Like so many things in Silicon Valley, venture capital investment in climate tech is cyclical. Climate tech first gained attention from venture capitalists starting around 2006, thanks in part to legendary venture investor John Doerr. After initially seeming to fizzle, climate tech VC bouced back. In 2021, at least $49 billion of climate tech VC investments were made, which PWC estimates at 14% of the year’s total. Since then, climate tech VC fell again—along with overall venture capital investing, which was hurt by the spike in interest rates that started in 2022.

Yet climate tech investment has continued to make up 10% or more of total venture funding. Even that significant proportion greatly understates the tremendous attention and optimism that climate VC funding continues to attract. Partly this is because Silicon Valley has an outsized influence on our national economy, culture, and discourse. The valley’s can-do attitude, outside-the-box thinking and record of transforming society have generated justified optimism that tech entrepreneurs can help drive progress on climate.

Yet silicon valley’s monomaniacal pursuit of unimaginable profits have sometimes caused its leaders to betray their vaunted ideals of social progress. And tech firms in recent years have often burdened workers, communities, and the broader society with devastating and persistent side effects of the next big thing.

My guest today is Catherine Bracy, founder and CEO of the nonprofit organization TechEquity. She’s also the author of World Eaters: How Venture Capital is Cannibalizing the Economy.

I sat down with Catherine to talk about her insightful book and related work. Although her work doesn’t focus primarily on climate tech, her perceptive critique of Silicon Valley’s excesses and venture capital’s pathologies provided for me a new way to think about the consequences of VC as a driving force behind climate tech.

Additional resources:

• TechEquity
• World Eaters: How Venture Capital is Cannibalizing the Economy

In the U.S., between 2020 and 2024, the total cost of major weather related disasters averaged about $150 billion per year. That’s more than five times the annual average during the 1980s, even after adjusting for inflation. At the same time as they’ve gotten more costly, major disasters have become more frequent. Inevitably, increasing losses have begun to strain property insurers. In some areas, like parts of California, premiums have gone up drastically. In some markets, insurance is now only offered through last-resort government-sponsored programs.

My guest today is Dr. Carolyn Kousky, an expert on disaster insurance and climate risk management. She has advised numerous communities on these subjects. Her many publications include the 2022 book Understanding Disaster Insurance: New Tools for a More Resilient Future. She’s taught courses on related subjects at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. More recently she founded a nonprofit organization called Insurance for Good, and she currently serves as Associate Vice President for Economics and Policy at the Environmental Defense Fund.

I sat down with Carolyn to better understand the current and future points of failure in markets for insurance against weather disasters. I was interested to know what the broader consequences may be of a breakdown in those markets. I wanted to hear about what kinds of innovations or policy changes might help in this critical area of climate finance, which has the potential for such profound effects on households and businesses everywhere.

Additional resources:

• Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS)
• First Street
• United Policyholders
• Insurance for Good
• Understanding Disaster Insurance: New Tools for a More Resilient Future, by Carolyn Kousky
• Environmental Defense Fund (EDF)

Few people are more closely associated with the climate movement than Bill McKibben. In 1989 he published The End of Nature. It was the first popular book for a broad audience on the climate crisis. Over more than 35 years since then, he’s written about 20 books, and many, many articles in prominent publications. In 2008, he founded a climate advocacy nonprofit called 350.org, which now has about $20 million in annual revenues and is active on six continents. More broadly, he played a critical role in establishing a grassroots activist movement for climate action. He’s been instrumental in a number of climate campaigns, encouraging fossil fuel asset divestment and pushing to block construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, among many other efforts.

With all the things he’s been involved with, you or I may quibble with McKibben about this or that particular strategy or tactic or approach. But it’s undeniable that he has worked more tirelessly and authentically over a longer time period than almost anyone toward progress on the climate crisis.

I sat down with Bill to talk about his latest book, which is called Here Comes the Sun: A Last Chance for the Climate and a Fresh Chance for Civilization. I wanted to learn more about how he sees the current role of the climate movement. And I wanted to hear how and why he thinks solar power may provide a uniquely important path forward for climate progress at this dangerous and critical moment.

Additional resources mentioned in this episode:

• Here Comes the Sun by Bill McKibben
• The Crucial Years
• Third Act
• Sun Day
• 350.org
• Short Circuiting Policy, by Leah Cardamore Stokes
• How Big Things Get Done, by Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner