Build an Army of Climate Entrepreneurs

It’s a simple but radical prescription. In a 5-minute speech before COP28, SOLshare founder Sebastian Groh lays out what we would need to do to meet the moment. 

Addressing the delegation of 150 ministers from around the globe, he asks:

𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑖𝑓 𝑤𝑒 𝑚𝑖𝑠𝑠 𝑖𝑡? 𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑖𝑓 𝑤𝑒 𝑘𝑒𝑒𝑝 𝑙𝑜𝑜𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑟𝑜𝑛𝑔 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑐𝑒𝑠? 𝐹𝑜𝑐𝑢𝑠 𝑜𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑢𝑠𝑢𝑎𝑙 𝑠𝑢𝑠𝑝𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑠?

We now face a narrow window to change our focus, he emphasizes that necessity is the mother of invention: “people close to problems often come up with the best solutions. If we keep investing in people far from the problems the rest of us face, we won’t build what we need.

This is no idle observation. Groh’s firm, SOLshare, is busy addressing urgent needs in Bangladesh, enabling the country’s millions of electric rickshaws to power buildings with unspent power. In a country that sits 7 feet above sea level and already faces massive displacement due to floods, the cataclysmic effects of climate change are at the gates.

But in receiving the prestigious Zayed Sustainability prize, Groh’s not content to serve as a “poster child” to make the rest of us feel comfortable while we cheer for him.

Instead, he challenges us to raise our hands if we’re willing to fund an army of entrepreneurs working alongside him. Entrepreneurs working to solve climate, starting in the developing world. 

To equip this army, Groh leads the work on RebelBase in Bangladesh—and works directly with colleagues doing so from South Africa to Belarus.

In the talk, Groh makes the following points (for a quick snapshot, here’s the Zayed Prize’s post featuring a 47-second clip.)

There is an alternative:

Fund an army of entrepreneurs working on climate in developing countries.

Startups, in climate, in the developing world. It’s that simple.

Now you might ask, but do those closest to the problem who have a better grasp at solution have the capacity?

I stand here before you today, and in the last ten years I spent in Bangladesh I undertook two experiments to prove that we can.

1st: Building on a world-record of millions of solar home systems in Bangladesh, at SOLshare, we started to connect them, so people could share solar electricity from house to house throughout the country. We weren’t trying to be groundbreaking. We were simply working to meet the need here, where the rubber meets the road. Only later we learned that we were the first ones to have done so in the world.

2nd: Building on Bangladesh’s millions of electric vehicles, local three-wheelers Teslas, we are going even one step further. We use the batteries to power homes, buffer the grid and give the driver’s a higher income at the same time. It’s a simple, yet revolutionary concept: Harness solar energy when needed; use rickshaws even when they’re idle. Aggregated we have the potential to buffer more than 30% of the peak load of the national grid.

𝑂𝑛𝑒 ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑠 𝑎 𝑙𝑜𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑡𝑎𝑙𝑘 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑣𝑖𝑟𝑡𝑢𝑎𝑙 𝑝𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑡𝑠. 𝐵𝑢𝑡 𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛, 𝑖𝑛 𝐵𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑎𝑑𝑒𝑠ℎ 𝑤𝑒’𝑟𝑒 𝑑𝑜𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑖𝑡. 𝐴𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑠𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑠 𝑠ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑢𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑎𝑦.

𝐼𝑓 𝑤𝑒 𝑐𝑎𝑛 𝑑𝑜 𝑖𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒, 𝑤𝑒 𝑐𝑎𝑛 𝑑𝑜 𝑖𝑡 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒. 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑠𝑜𝑛𝑠 𝑤𝑒 𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑛 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑙𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑎𝑦 𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑤𝑎𝑟𝑑.