Gates has an history of funding solutions to problems that don't need solutions and being pretty bad about predicting the future. He invested a lot in "solving" malaria, a problem which is already solved by the virtue of building normal modern infrastructure. Same goes for "climate change", another non problem that doesn't require any solution. But maybe some of those companies will solve other problems of making certain things cost effective with no relation to climate change.
Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
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Re: Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
#22Zero Mass Water: A startup selling specialized panels that use solar power and batteries to pull water from the air. The goal is to reduce the amount of energy needed to access clean drinking water without geographical limitations. There is a lot of energy involved in the phase change of water. We've also had dehumidifiers for over 100 years. The takeaway from that is, dehumidifiers produce don't produce water well i…
Yes it is energy intensive but it's for a niche application:
Allowing access for clean water in areas where it is prohibitively more expensive (monetarily and energy wise) to get clean water. Think remote or disaster stricken areas (with appropriate conditions to use the device).
Re: Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
#23> These startups progress slowly and at great expense, earning them the moniker “tough tech” because they work on difficult problems that require fundamental breakthroughs. I am genuinely curious if for-profit startups is the right setting for "fundamental breakthroughs". Could the current nuclear power technology have been invented by a startup for example?
I guess the answer depends on which country you're talking about. The U.S. government pioneered nuclear power but has done very little with it over the past several decades, and has impeded private efforts. Canada has a regulatory system friendlier to reactor startups than the U.S., and at least one molten salt reactor company (Terrestrial Energy) is making good progress there. China has an aggressive government prog…
Besides, comparing the efficacy or ability of government's in 1940s wartime vs the modern nation states is a terrible idea and is very weakly related. In terms of pure scale, administrative top heaviness, legislative/regulatory oversight has expanded 100x in the past century, the degree of economic intervention, access to talent in peacetime, etc are all vastly different.
Even NASA in the peacetime 1950-60s which was so famously efficient and effective was largely the result of talent quickly absorbed from private industry and academia into one organization. It was a newish organization which held many of the benefits of non-gov/private organizations, as they were not yet fully affected by the heavy bureaucratic and political load which hits every government agency over time.
The type of stuff that scares away the raw talent and creatives and shifts to a system which values people who play politics and shifts power to administrative roles over the producers. https://www.jerrypournelle.com/reports/jerryp/iron.html
Re: Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
#24> These startups progress slowly and at great expense, earning them the moniker “tough tech” because they work on difficult problems that require fundamental breakthroughs. I am genuinely curious if for-profit startups is the right setting for "fundamental breakthroughs". Could the current nuclear power technology have been invented by a startup for example?
If a self-sustaining nuclear fission reaction had not been previously demonstrated, could you build a proof-of-concept in 2018 on a startup budget? I would say yes. It is conceivable that you could build a modern equivalent of Chicago Pile-1 on a startup budget, assuming that you didn't implement any more safety features than the original CP-1. And if nuclear fission had never been demonstrated before this hypothetic…
Actually uranium at various enrichments is cheaper than ever. SWU cost last year was $125.43/SWU https://www.eia.gov/uranium/marketing/
Re: Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm curious about why you included this sentence: 'The startups announced by BEV so far are all North American, and most of their leadership is also largely white and male' I mean, isn't it enough for BEV to help fund a small sample of companies tackling some of the most challenging problems on earth? Probability of success in such an endeavour is already vanishingly small without adding further constraints. Aren't i…
It's ludicrous to think good ideas only come from North America and white males. Carmichael Roberts agreed with me. His words were that my question felt "piercing" because he was not at liberty to tell me about some of the companies outside the US with diverse leadership, but he said he will soon say more. Rodi Guidero agreed and said to look at the BEV team. It's very diverse: http://www.b-t.energy/ventures/team/ We…
> but if you want to elevate those that don't come from privileged backgrounds you have to work harder.
I'm not white yet from a very privileged background. I find the way you so casually equate ethnic origin and social background to be quite shocking frankly.
