🌿 Vol 148: Amping Up Plant-Based Batteries

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The path to nuclear is far from straightforward. But the prize is enormous: carbon-free, abundant power at a global scale.

Here at Hack, we tracked 60 teams betting on radically different designs and uncovered the strengths and challenges behind each technology.

Some are harnessing decades of proven fission science, while others are pushing fusion toward a reality that has long eluded scientists.

To get the inside track on what’s new and next, we caught up with VCs and Founders at: Firefly Fusion, First Light Fusion, Nano Nuclear Energy, NearStar Fusion, nT-Tao Compact Fusion Power, Nucleation Capital, Realta Fusion, SHINE Technologies, Thea Energy, Tokamak Energy and World Fund.

We’ve got you covered with our Nuclear Energy 101.

In this week’s edition:

✨ Breakthrough Energy, Khosla Ventures, DCVC and others, have launched the All Aboard Coalition, aiming to raise $300 million by October to support ClimateTechs.
🪵 New Dawn Bio secured a grant for its €1.4 million project to advance cultured wood as a sustainable alternative to deforestation.
🏭 Panasonic reopened its €320 million “giga factory” in the Czech Republic, making it the company’s primary European hub for heat pump production and R&D.

Digest x Climate

📊 Green Premium Graph: Sebastian Linder-Liaw on why we have a long way to go to bring down the cost of green molecules so that they can compete directly on price with their fossil-based counterparts.

📈 What’s up? Researchers from the University of Bern and ETH Zurich report that climate change is set to increase the frequency and severity of deadly supercell thunderstorms in Europe, especially in the Alpine region.

⚔️ Good Read: As the AI boom accelerates, the real race isn’t just for algorithms or talent; it’s for the rare minerals, chips, and energy that power them. IMD unpacks how circularity and resource recovery could become the secret weapon in the global quest for tech sovereignty.

👋 New Climate Futures returns to Newlab on September 25, during New York Climate Week. Convening more than 1,500 entrepreneurs, investors, policymakers, and corporate leaders, the event showcases the technologies, partnerships, and policies defining the next wave of climate innovation.

💡 Jobs with Cur8, ecoLocked, Enerkii, Ore Energy, Symbrosia, Earthshot Prize

🧢 Take part in ClimateHack’s Global Impact Survey packed with perks as a thank you.

🎟️ Head this way to lock in your HackSummit pass and join us in NYC this December.

AgriFood x Climate

🌾 Californian AI-powered precision agriculture startup Orchard Robotics raised $22 million in an oversubscribed Series A funding round led by Quiet Capital and Shine Capital with participation from General Catalyst and others, to scale its crop inspection and farm management technology.

🇫🇮 Finnish Food Factory, a contract manufacturer of plant-based dairy alternatives, secured €10 million from the Taaleri Bioindustry Fund I to support its continued growth and sustainable production.

🇪🇺 The European Union has invested €2.2 million into a two-year initiative that will run across Portugal, Czechia and Denmark to expand plant-based food adoption and innovation.

🧬 Scientists at the University of California, Davis have used CRISPR gene-editing to develop wheat plants that boost their own fertiliser production by stimulating soil bacteria to fix nitrogen, a breakthrough that could cut costs, reduce pollution, and benefit farmers globally.

Carbon x Climate

👀 Good read: Locating the sweet spot for biochar carbon removal

🚢 Seabound secured a £1.1 million UK government grant to deploy its containerised carbon capture system at the Port of Southampton, creating the world’s first commercial-scale solution combining CO₂ and air-pollutant capture for ships at berth.

Energy x Climate

🔢 IQM Quantum Computers raised a record-breaking $320 million Series B funding round led by Ten Eleven Ventures with participation from Tesi, Elo Mutual Pension Insurance, Varma Mutual Pension Insurance, the Companies of Schwarz Group, Winbond Electronics Corporation, EIC, and Bayern Kapital, to expand globally and accelerate development of large-scale error-corrected quantum systems.

⚡️ India-based Offgrid Energy Labs raised $15 million in Series A funding round led by Archean Chemicals with participation from Ankur Capital to scale its proprietary zinc-bromine ZincGel battery technology as a cost-effective, safer alternative to lithium-ion.

