Creative Destruction Lab (CDL) is proud to announce the launch of CDL Climate, a new stream that will bring together entrepreneurs, scientists, mentors, investors and industry partners to support high impact and scalable solutions targeted towards fighting climate change. The stream will operate from CDL-West at UBC Sauder and CDL-Paris at HEC Paris.
CDL Climate will focus on innovation areas such as renewable/alternative energy, power storage, infrastructure, transportation, carbon/methane sequestration, select water, ocean and food initiatives aligned with climate solutions and geo-engineering. Leader of CDL-West and Assistant Dean of Innovation at UBC Sauder, Paul Cubbon, says the initiative is part of a critical need to fight climate change with innovations that can be quickly deployed and scaled up. “Climate-related technologies often face significant challenges in breaking through the status quo and speeding up the process to market. Our model will connect individuals and organizations with the experience, commitment, network and capital required to efficiently develop and implement truly impactful solutions.”
UBC Sauder School of Business Dean Robert Helsley says the CDL Climate initiative speaks to the importance of responsible leadership. “There is an urgent need to fight climate change. Business has a key role to play in ensuring that breakthroughs from university labs can become well-capitalized, massively scalable ventures that result in highly tangible climate and societal benefits.”
CDL’s objectives-based program has already supported founders building massively scalable climate positive companies such as Clir Renewables (developing a cloud-based AI asset management and reporting software that increases optimization for wind farms ), Ionomr (enables the global renewable transition with advanced membrane and polymer materials to unlock hydrogen & carbon-neutral technologies), and Ecoation (end-to-end robotic solution and AI platform that detects pests, diseases, and deficiencies in crops at the earliest stage). The intent of CDL Climate is to significantly scale the volume to 50 climate focused ventures per year, addressing a wide range of major climate issues.
Applications for CDL Climate are now open and available online at creativedestructionlab.com/apply. Selected ventures will begin the nine-month CDL program in October 2020. To learn more about CDL Climate at CDL-West anchored at UBC Sauder School of Business in Vancouver, please contact cdl-west@creativedestructionlab.com.