Re: Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
If a self-sustaining nuclear fission reaction had not been previously demonstrated, could you build a proof-of-concept in 2018 on a startup budget? I would say yes. It is conceivable that you could build a modern equivalent of Chicago Pile-1 on a startup budget, assuming that you didn't implement any more safety features than the original CP-1. And if nuclear fission had never been demonstrated before this hypothetic…
Actually uranium at various enrichments is cheaper than ever. SWU cost last year was $125.43/SWU https://www.eia.gov/uranium/marketing/
Right, that's true in the actual world. I'm trying to imagine a world where a startup is developing nuclear power for the very first time, which includes developing/building any enrichment technologies their reactor might depend upon.
I don't think that a reactor requiring enriched fuel is a good Very First Reactor design -- and the actual first reactors did not require enriched fuel -- but enrichment came up in the course of answering whether a startup could invent a modern reactor in the absence of an existing nuclear industry.
Re: Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's ludicrous to think good ideas only come from North America and white males. Carmichael Roberts agreed with me. His words were that my question felt "piercing" because he was not at liberty to tell me about some of the companies outside the US with diverse leadership, but he said he will soon say more. Rodi Guidero agreed and said to look at the BEV team. It's very diverse: http://www.b-t.energy/ventures/team/ We…
> but if you want to elevate those that don't come from privileged backgrounds you have to work harder. I'm not white yet from a very privileged background. I find the way you so casually equate ethnic origin and social background to be quite shocking frankly.
What race do you consider yourself to be fvdessen?
http://frederic.vanderessen.com/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/fr%C3%A9d%C3%A9ric-van-der-essen... https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=fvdessen
Re: Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
#28I wrote this article, and I'm happy to field any questions
I'm curious about why you included this sentence: 'The startups announced by BEV so far are all North American, and most of their leadership is also largely white and male' I mean, isn't it enough for BEV to help fund a small sample of companies tackling some of the most challenging problems on earth? Probability of success in such an endeavour is already vanishingly small without adding further constraints. Aren't i…
> Probability of success in such an endeavour is already vanishingly small without adding further constraints.
Wouldn't only choosing North American startups (along with having a largely white and male leadership ) be a constraint in itself? Either way, the next part states it will be more international when the companies go public over time.
Now, that's not to say they've specifically gone out and chose startups with a white male leadership but I've seen places try to explain this away by saying they "chose the best person for the job" which sounds awfully familiar to "companies with most promise".
Re: Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
#29Zero Mass Water: A startup selling specialized panels that use solar power and batteries to pull water from the air. The goal is to reduce the amount of energy needed to access clean drinking water without geographical limitations. There is a lot of energy involved in the phase change of water. We've also had dehumidifiers for over 100 years. The takeaway from that is, dehumidifiers produce don't produce water well i…
I absolutely agree with you - this is bad allocation of money and effort.
I just cannot think of a niche where these units would actually make sense.
It is a terrible idea to use these for disaster relief - never mind the cost, it would be better to ship in an equal weight of water.
It is wrong to use these wherever there is salt water, or polluted water - it would be far cheaper to purify whatever water there is.
And it is a bad idea to use them at remote locations, as emergency supplies or wherever reliability is important. Again, equal weight of bottled water would be much cheaper, and safer - bottled water will not break down.
I invite anybody (Mr Carmichael Roberts or company itself) to outline a scenario where this technology is preferred over reverse osmosis, or bottled water. The "Applications" page on the company web site demonstrates IMO 100% wastefully inappropriate applications. Happy to comment on any specific one of those.
Re: Bill Gates-led $1B energy fund expands startup portfolio fighting climate change
#30Zero Mass Water: A startup selling specialized panels that use solar power and batteries to pull water from the air. The goal is to reduce the amount of energy needed to access clean drinking water without geographical limitations. There is a lot of energy involved in the phase change of water. We've also had dehumidifiers for over 100 years. The takeaway from that is, dehumidifiers produce don't produce water well i…
So the tech inside Zero Mass Water is not the same as dehumidifier. Instead, they use a sophisticated absorbent to selectively capture water, heat it to release the water, then sterilize and add minerals. But you're right. It's the company that I was most surprised to see in the list. The economics don't yet make sense to me. I pushed Carmichael Roberts (BEV's head of investing) to explain. He said he has studied wat…
>more importantly, he is very impressed by Cody's skill to sell this unit and far wide
That is a really bad reason to invest, given the stated aims of the fund.