🔋 UK-based Palmer Energy Technology Limited has acquired Oxford University spin-out Brill Power in a deal backed by a £5 million Series A funding round co-led by FirstGroup, Barclays Bank, and the University of Oxford, combining PETL’s battery energy storage systems with Brill Power’s advanced cell-level management software to boost safety, efficiency, and lifespan across applications from EVs to grid storage.

🔌 Sweden’s Greenvoltis closed a multi-million-dollar funding round led by DeepMind Capital to scale its real-time optimisation platform for renewable asset owners, battery operators, and energy retailers.

💰 RYE, a UK-based energy intelligence startup for multi-site businesses, secured €1 million pre-seed funding in a round co-led by CapitalT and January Ventures with participation from Earth and Norrsken Evolve. It will use the funds to expand its product range and scale its transparent, renewable-aligned energy management platform.

🏭 Panasonic has reopened its expanded €320 million “giga factory” in Pilsen, Czech Republic, making it the company’s primary European hub for heat pump production and R&D with capacity projected to reach 1.4 million units by 2030.

👀 See the world’s electricity mix in real time.

Funds x Climate

🧱 The Climate Liquidity Stack: A mental model for how trust, financing, and secondary markets unlock capital across asset classes by Contrarian Ventures.

✨ A group of over a dozen venture capital and private equity firms, including Breakthrough Energy, Khosla Ventures, and DCVC, have launched the All Aboard Coalition, a collective effort aiming to raise $300 million by October to support climate tech companies, particularly those developing carbon removal, green hydrogen, and long-duration storage solutions facing difficulties in scaling.

✍️ The UK and Saudi Arabia have signed a £360 million joint investment package focused on clean energy and financial services, supporting the UK’s Industrial Strategy and Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 while advancing sustainability goals such as transport decarbonisation and green fuels.

Materials x Climate

🌿 ALOE ECELL have developed plant-based batteries made with aloe vera that are biodegradable, non-toxic, and safer for your homes and our planet.

🪵 Dutch startup New Dawn Bio secured a Eurostars grant for its €1.4 million project with the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology to advance cultured wood as a sustainable alternative to deforestation.

🧬 Cambridge-based Xampla closed its Series A funding round led by Emerald Technology Ventures, with participation from BGF, Matterwave Ventures, Amadeus Capital Partners, and Horizons Ventures. Its Morro™ plant-protein materials are biodegradable alternatives to plastics, and it will use the funds to expand in Europe and Asia Pacific and scale replacements for single-use plastics.

♻️ Researchers at MIT have developed a self-assembling battery material that functions as a solid-state electrolyte and can disassemble in minutes when exposed to an organic liquid, offering a breakthrough approach to easier recycling of electric vehicle batteries.

Mobility x Climate

🗺️ This map of all domestic flights around the world is a living network of connections.

🚗 Deftpower, an Arnhem-based provider of AI-powered EV charging solutions, secured €12.5 million to scale its European operations and enhance its smart charging technology, in a round led by Endeit Capital alongside existing backers Proeza Ventures, 4impact Capital, Rethink Mobility, and business angel Jan Fredriks.

🛞 Brussels-based circular electric car leasing startup LIZY raised €10 million in equity from existing investors D’Ieteren, Alychlo, and NewAlpha Asset Management alongside €65 million in debt financing to accelerate its international growth and make second-hand EV leasing more accessible to SMEs.

⚓️ Spain’s Green Bunkers, a maritime fuel platform launched in 2025, has kicked off operations with an initial €5 million investment from parent company Baghdadi Capital to develop technology, open offices, and drive the transition to cleaner, more transparent bunkering solutions.

🚖 Munich-based Hyperdrives closed an oversubscribed €3 million pre-seed funding round led by Rethink Ventures with participation from First Momentum Ventures, SDAC, Acequia Capital, 2100 Ventures, Prototype Capital, and angel investors. It is developing high-performance electric motors, and will use the funds to prepare for industrial-scale rollout.

Soundtrack x Climate 

🎶 Breaking the “sound of silence” in the boardroom

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Editorial by Laura, Curation by Nicola