CTC #64 - Entropy lands $200M and a historic carbon offtake deal

Hey there,

Welcome to another issue of Climate Tech Canada! It’s our first issue of the year, written from the middle of a snowstorm here in Ottawa.

I’m a big annual goal-setting person, and I spent some time over the past few weeks reflecting on CTC and where to go next. I couldn’t do this without you reading every week, and wanted to share a bit about what to expect in the year ahead.

Telling more founder stories … on a podcast

Yep, I’m launching a podcast focused on Canadian climate tech later this quarter. I love talking to founders, and I know that getting more of these stories out there helps build the narratives we want to see. More founders, more people seeing climate as a viable career path, and more ambition.

We have some fantastic guests lined up and I'll share more details and a trailer as soon as I can.

👉🏼 Do you know a climate tech founder climate company that would make a great guest? (Maybe you?) Let me know at [email protected]

More long-form content

I didn’t publish nearly as much of this as I wanted to last year. The pieces on climate-smart housing, insights on climate capital and the H1 Funding Report did well and I’m looking forward to more like this in 2024.

Long form is where I learn the most, and it’s the number one thing that folks have said they want to see more of. It’s hard 😅 but worthwhile. Some topics I’m excited to dive into:

• Battery materials supply chain

• The intersection of climate and AI

• Climate adaptation

• How to make a career switch into climate

👉🏼 Have a topic you think we should cover? Let me know in the comments or hit reply.

More real-world impact

A big theme for me last year was connection. From Toronto’s climate drinks, to 1:1 Zoom and coffee chats, to hosting our first climate tech meetup in Ottawa, getting to know more people in climate was a huge highlight.

This year, I want to keep that trend going with a focus on three areas: careers, capital and community. That means more meetups, job postings, career guides, etc.

Needless to say I’m stoked for this year and to continue building out Canada’s climate tech community with you all. Let’s go!

💰 Funding

💨 Entropy (Calgary, AB) landed $200M in convertible debt from the Canada Growth Fund for its point-source carbon capture and storage technology.

• CGF will also purchase up to 1 million tonnes of CO2 per year at a fixed, 15-year term of $86.50, the first “large-scale, long-term, fixed-price carbon credit offtake agreement in a compliance carbon market”.

• See CGF’s full deck on the investment here.

🚢 Veer Group (Lunenburg, NS) signed a $73.2M letter of intent to finance its first hydrogen and wind-powered container ships. Veer is designing new cargo ships that combine hydrogen and sails to decarbonize shipping, and is in the process of reviewing tenders from shipyards for construction.

💸 Idealist Capital, PaceZero, and The51 Food and AgTech received new funding from the federal government’s Social Finance Fund via Realize Capital Partners. A total of $35.2M was deployed to nine investors.

📈 Milestones & Growth

💨 Carbon capture developer Deep Sky will deploy a 50 tonne direct-air-capture (DAC) unit from Sherbrooke, QC’s Skyrenu. Skyrenu won the XPRIZE Carbon Removal student competition in 2021 and uses modular direct air capture units that can be installed at sequestration sites, eliminating the transportation of captured CO2.

🏗️ Low-carbon cement developer Carbon Upcycling and sustainable building panel company ZS2 Technologies will both join the upcoming cohort of Greentown Labs’ accelerator focused on circularity and decarbonization of the built environment.

🗞️ In the news

🔋 More links in the chain: South Korea’s Bobaek America will build a new battery parts plant in southern Ontario. The plant will manufacture insulation panels and cell sheets for EV batteries, and adds to Ontario’s vision for an end-to-end EV supply chain.

• Honda is also eyeing Canada for an EV plant, potentially next to an existing plant in Ontario. The $13.8B US project could also include in-house battery production

• And an unnamed Japanese company is considering Manitoba for a $1.6B lithium ion battery separator plant.

♻️ Cutting back on plastic: If you’re trying to cut plastic out of your life , it’ll be a little easier in 2024. The federal single-use plastics ban came into effect on December 20th, cutting out checkout bags, cutlery, straws and more. A court decision late last year called some underlying parts of the rules into question, but the ban is still in effect.

• More places are putting their own rules in place as well - B.C. now prevents food service providers from giving out single use plastics unless requested and Calgary will do the same later this month.

• The feds are also consulting on a new plastics registry to monitor the lifecycle of plastic from production to end of life and reduce plastic waste.

• It’s a positive move for companies like Friendlier, Reusables.com and Suppli who are developing and deploying circular solutions for food service.

In other news

• The Arctic ocean is warming faster due to high-carbon outflows from the Mackenzie River in Canada’s north.

• The feds introduced up to $22,000 in funding for low-to-median income households in Newfoundland and Labrador to switch to heat pumps.

• The Saskatchewan government says it will no longer collect the carbon tax on natural gas this year. The move could result in fines or jail time.

• Ontario’s energy board will no longer put the risk of stranded natural gas assets on ratepayers, citing the ongoing shift towards electrification.

📣 What’s going on

📅 Ottawa Climate Exchange: Sustainability Tech: Join us at this fireside discussion featuring Derik Lawlis of Invert. (I’m hosting alongside the Ottawa Climate Tech crew!) Jan 18th, Ottawa.

📅 Climate North: Common Ground Film Screening: Join Toronto’s climate community for a screening of Common Ground, exploring the world of regenerative agriculture and soil health. Jan 17th, Toronto.

📌 Jobs

New year, new job? Check out postings from some of Canada’s most innovative companies including Mangrove Systems (carbon capture software), Adaptis (circular buildings), Spare Labs (on-demand transit) and more!

➡️ Hiring? List your posting here.

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Justin