ABOUT CLIMATE PROSPERITY

The Climate Prosperity Initiative is aimed at reducing our use of fossil fuels while accelerating the emergence of a cleantech sector in Silicon Valley.

What are we doing?

Building on Silicon Valley’s history of innovation, Joint Venture is working with business, government, academia, labor and the community to encourage the growth of our clean and green industries as they simultaneously reduce greenhouse gas emissions.  The strategy for this initiative – The Greenprint for Silicon Valley –provides the framework for a plan of action to insure that Silicon Valley is the leader in the clean energy revolution that will meet our current economic, environmental and energy challenges.  The Climate Prosperity Initiative focuses on four areas based on the California Global Warming Solutions Act and the opportunity to leverage local resources: renewable energy, building efficiency, clean and convenient transportation, and green infrastructure.

This effort has been focused on the following project areas:

• Accelerating improved energy efficiency in existing buildings
• Exploring funding mechanisms to finance carbon abatement technologies
• Identifying impediments to the adoption of renewable energy technologies
• Growing the energy storage industry in Silicon Valley
• Growing the smart grid industry and create a large scale demonstration site for the smart grid in Silicon Valley

Why are we doing it?

It has been scientifically proven that our climate is changing. Emissions reduction targets and renewable portfolio standards have already been established to help mitigate the impacts of climate change.  The goal of the Climate Prosperity Initiative is to develop a roadmap for how Silicon Valley can help achieve these goals while also driving local economic growth.

In Silicon Valley, we have a unique advantage.  We both produce and consume the technologies, products and services needed to achieve Climate Prosperity.  Our strategy is to stimulate local demand for clean and green technology and supply those solutions to global markets.  Silicon Valley is uniquely prepared for this challenge.  The region has been at the forefront of information technology and biotechnology innovation, positioning Silicon Valley to be a global leader in clean technology innovation.  We also have supportive public policies, the venture capital community, research programs and a talented workforce.

Achieving Climate Prosperity has significant benefits for Silicon Valley:

• More energy efficient homes and cars mean less money spent on energy and more disposable income that is likely to stay in the community.
• Adding solar and other renewable energy sources on local homes and offices accomplishes important energy goals, expands a newly emerging sector, and stimulates the local economy.
• Retrofitting homes and offices to be more energy efficient creates new jobs for construction workers, energy auditors, efficiency monitoring tools, network installers, and manufacturers of products ranging from temperature sensors to building components made from sustainable materials.
• Transportation alternatives reduce our use of fossil fuels, clean up the air, and have important lifestyle and health benefits.
• Livable, walkable, sustainable communities are more appealing to the rising generation of talent that we need to locate here.
• Progress on all these fronts helps California achieve its goal of reducing emissions by 80% from 1990 levels by 2050.

Who’s involved?

The Climate Prosperity Council is composed of leading minds from all aspects of the clean technology sector in Silicon Valley. It is chaired by San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed and Chris DiGiorgio, California Managing Director of Accenture, who also serve as co-chairs of Joint Venture's Board of Directions.  Council members include:

• Chuck Reed, City of San José – Co-Chair
• Chris DiGiorgio, Accenture – Co-Chair
• Mark Bauhaus, Juniper Networks
  Jessy Borges, Bloom Energy
  
• Doug Davenport, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
• Ben Foster, Optony
• Charlie Gay, Applied Materials Inc.
• Todd Glass, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich Rosati
• Carl Guardino, Silicon Valley Leadership Group
• Don Hall, Pacific Gas & Electric
  
• Russell Hancock, Joint Venture Silicon Valley
  Bryan Hannegan, Electric Power Research Institute
• Scott Jacobs, McKinsey & Company
• David MacMillan, MegaWatt Storage Farms
• Michael Marlaire, NASA Ames Research Park
• Tom McCalmont, McCalmont Engineering
• Rick Needham, Google
• Bobby Ram, SunPower
• Harry Sim, Cypress Envirosystems
• Tim Walsh, Silicon Valley Bank

The Climate Prosperity Initiative was launched in early 2009 and is funded, in part, by a generous grant from leading solar and semiconductor equipment manufacturer Applied Materials.

What are the latest developments?

Climate Prosperity reached a major milestone in September 2012 with the launch of the Smart Energy Enterprise Development Zone (SEEDZ) initiative. 

The Smart Energy Enterprise Development Zone is located in an area spanning north Sunnyvale, north Mountain View and Moffett Field.  This zone will serve as a replicable example for development and implementation of “smart energy” solutions in other regions, and incorporates Silicon Valley’s latest developments in efficiency, clean energy, grid performance and business model integration.   SEEDZ aims to create:

• The country’s highest-performance two-way power network, supporting and rewarding active energy management and clean distributed generation on a sustainable economic scale.
• A replicable example that demonstrates Silicon Valley’s latest developments in efficiency, clean energy, grid performance, and business model integration.

We have already engaged many of the larger companies in the zone, including Juniper Networks, Google, NetApp, Yahoo and others, as well as the cities of Sunnyvale and Mountain View.  Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, EPRI, PG&E and other members of our Climate Prosperity Council are acting in an advisory capacity to this effort.

The SEEDZ goals, vision and strategy are outlined in the report Uniting Performance and Sustainability in the Power Network of the Future.  This report is the result of a three month stakeholder vetting process, and we believe it is a compelling manifesto describing the need and opportunity for a large-scale smart energy project in Silicon Valley, laying out a path for national leadership on smart energy collaboration.  The report was presented to and adopted by the Climate Prosperity Council on September 28, 2012.

More information on SEEDZ can be found at www.jointventure.org/seedz.

On May 30, 2012, we held the third annual Silicon Valley Energy Storage Symposium.  More information about Joint Venture's Energy Storage Initiative is available here.

In October of 2011, in partnership with the California Clean Energy Fund (CalCEF), the Climate Prosperity Initiative contributed to the publication of a white paper titled “Insuring Innovation: Reducing the Cost of Performance Risk for Projects Employing Emerging Technologies.”  The publication details a set of recommendations for the cleantech industry to engage the insurance sector in helping finance commercial-scale implementations of new energy technologies.

In June of 2011, the Climate Prosperity Council brought together companies, organizations and local governments from the Moffett Field area to begin the process of implementing our community smart grid effort around Moffett Park.  The goal of this effort is to locate a fully-integrated smart grid in and around Moffett Field.

What are the next steps?

We have initiated work on the first phase of the SEEDZ project plan.  Beyond the SEEDZ vision and strategy report, Phase 0: Collaboration Development includes organizational and engagement components, starting up several “quick-win” initiatives, and performing a strategic needs assessment.

We have started to work on the quick win initiative focused on power quality within the zone.  We are working closely with EPRI, PG&E and zone customer NetApp on this issue and how we can share detailed power quality information among energy customers and the utility, and work toward improving it.  One of our first action items is to hold a set of workshops, scheduled for January 2013, focused on this topic for zone energy customers.

To learn more about the initiative, contact: