Thank you to the 200 CleanTechies and friends that came to usher me into my 30’s and raised over $4,000 for GRID Alternatives – an impressive sum for a great night of partying!

Here are a couple of pictures from the night. For many more, please go to photographer and dear friend Philipp Weitz’s website (click on “Galleries”, scroll down to our event, and use “cleantechies” as the password).  As you can see, he took some amazing shots of the party, and you can get them printed and sent to you. Bonus of bonuses: He’s donating the proceeds to GRID Alternatives!

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Yesterday I caught up with Adam Browning, Co-Founder and Executive director of Vote Solar, a non-profit with the expressed goal of building the economies of scale necessary to bring down solar’s costs.

We talked about PG&E’s 500MW proposal presented to California’s Public Utilities Commission last week, how it compares to recent similar proposals, interest and participation from IPP (Independent Power Producers) and the impact the proposal could have on jobs creation and policy changes.

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CleanTechies has a strong social mission and is dedicated to supporting individuals and organizations in bringing clean technologies and green energy to more businesses, residences and communities. We are glad to announce that we are supporting GRID Alternatives, a San Francisco Bay Area not-for-profit providing renewable energy and energy efficiency services to communities in need. On March 7, CleanTechies is kicking off its philanthropic activities by hosting a fundraiser party in San Francisco. All proceeds of the event will go to GRID Alternatives. This will be the first in a series of events with a dual purpose, to bring together CleanTech community members in support of local causes and to provide networking opportunities.

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The US electrical grid is a century-old “machine” built for a singular purpose: to power the development and industrialization of the nation’s economy.  It is designed to deliver electrons from centralized power producing plants through transmission wires to end consumers.  This archaic, unidirectional architecture is unreliable, inefficient, and unsafe.

Using many of the same technologies and assumptions first implemented in the 19th century, today, the grid must keep up with rising demand which outstrips available generating capacity and technological advancements designed to make the grid “smarter“.

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Smart, Eager and Cost Effective...

This weekend is important as both IESE (Barcelona) and Wharton (Philadelphia) are holding competitions and conferences surrounding sustainability.

Thinking locally (for me anyway):

Bay Area startups looking for some “cost effective” strategic help, here is some free strategic help: Invest a couple of hours in mid-March, and send someone to talk to students looking for some experience and a chance to prove their mettle.

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It is no secret that we need global participation in order to substitute our polluting ways. The World needs innovative and passionate leaders to bring about the change.

Athgo and UCLA are calling for Social and CleanTech entrepreneurs (or wannabes) with a passion for sustainability: On March 4-7 there will be a great event taking place in Los Angeles. If you’re a college student or young entrepreneur, this is the place to be. The 6th annual Global Clean Technology Forum at UCLA provides a platform for 200 selected young minds across the globe to learn and advance their causes toward achieving environmental sustainability. If you’re between the ages of 18 and 32 you might want to try and get one of the open slots. The deadline for applications is coming up fast, February 24.

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We get a lot of questions from people who want to start a career in CleanTech. As a professional recruiter for CleanTech companies, Ian has been giving valuable career advice on the CleanTechies Blog (read for example “A Crisis is a Terrible Thing to Waste” or “Does your CleanTech job hunt s***?“). Today, I want to draw your attention to some upcoming career fairs you shouldn’t miss if you’re in the area and looking for a job in this space. Events like these are a great way to learn more about the industry, its key players and what different companies are looking for in their new hires. Some of the job fairs post open positions on their web sites and offer on-site one-on-one interviews to selected candidates. My advice: even if you don’t get an interview, visit your favorite companies’ booths, and talk to their recruiters and managers. Not only can you get valuable insights into their hiring and selection processes, you might also meet somebody who can be a  good reference when applying to your dream job.

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45 minutes of engaging discourse – last night Van Jones, president and founder of “Green For All”, had his audience, made up largely of members of the greater Berkeley community, enthralled. In an age of public relations, spin and hype we had before us one of the rare respites of integrity, in a man that gets the (positive) credit he deserves.  If you’ve not yet heard him speak, check out the clip below, you will hear a very compelling and articulate argument to invest in our capacity by developing our workforce.

As I looked around the room there were students, faculty, venture capitalists, social workers, community activists, environmentalists, non-profit organizers and reporters; Van can bring people together like no other, but being on a university campus brought an even more diverse group of people to the event. I thought back to the countless symposiums (symposia?) I have been to over the years – without fail it has been those organized by the universities have brought the most diverse audiences of participants together – and in that mix, the magic of cross pollination happens.

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Crikey!! I seem to have started a bit of a debate about the validity of the word expert and its use in our courageous clean tech world. It appears that some of you are happy in your expert skin. While others are more coy and think of the term as a passing trend, which makes sense in that if you are currently the only one with a bit of an answer then you my friend are most definitely it for the time being – whether you like it or not.

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We thought you might be interested in finding information about CleanTech events on the CleanTechies website. Below, we put together a first overview of some upcoming conferences around the world. This is just a start, stay tuned as we will announce more events on this Blog.If you would like us to mention a particular event, please contact us or simply post a comment below. We will update this list to reflect relevant entries. This post has been updated to include additional events.

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