320 - Giving Tuesday Special - EarthSpark International is Electrifying Everything - GIVE Today

 
GIVINGTUESDAY IS A GLOBAL GENEROSITY MOVEMENT UNLEASHING THE POWER OF PEOPLE AND ORGANIZATIONS TO TRANSFORM THEIR COMMUNITIES AND THE WORLD.

GIVINGTUESDAY IS A GLOBAL GENEROSITY MOVEMENT UNLEASHING THE POWER OF PEOPLE AND ORGANIZATIONS TO TRANSFORM THEIR COMMUNITIES AND THE WORLD.

 

Welcome back, Solar Warrior.

As the title might suggest, today is #GivingTuesday.

What exactly is Giving Tuesday? You can check out more down below where we give more insight into Giving Tuesday.

We first introduced Giving Tuesday, to our audience here on SunCast a year ago with Kristina Skierka, which is still a worthwhile interview to give a listen (here).

Today, we're going to follow the tradition with an interview of Allison Archambault, President of Earthspark International, a non-profit focused on electrifying rural communities in Haiti and incubating some of the most forward-thinking and innovative grid tech for microgrids.

This brief conversation will provide insights on what Earth spark is all about. Please participate in Giving Tuesday as we do here at SunCast every year. Also also check out Allison’s longer episode, also published today, where I get into the usual details and backstory of Earthspark and Allison’s career.

SUPPORT EarthSpark today as your contribution to women’s empowerment and rural electrification on this GivingTuesday!

What is Giving Tuesday?

GivingTuesday was created in 2012 as a simple idea: a day that encourages people to do good. GivingTuesday was born and incubated at the Belfer Center for Innovation & Social Impact in New York City. GivingTuesday is now an independent nonprofit and a global movement that inspires hundreds of millions of people to give, collaborate, and celebrate generosity.

Whether it’s making someone smile, helping a neighbor or stranger out, showing up for an issue or people we care about, or giving some of what we have to those who need our help, every act of generosity counts, and everyone has something to give.

In an era of global crisis and disconnection, we need new rituals to connect us. As the world’s largest giving movement, we believe we can go further, faster when we unleash generosity together.

More information at https://hq.givingtuesday.org/

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Join me in Supporting Earthspark as your GivingTuesday donation!

Connect with Allison on LinkedIn and Twitter

Check out the work of EarthSpark International on LinkedIn, Twitter, and their website.

Big News + Building Our Future

Books mentioned

Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution - Paul Hawken

319 - How Feminist Electrification is revolutionizing Haiti's grid, with Earthspark International Allison Archambault

319 - Allison Archambault.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior.

Today's entrepreneur is no stranger to not just business in the developing world, but also bridging the gap between business development, sales, and nonprofit fundraising and growth. It's an honor to be able to introduce Allison Archambault and the work of EarthSpark International on this Giving Tuesday.

Allison developed not just her career, but the organization that she's been leading now for a decade, providing light, access to opportunities, and what she refers to as feminist electrification, to the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.

Allison is president of EarthSpark International, a non-profit organization incubating businesses that solve energy poverty. EarthSpark has built a town-sized, solar-powered smart grid in rural Haiti and has spun off a smart meter company, SparkMeter, to unlock business models for grid operators worldwide to expand energy access to low-income customers.

Allison has consulted to clean energy companies, governments, and advocacy groups. She previously worked with 3TIER on large-scale renewable energy siting and integration and with GridPoint, an early cleantech company combining distributed energy storage, solar PV, and energy management.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Support Earthspark on this GivingTuesday (or any other day of the year!)

Connect with Allison on LinkedIn and Twitter

Check out the work of EarthSpark International on LinkedIn, Twitter, and their website.

Big News + Building Our Future

What is Giving Tuesday?

It’s a global generosity movement unleashing the power of people and organizations to transform their communities and the world. GivingTuesday was created in 2012 as a simple idea: a day that encourages people to do good.

Book mentioned

Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution - Paul Hawken

318 - Are high-power home solar + battery systems a game-changer? With Arnold Leitner, CEO of YouSolar Inc.

318 - Arnold Leitner.png

Welcome back, Solar Warriors.

Welcome to a special holiday version of SunCast. Happy Thanksgiving to those of you faithful who listen on the day that episodes are produced.

