerment of women and championing of family planning. I was
curious how she was able to bring nations together to support this
cause despite the existence of strong conservative lobbying forces,
and she replied in one word “civil society.” Having civil society
present in negotiations and recognizing their role in the process, she
said, kept negotiations on track and moving forward. Having witnessed
the frustration at COP15 in person, I sincerely hope to see the UNFCCC
that recognizes the important role of civil society, and hope that the
civil society’s support for Christiana is heard at the highest ranks
within the UN.

If you would like to take a look at the Christiana Figueres Facebook group, please visit and join

Eugene Jinyoung Nho

Stanford University, Class of 2010 (senior), major in Economics, minor
in Environmental Engineering. Study focus on climate change and energy
policy.

Co-founder & Co-executive director of IDEAS, an environmental
non-profit working with college students in the developing world to
tackle environmental/sustainability problems in their communities.

Born and raised in Korea.

Content provided by and all rights reserved to CleantechBlog.com. Also check out http://www.cleantech.org

So, with recent changes in my professional life, my family and I made the decision to relocate to the Bay Area. There were a lot of reasons, but the main one is my general perception that my world (carbon trading) and their world (cleantech and information technology) rarely meet. Indeed, the maestro of this blog, Neal Dikeman, is one of the only folks I’ve met who keeps a foot firmly planted in both camps. And despite the slap yourself in the forehead, Homer Simpson “Doh” sensation that cleantech and carbon should not only converse they should be actually be singing harmonies together, there is utterly no doubt that the two camps ogle each other over the picket fence with a mixture of curiosity and bewilderment. So, to make a long story short, I’m hoping to advance a few pawns a couple squares.

But enough about macro issues. Let’s talk real life. Like buying a house. Given the circumstances that we found ourselves in (having spun the wheel of capitalism and, somewhat to our surprise, won), we were in the privileged position to actually be able to afford Bay Area real estate. And, to be blunt, a fair bit of Bay Area real estate at that. One thing led to another and we made a rapid fire bid on a house that reminded me of a better version of the battered 1890’s New Jersey quasi Tudor my parents plunked $50,000 down for in 1970 and I grew up in. And, lo and behold, we own it. It’s utterly lovely, but certainly planted in the larger end of the US housing spectrum. To borrow Warren Buffet’s reference to the Berkshire Hathaway corporate jet, it’s Indefensible. But you only live once and with Treasuries paying a nice solid 20 basis points, well – you gotta put it somewhere.

Now, considering myself an environmentalist (market variety) I want to make it as green as possible. I knew it needed a lot of work in that direction – though inspections showed the house was actually in very good shape and I could observe niceties like double glazed windows, I also know what I don’t know. The sheer armada of AC units along the back of the garage gave me pause. And after experiencing PG&E’s first billing cycle while still uninhabited, I can honestly say I was a motivated participant in that greening process– tiered energy pricing to $0.45/kwh truly does grab your attention.

Solar is the default greening step in California – it’s ground zero of the million solar roofs initiative and there are piles of federal and state incentives to plop them up there. Unfortunately, a cursory examination showed it was not a particularly viable option – the roof is mainly angled to the Northwest and is comprised of a bunch of steep, fragmented gables and windows. Moreover, it’s real slate tiles and – to be frank – stunningly gorgeous. The idea of slapping down a couple hundred square feet of First Solar’s finest seemed aesthetically criminal. The next idea – a geothermal heat pump – also went by the wayside pretty quickly, when I came to the conclusion that setting up a drilling rig in the Oakland hills for a couple weeks was not the way to endear our family unit to our exceedingly close neighbors.

Which left us with a final intriguing option on the energy production side – a fuel cell. And yes, my eyes got that addictive glint of the early adopter that is usually reserved for talismans that emanate from Steve Jobs skunk works. So I bought one of the suckers – the ClearEdge 5kw version. And future updates of this blog will talk about that – installing it has been a fascinating process and one that deserves some attention.

But at the outset, I’m going to focus on the first – and doubtless more relevant– part of my energy project . Making the house it the most efficient it can be, given its overall inherent footprint. To start off, I brought in a crew of energy efficiency gurus to give it their best once over. 60 man hours on-site, a 70 page report, two CD-ROMs and a whole lot of data later, I know a heck of a lot more about my living quarters. To say it was illuminating to get a holistic view of the space we’ll inhabit the next decade or so is an understatement.

Which brings me to a broader theme I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about the last few months– the interface between technology, expertise and execution. And the tendency we tend to have to think that use – or even simply creation – of the former can blithely substitute for the latter. I fall into the trap myself all the time – I buy stuff with features that I never really use because I cannot seem to be bothered to learn how to operate them.

What I’m in the process of doing on my house feels like a microcosm of that balance between technology and capability. Extrapolate that to the multi-trillion dollar global effort to decarbonize the global economy through accelerated deployment of a raft of both new and old technologies and you can see the potential gaps. Or gapes is probably more accurate. Capability doesn’t scale as logarithmically as technology – but it’s an equal part of the overall equation. So, while I truly appreciate the tidal wave of forthcoming cleantech widgets, I worry that without with right kind of execution platforms – on the front end and throughout productive lifespan – we’ll end up with lots of stranded assets that over promise and under deliver.

My idea for these next couple contributions to Cleantechblog over the coming weeks is to try to explore that interface in my real life situation and try to do some hypothesizing on how cleantech delivery is going to work across key markets. It may or may not work, but hope you enjoy it.

Marc Stuart was one of the founders of EcoSecurities, where he worked for 13 years prior to its integration into JP Morgan in early 2010. His new firm, Allotrope Ventures, seeks out early stage private equity opportunities in technology and execution platforms that are positioned to thrive in the transition to the low carbon economy.

.

Content provided by and all rights reserved to CleantechBlog.com. Also check out http://www.cleantech.org