NewHavenBIZ

12 n e w h a v e n B I Z | O c t o b e r 2 0 2 2 | n e w h a v e n b i z . c o m prototyping lab, and programming and training to help them be successful and scale their ventures, Geballe said. e hope is that New Haven will be- come a hub for climate-related technol- ogy, a place where several companies are working toward a cleaner future for the planet, he added. Another rationale for the effort is to ensure that climate-related startups that originate in Greater New Haven stay here for the long term, Geballe said. "We have been seeing more cli- mate-related technologies being devel- oped at Yale and more startups being spun out of Yale to scale up those new technologies," Geballe said. "We were seeing those startups leave New Haven to go to New York or Boston, where there is a bigger community of people working on climate startups." Geballe declined to identify local startups that decided to move elsewhere. He did say he asked their leaders if they would have stayed if something like ClimateHaven had already been in existence. "e overwhelming answer was, 'Yes, we love New Haven. We'd love to stay. But it's important to us to have a place where we can get started, where we can grow and where we can work side by side with other By Michelle Tuccitto Sullo A s troubling statistics about the Earth's climate make headlines, a new Elm City nonprofit organi- zation will help entrepreneurs who are working to solve the global warming crisis. ClimateHaven will be a climate tech incubator and makerspace in downtown New Haven, according to Josh Geballe, managing director of Yale Ventures, which is in charge of translating Yale University research into real-world products and businesses. Organizers say it will be a center where entrepreneurs, innovators, academics, corporate sponsors and investors can work together toward a common goal: to create technology and new ventures that will help reverse and adapt to climate change. e plan is to launch ClimateHaven this winter. "e big problem that we're all focused on is the development of new technologies that can help positively impact our climate crisis," Geballe said. e decade from 2011 to 2020 was the hottest on record, according to the United Nations, which predicts that global warming will mean more powerful storms, flooding, severe fires and drought. According to the U.N., moving away from fossil fuels to clean energy such as solar and wind power will help curb emissions that are caus- ing climate change. ClimateHaven will not be part of Yale, but will be a separate nonprofit, Geballe said. Yale is helping by bring- ing together a group of stakeholders who see a need for it and want to work together to make it happen. ClimateHaven will provide space for these startups and help them as they develop climate technologies and grow. e startups will benefit from being part of a community of other startups that are working on similar challenges. rough ClimateHaven, these ini- tiatives will benefit from office space, a entrepreneurs who are focused on the same challenges.' " at's why stakeholders are eager to develop ClimateHaven in New Haven, Geballe said. "We want to have a home for those startups to be able to stay here when they spin out of Yale and take root here and benefit from being close to their scientific founders," Geballe said. Climate change coalition ere are several stakeholders in- volved in creating ClimateHaven, and the number is growing. e list already includes Yale Ventures, Connecticut Innovations, the city of New Haven, Connecticut Green Bank, Collab, the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven, CTNext, MakeHaven Inc., Purpose Built Ventures, SeeClickFix and Stanley Black & Decker. Yale anticipates that stakeholders will serve on ClimateHaven's founding board of directors. Yale and Connecticut Innovations, the state's quasi-public venture arm, were the primary organizations that came together and decided ClimateHaven was something that made sense to create, according to Geballe. Organizers as of late September were still finalizing ClimateHaven's headquarters location, but they anticipate it will be close to the nonprofit MakeHaven, a makerspace at 770 Chapel St., New Haven. MakeHaven provides space and tools for making projects a reality. Green Opportunity Yale-backed climate tech incubator to focus on addressing global warming, growing New Haven startups PHOTO | CONTRIBUTED Josh Geballe is the managing director of Yale Ventures.

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