My dear friend Arnold Leitner, an entrepreneur and pioneer in his own right, founded a company called SkyFuel that, as I was kicking off my career way back in 2005, was already taken on investor dollars and cranking out a really novel product in the concentrating solar photovoltaic industry.

Arnold Leitner is a clean-tech pioneer, Founder & CEO of YouSolar, Inc. an affordable, user-friendly, plug-and-pay solution. The systems feature a proprietary DC bus architecture, sophisticated energy management, and a stunning user interface.

For those of you who've been following along, CSP has been sidetracked lately by the ridiculously fast dropping costs of photovoltaics, and Arnold and I get into how, as a young entrepreneur in his late 20s, early 30s, he had to pivot his career away from the technology he had selected and raise money for towards what the inevitability of the industry was going to be.

We talk about how he also has taken alternative strategies for fundraising. And I have so much respect for this entrepreneur and the way that he has learned to thrive and pivot, raise money and satisfy customers and investors alike in his 20 years in cleantech.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Connect with Arnold on LinkedIn

Check out the work of YouSolar Inc. at their website, and follow them on Twitter

How does an afterburner work?

Mentioned books

Let My People Go Sufring: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman - Yvon Chouinard

The Prepper's Medical Handbook - William Forgey

317 - The Great Solar Debate: Can Energy Management Software Alone Replace Batteries?

317 - The Great Solar Debate.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior.

Welcome to another Tactical Tuesday, a short-form conversation with subject-matter experts designed to give you practical tools, tips, and advice for building your solar business or career. What you’re about to hear is a recorded version of an insightful debate we hosted at SPI, ESI & NORTH AMERICA SMART ENERGY WEEK 2020.

Can energy management software alone replace batteries? This was an amazing roundtable discussion sparring back and forth between our good friends, John Powers over at Extensible Energy, Andrew Tanner at Yotta Energy, and also Jonás Villalba from Promise Energy, three practitioners both using, creating, and evangelizing energy management software and storage.

If you’d like to watch the replay of this debate, make sure to subscribe to our Youtube channel so you don’t miss whenever we publish new podcast episodes, live interviews with cleantech pros, and more.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Connect with John on LinkedIn

Connect with Andrew on LinkedIn

Connect with Jonas on LinkedIn

316 - Culture-centric tech startup raises $25m for Demand Response, Gregg Dixon of Voltus Inc.

316 - Gregg Dixon.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior.

Today's entrepreneur is no stranger to distributed energy, and high growth startups. Gregg Dixon has held executive marketing and sales roles in public companies in consulting, energy, petrochemical products, heck, even crayons. But nothing has captured and commanded his attention and focus, like saving customers money on their energy bills.

We're going to dig into how he's helped literally thousands of businesses save money and how he's turning an entire industry on its head with smart tech and deep culture. After a decade of running one of the most successful public companies and demand response, Gregg has just raised 25 million dollars for his own startup called Voltus, Inc.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Who is a Voltan_.png
 

Influence - Robert Cialdini

The Grid: The Fraying Wires Between Americans and Our Energy Future - Gretchen Bakke

Oil 101 - Morgan Downey

The Prize - Daniel Yergin

AC/DC: The Savage Tale of the First Standards War - Tom McNichol

Internal Combustion: The Story of a Marriage and a Murder in the Motor City - Joyce Maynard

315 - How will VR be used in Solar training? 40+ year Solar Pioneer, Mark Mrohs, Part 2

315 - Mark Mrohs.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior!

Mark Mrohs is a true solar pioneer and lifelong dedicated educator for our industry. If you missed Part 1 of this episode, I really encourage you to press pause here, and go back and listen to part 1. I think that it would be helpful to better understand Mark’s background and trajectory.

Today, Mark and I go into a lot on his theory of learning, where he sees the world of virtual reality and whether or not we're ready for it. VR Headsets like Oculus and many other headset makers are changing the way we think about virtual reality.

I hope that you'll have some takeaways from this episode, as I did around the trade gap in many industries and how we are working towards training the next generation, all the hundreds of thousands of people we need, both in the field and in the office, to help make sure that the electricity sector is converted to clean and renewable energy.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Connect with Mark on LinkedIn

Check out Mark’s website

Check out the work of Solar Energy International at their website and follow them on Twitter

 

Oculus Quest 2, Advanced All-In-One Virtual Reality Headset

 

Mentioned books

The Prophet - Kahlil Gibran

It Can't Happen Here - Sinclair Lewis

Ishmael - Daniel Quinn

The Chalice and The Blade - Riane Eisler

When God Was A Woman - Merlin Stone

314 - How will VR be used in Solar training? 40+ year Solar Pioneer, Mark Mrohs, Part 1

314 - Mark Mrohs.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior.

We're going to jump into what I expect to be a very exciting and interesting conversation with Mark Mrohs, a true solar pioneer. A couple of things as his accreditations just to set the stage, Mark was Training Director for ARCO Solar Inc, Siemens Solar, AstroPower, SunPower, SunEdison, of course, he's an instructor for Solar Energy International, and he was a Technician at Spectrolab Inc. before that.

He's also had some time now focused on virtual reality with a young company called Interplay Learning down in Austin. Mark has had such a fascinating life and it's all centered around training in the solar photovoltaic industry.

It's been so long coming that I sat down with Mark for a long period of time, just catching up and having fun. We've broken this conversation down into Two Episodes. What got Mark into the industry? A deep dive into how he thinks about education and how the education of our industry is evolving.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Connect with Mark on LinkedIn

Check out the work of Interplay Learning at their website and follow them on Twitter

Check out the work of Solar Energy International at their website and follow them on Twitter

 

Oculus Quest 2, Advanced All-In-One Virtual Reality Headset

 

Books mentioned

The Prophet - Kahlil Gibran

It Can't Happen Here - Sinclair Lewis

Ishmael - Daniel Quinn

The Chalice and The Blade - Riane Eisler

When God Was A Woman - Merlin Stone

313 - How Clean Energy Jobs can lead the recovery, with Abby Hopper, Emilie Wangerman, Erika Symmonds, and Audrey Lee

313 - How Clean Energy Jobs Can Lead The Recovery.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior.

Welcome to another Tactical Tuesday, a short-form conversation with subject-matter experts designed to give you practical tools, tips and advice for building your solar business or career. What you’re about to hear is a recorded keynote of Day 2 of our SunCast Career Summit.

Clean Energy has led the job-creation efforts for the decade since the last recession. Hear from industry insiders, SEIA’s Abby Hopper, Lightsource BP’s Emilie Wangerman, GRID Alternatives’ Erika Symmonds, and Clean Energy for Biden’s Audrey Lee, Ph.D., on what roles are being hired for and where we might see the greatest momentum coming out of the current crisis.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Video replays are part of the paid SunCast Career Summit Evergreen ticket, and are still available for purchase. Get access to the video replay of this and other sessions from our SunCast Career Summit by clicking here. Use the code TRIBE20 for a 20% discount.

Connect with Abby on LinkedIn

Connect with Emilie on LinkedIn

Connect with Erika on LinkedIn

Connect with Audrey on LinkedIn

312 - How to productize renewable energy assets, with Emilie Wangerman, VP Business Dev. at Lightsource BP

312 - Emilie Wangerman.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior!

Today is going to be a fun look inside the inner workings of one of the hot fast growing development companies in North America utility scale solar development.

I have really enjoyed the conversations that I've been having with Miss Emilie Wangerman, the Vice President of Business Development for Lightsource BP. Emilie has over 8 years of experience in power markets and energy policy, on both the buy-and-sell side of solar, storage, and distributed energy resources (DERs), as well as experience with generation and electric system operations and utility rate design, which is complemented by her background in technology development and process engineering.

We go deep into how Emily started at Lightsource how she has grown into an executive in the industry, and the intentional and not so intentional decisions that led her down that path. We also take a look at the way her experience at previous firms like PG&E and GE which have informed some of the decisions that she now gets to execute inside the marketplace. It's a wide-ranging conversation with someone I find particularly very interesting, and I hope you will too.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Connect with Emilie on LinkedIn and follow her on Twitter

Check out the work of Lightsource BP at their website

Read:

One Year On

Books mentioned

Daring Greatly - Brené Brown

Salt: A World History - Mark Kurlansky

The Vanishing Half - Brit Bennett

311 - SunCast Weekly Roundup, Presented by LG! Week 7

311 - SPI Weekly Roundup Week 7.png

We're so excited to be back with you for SPI, ESI & NORTH AMERICA SMART ENERGY WEEK 2020 in its new virtual format. This is the final edition of the SunCast Weekly Roundup, presented by LG Solar, where we decided to go LIVE and catch some of the big takeaways from the first-ever Virtual Solar Power International.

In today’s episode, my Co-Host Joshua Porter from SolarCoaster and I held interesting conversations Inside the Green Room with cleantech leaders like Erika Myers from Smart Electric Power Alliance, Tara Lynn Gray from Fresno Metro Black Chamber of Commerce, David Schlosberg from Enel X, and AJ Perkins from Instant ON as they share with us their final insights on the sessions from last week, their experience participating in this fully-virtual format of North America’s most popular cleantech tradeshow, and what to expect for next year.

We had Brian Lynch, LG Electronic’s Director of Solar and Storage, and Julia Pyper, Host and Producer of Political Climate, starring yet again in our newest segment, “Industry Pulse, Presented by LG Solar”. During each week of the event, Brian went 1 on 1 with an industry expert to get hot takes and the latest topics impacting our industry.

We also spoke to Ann Gaglioti from Groundwork Renewables, and Christian Roselund from Rocky Mountain Institute, on the importance of the presidential elections for the clean energy industry, and why you should go out and vote!

Lastly, we had Danielle Danko from Solar Energy Trade Shows to wrap up these 7 weeks of content with some final thoughts around the efforts to bring SPI to life virtually, how the Virtual Tradeshow will go through the end of the year, and expectations for next year’s edition.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsors, PowerHub, and Lightsource BP for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

310 - Span.io is revolutionizing a 100 year old home appliance, with CEO Arch Rao, ex Tesla Powerwall lead

310 - Arch Rao.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior.

Today’s guest is Arch Rao, Founder & CEO of Span.IO, a technology company reinventing the electrical panel to enable the rapid adoption of renewable energy.  He is an engineer and entrepreneur with expertise in research, development and commercialization of energy technologies.

We’re going to not only explore how Span is advancing the very technology that supports your home devices, but also the background of this engineer and entrepreneur, and his expertise in storage systems and their integration to our energy world.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Connect with Arch on LinkedIn

Check out the work of Span at their website and Twitter

 

Start With Why - Simon Sinek

309 - SunCast Weekly Roundup Live at SPI 2020, Week 6

309 - SPI Weekly Roundup Week 6.png

We're so excited to be back with you for SPI, ESI & NORTH AMERICA SMART ENERGY WEEK 2020 in its new virtual format. We're stoked to have been invited back by the SPI team to bring you an exciting new segment - the SunCast Weekly Roundup, presented by LG Solar. This is a recap of week 6, focused on Grid Integration.

In today’s episode, you’ll be able to hear insights from clean-energy thought leaders like Daisy Meyer, Robert Broadwater, Gwen Yamamoto and Lavannya Pulluveetil Barrera, as they share with us their insights on week 6 sessions, as well as their experience of participating in this fully-virtual format of North America’s most popular cleantech tradeshow.

We also had Brian Lynch, LG Electronic’s Director of Solar and Storage, and Kenneth Locklin, Director at Impax Asset Management, LLC starring in our newest segment, “Industry Pulse, Presented by LG Solar”. Each week, Brian will go 1 on 1 with an industry expert to get hot takes and the latest topics impacting our industry.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 300 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsors, PowerHub, and Lightsource BP for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

308 - How-to LinkedIn from a certified expert, Andy Foote of LinkedInsights

308 - Andy Foote.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior!

Welcome to another Tactical Tuesday, a short-form conversation with subject-matter experts designed to give you practical tools, tips and advice for building your solar business or career.

Today’s guest is Andy Foote, a professional LinkedIn consultant. He’s spent the last decade obsessively testing multiple engagement strategies and building a large and supportive network on the largest professional networking website in the World. His podcast, Foote Notes, is an interview show featuring interesting people that he’s discovered on LinkedIn.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 300 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsors, PowerHub, and Lightsource BP for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Listen to Andy’s podcast, Foote Notes

Connect with Andy on LinkedIn and Twitter

Check out Andy’s work at LinkedInsights

Read:

The LinkedIn Algorithm Explained In 25 Frequently Asked Questions

The Sophisticated User's Guide To LinkedIn

307 - How NREL helps bring Cleantech innovations to market, with Trish Cozart, Innovation & Entrepreneurship Center Group Manager

307 - Trish Cozart.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior.

Thank you for giving me your time for yet another fantastic foray into the world of renewable energy, always listening to how these businesses are built and careers are made.

This week we have a really interesting angle on the way that cleantech companies are lifted from the dust.

