Cemvita Factory Recognized as a 2021 BloombergNEF Pioneer for Climate Innovation

New York, April 08, 2021 – BloombergNEF (BNEF) today announced the twelve winners of the 2021 BNEF Pioneers – early-stage companies that are pursuing exciting and important low-carbon opportunities. The winners were selected as their innovations fill important gaps in optimizing long-haul freight, making sustainable materials, tracking greenhouse gases, valuing carbon sinks and reducing energy and chemical use.

Since the inception of the BNEF Pioneers program more than a decade ago, cheap, clean technologies such as renewable energy and electric vehicles have changed the world. Although these technologies will decarbonize large parts of the world economy, there are still significant challenges to address in achieving net-zero emissions and slowing climate change. The 2020s will arguably be an even more pivotal decade in the fight against climate change, and the Pioneers competition this year has recognized transformative technology solutions filling some remaining net-zero innovation gaps. In 2021, we solicited applications from companies, non-profits and projects that addressed three climate-tech innovation areas:

• Managing and optimizing long-haul freight
• Advancing materials and techniques for sustainable products
• Monitoring and understanding our changing planet

The competition received over 250 applications from 36 different countries. A team of lead analysts at BNEF evaluated candidates against three criteria: the potential impact on greenhouse gas emissions and the planet; the degree of technology innovation and novelty; and the likelihood of adoption.

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• Cemvita Factory (U.S.) engineers microbes that use carbon dioxide or methane as a feedstock for the production of carbon-negative industrial chemicals. These chemicals are used by oil and gas, chemical, mining and aerospace companies that seek to apply nature-inspired technologies for reducing their carbon footprint.

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Claire Curry, selection committee co-chair and head of digital industry research at BloombergNEF, commented:

“Displacing petrochemicals from everyday products will be a difficult task, even after we are no longer burning oil as a fuel. Displacing petrochemical feedstock with biomass, or even with added carbon dioxide, will create carbon sinks, trapping CO2 in plastics, fabrics and chemicals. Our winner Cemvita Factory is looking to do just this."

Video interviews with each of the Pioneers will be posted once per week on the BNEF website at https://about.bnef.com/bnefpioneers/ starting in the second half of May.

“We are honored to be named among the 2021 BNEF Pioneers and further encouraged to create a carbon-negative future that we all deserve. A future where humans can live in harmony with nature, and create a sustainable and balanced climate. We are making this possible by applying synthetic biology to enhance natural processes such as photosynthesis for production of chemicals.”
– Moji Karimi,CEO, Cemvita Factory

Link to the complete press release: https://about.bnef.com/blog/twelve-climate-innovators-chosen-as-2021-bnef-pioneers/