Today's intrapreneur and entrepreneur is Trish Cozart, Program Manager for the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Center at the National Renewable Energy Lab in Colorado. Now, Trish has been recommended by several people, but a special shoutout to Antenna Group for helping make this interview happen for you.

Trish and I really dig into how the National Renewable Energy Lab, through its Innovation Entrepreneurship Center, is helping to spur entrepreneurship, hence supporting what most cleantech activists and advocates are trying to bring in to the world, both from funding as well as enabling a much broader network, far beyond just the dollars that go into the companies that come through the cohort's in her organization within NREL.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Connect with Trish on LinkedIn and Twitter

Check out the work of NREL Innovation & Entrepreneurship at their website

Books mentioned

 

Breaking The Rules: Removing the Obstacles to Effortless High Performance - Kurt Wright

 

Wells Fargo Innovation Incubator (IN2) Cohort 6

 
 

306 - SunCast Weekly Roundup Live at SPI 2020, Week 5

306 - SPI Weekly Roundup Week 5.png

We're so excited to be back with you for SPI, ESI & NORTH AMERICA SMART ENERGY WEEK 2020 in its new virtual format. We're stoked to have been invited back by the SPI team to bring you an exciting new segment - the SunCast Weekly Roundup, presented by LG Solar. This is a recap of week 5, focused on Grid Integration.

In today’s episode, you’ll be able to hear insights from clean-energy thought leaders like Emma Nicholson, Jon Wellinghoff, and Dawn Weisz, as they share with us their insights on week 5 sessions, as well as their experience of participating in this fully-virtual format of North America’s most popular cleantech tradeshow.

We also had Brian Lynch, LG Electronic’s Director of Solar and Storage, and Ian Lochore, Vice President and General Manager of Baker Electric Home Energy starring in our newest segment, “Industry Pulse, Presented by LG Solar”. Each week, Brian will go 1 on 1 with an industry expert to get hot takes and the latest topics impacting our industry.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 300 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsors, PowerHub, and Lightsource BP for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

305 - What is localized generation? With Phil Watts

305 - Phil.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior!

Special shoutout to Nicole Watson from Iconic Earth Foundation back in Episode 277 for the intro to Dr. Phil Watts, today’s entrepreneur.

Dr. Watts studied aeronautical engineering at McGill University, and went on to earn his Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering Sciences from Caltech, where he lobbied for on-campus recycling and green buildings. Upon graduation, he worked as a research scientist for around a decade, publishing more than 30 scientific papers in some of the top peer-reviewed journals in the world. This pioneering work, carried out with renowned academic colleagues, created the foundations for a brand new field of science and resulted in at least one paper being referenced more than 100 times.

Today’s story is about a critical moment in 2002 when his daughter was born, and the newspaper headlines rang alarm bells that would forever change the history for him and his family, as well as how he showed up to the world. Stick around to find more about what has happened ever since.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 310 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsor, PowerHub for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Connect with Phil on LinkedIn

Check out the work of Resource Renewable Energy, Inc. on their website

304 - SunCast Weekly Roundup Live at SPI 2020, Week 4

304 - SPI Weekly Roundup Week 4.png

We're so excited to be back with you for SPI, ESI & NORTH AMERICA SMART ENERGY WEEK 2020 in its new virtual format. Alongside my friend Glenda Johnson, we're stoked to have been invited back by the SPI team to bring you an exciting new segment - the SunCast Weekly Roundup, presented by LG Solar. This is a recap of week 4, where interesting sessions like “Using Storage to Achieve Long-Term Equity Outcomes “, and “Storage Solutions for Utilities” took place.

In today’s episode, you’ll be able to hear insights from clean-energy thought leaders like Jessica Lim, Kate Howling, Cameron Freberg, and Marion Hill as they share with us their insights on week 4 sessions, as well as their experience of participating in this fully-virtual format of North America’s most popular cleantech tradeshow.

We also had Brian Lynch, LG Electronic’s Director of Solar and Storage, and Mike Casey, Founder of Tigercomm starring in our newest segment, “Industry Pulse, Presented by LG Solar”. Each week, Brian will go 1 on 1 with an industry expert to get hot takes and the latest topics impacting our industry.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 300 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsors, PowerHub, and Lightsource BP for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

303 - How & why to put together a 30/60/90 plan for/as a new hire, with Hanna Grene from PXiSE

303 - Hanna.png

Welcome back, Solar Warrior.

This is Two For Tuesday! Whether that's a Tactical Tuesday or just content from our many live events like SunCast Weekly Roundup, Presented by LG! or the SunCast Career Summit, this is going to be a short form conversation typically with subject matter experts designed to give you the practical tools tips, and advice for building your solar business or career, and grow with us here on SunCast as I know you will.

In case you haven’t heard about Hanna Grene, Head of Commercial Development for PXiSE Energy Solutions, I invite you to listen to episode 296 where she and I talked about the 16 Core Infrastructure Sectors of Modern Economy.

In today’s interview with Hanna, we‘re going to deep into a framework we’ve both used in our career: a 30/60/90 plan. Michael D. Watkins, author of the book “The First 90 Days” framed this out for millions of other hiring managers, and Hanna will help us understand what the framework is, how to best apply it, why would someone use it, and who would find this framework useful.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 300 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsors, PowerHub, and Lightsource BP for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

Connect with Hanna on LinkedIn and Twitter

Check out PXiSE on Twitter and their website

Read: Guidance on the Essential Critical Infrastructure Workforce

CISA’s Frequently Asked Questions

Books mentioned

The First 90 Days - Michael D. Watkins

Talking to Humans - Giff Constable

Strategize to Win - Carla A. Harris

The Art of Authenticity - Karissa Thacker

302 - Solar’s Fit in Public Power, with Paula Gold-Williams, President & CEO of CPS Energy

302 - Paula.png

This is Public Power Week

Welcome back, Solar Warrior
This week's entrepreneur is someone who's risen to the title of CEO of the largest public power, gas, and electric utility in the United States, CPS Energy down in San Antonio. If you’re from Texas, then this episode is especially for you.

Paula Gold-Williams is the President & CEO of  CPS Energy, a company that has over 3,100 employees and more than two billion dollars in annual revenue. Paula leads more than 3,100 team members with the vision she has coined “People First,” whereby CPS Energy is evolving its efforts to create and deliver value to its customers, community, and employees into a new age of energy solutions.

I was impressed with the thoughtfulness that she and her team have crafted around a massive renewable energy commitment. They've just rounded out an RFI for 900 megawatts of solar and storage, which is a historic amount of renewable energy to be added to the CPS portfolio.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 300 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsors, Extensible Energy, PowerHub, and Lightsource BP for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Join us at SunCast Puerto Rico

Remember that our upcoming 3D immersive event, SunCast Puerto Rico, is starting next Monday, October 12th. Make sure to save your spot at suncastpr.com

Resources

Why are there still so few black CEOs?

Paula Gold Williams at PechaKucha San Antonio Vol. 34

Even Renewables Are Bigger In Texas

Acciona buys 240-MW solar project in Texas

Vistra retiring coal plants, breaking ground on 6 solar projects

American Public Power Association - Stats and Facts

Connect with Paula on LinkedIn

Check out the work of CPS Energy on LinkedIn and their website

301 - SunCast 5-year Anniversary with Adam James, Part 2

301 - Adam James Pt2.png

SunCast Podcast 5-year Anniversary

Today is the official 5-year anniversary of SunCast, and I want to thank you again for being along for the ride.

If you didn’t have a chance to listen to part 1 of this episode, I invite you to check it out clicking here. During that episode, Impact Energy Solution’s Adam James and I walked down memory lane and reminisced some interesting facts about the clean energy industry back in 2015 when SunCast began.

This is Part 2, where we get really deep into Adam’s daily routine, how he manages his calendar, and how he manages his schedule. Adam kind of gives all about how he balances a family of three and being the effectively right hand of the CEO of this major venture fund. It's a wide-ranging but very fun conversation. I hope that you'll stick around and enjoy it.

If you love this episode, then you should check out our more than 300 additional founder stories and startup advice at www.mysuncast.com. And sign up to receive a notification when the next episodes have dropped!

Thanks a ton to our podcast sponsors, Extensible Energy, PowerHub, and Lightsource BP for continuing to help make this content FREE to You! Please check them out and let me know what you think!

Resources

What was happening when Adam and I recorded Episode #1?

CO2 Levels in 2015

2015 Renewable Energy Data Book

Adam’s Go-to note-taking tool

Connect with Adam on LinkedIn and Twitter

Check out the work of Energy Impact Partners on their website

Check out the work of Clean Energy Leadership Institute on their website

Books mentioned

The Idiot - Fyodor Dostoyevsky