Clever Geek Handbook

How to find a job in a company that helps fight global warming?





I'm a programmer. A few months ago, I decided to find a job in a company that somehow helps fight global warming.



Google immediately led me to Bret Victorā€™s article ā€œ What can a technologist do about climate change? ā€. The article helped me navigate my search as a whole, but still turned out to be part of an outdated, part impractical in details. Therefore, I had to do the bulk of the rough work of finding and organizing opportunities myself.



The goal of this post is to save your time if you also think about working against climate change, and also list as many directions as possible.



I added this post to the hub ā€œIT-emigrationā€, because in Russia (just like Ukraine and Belarus) there are practically no IT-businesses built on the idea of ā€‹ā€‹reducing and / or decarbonizing the economy. The only noticeable exception that I could find was Avito . You can check their vacancies ;)



Specialized job search sites and message boards



The main problem with finding a job that would help fight climate change is that there are simply no normal sites aggregating all (or at least any significant part) of relevant vacancies. There is www.climate.careers , but only a microscopic fraction of all relevant vacancies is represented there. But the attempt is not torture, you can start from this site.



There are several more similar sites: environmentalcareer.com , Climate Change jobs (IISD Community) , but the coverage there is even less than climate.careers .



A few more sites with "green" vacancies specifically on the German market are listed in the checklist compiled by Pedro Oliva.



If you are considering seed-level startups, AngelList has a matching selection of angel.co/clean-energy .



The ClimateAction.tech community in Slack has a vacancy feed. To be added to the group, you need to fill out this Google profile . The advantage of the group is that many of the vacancies that slip through there are able to work remotely, which, in general, is very rare in the companies listed below in this post. I must say right away that the only such relatively mature and large company whose vacancies are clearly designated as deleted are Rail Europe (formerly known as Loco2).



Unfortunately, as I already mentioned, all of the above resources with vacancies - a drop in the bucket. To find something worthwhile, with a good match in your skills, and also that the company is ready to relocate you (or with a remote) - get ready to walk a lot on the websites of companies, look at sections with vacancies and write them ā€œcoldā€ letters about relocation and udalenka, if itā€™s not written about anywhere (as will most often be).



So the next question is where to look for these same companies?



List of companies in the field of renewable energy that are traded on exchanges (Wikipedia)



A good place to start looking for jobs in mature companies in the clean energy market.



Awards and Associations



The second source is various industrial awards and associations in the field of clean technologies:





In addition, there are a huge number of green awards and awards in the field of environmental protection: google environmental awards only to find several meta-lists of such awards, including a category on Wikipedia . True, I doubt that through them you can find some interesting work options for programmers and engineers: there is more about planting trees in Africa and campaigning for using the small flush button in the toilet than about technology.



Perhaps there is a little more sense to see awards in certain relevant industries, for example, FoodTech or Smart Grid . All similar business branches known to me are listed below in a post.



The catalog of companies in the field of "smart" energy and batteries



Listed companies operating in the British market. The catalog is compiled by Regen .



Energystartups.org



Energystartups.org is an independent website with listings of startups in renewable energy and optimization. The lists are very fragmented and sometimes irrelevant (which, however, is a common problem for all resources: otherwise this article would not have been necessary). But on the site you can quickly see the largest companies by specialization: solar energy, wind, electric cars, etc. since startups are sorted by investment size.



Large companies / startups have several advantages over small ones:





There are also disadvantages to small start-ups: more stringent rules (regarding the working day, remote work, internal procedures), outdated technologies, and low efficiency are more common. Small startups have a chance to participate in the formation of a good engineering culture for years to come.



However, there is nothing specific for companies in the energy sector, everything is like everywhere else.



Learning Speakers at Clean Technology Conferences



We open the lists of speakers at the past CleanTech events and see where they work:





More events can be found on the International Cleantech Network website and in this blog post .



Companies by industry



If all of the above ways to find an employer did not lead you to interesting vacancies, you can begin to search "deep" for specific industries.



For each of the sectors, you can:



Look for industrial awards, ā€œtopā€ lists, associations, conferences - in other words, use all the same techniques as above, but for specific industries, such as solar energy or Smart Grid.



Do not forget to just google "% fieldname% companies" or "% fieldname% startups". For example, try " delivery drone companies ". Optionally, you can add the country: "solar startups netherlands".



Use chrunchbase.com to search for companies by category. In free mode, Crunchbase only shows the top 5 companies in each search, but if you patiently narrow your search to mutually exclusive filters, you can actually get around this limitation. For example, if you take the AgTech (ā€œagricultural technologyā€) field, you can start with companies headquartered in Silicon Valley , then look at companies headquartered outside the United States , etc.



At Crunchbase, each company has a CB Rank rating, the lower the better. In experience, companies with ratings below 20,000 are almost certainly rubbish. If a simple filter by category and location doesnā€™t allow you to ā€œget to the bottomā€ of all companies that deserve attention, you can ā€œpartitionā€ further, for example, by the year the companies were founded:





The Crunchbase blind spot is that it is the directory of individual startups. For example, during my search, I missed a nice start-up Tiko Energy (they are looking for Haskell programmers!) Because after Engie took over its CB Rank, its CB Rank fell to a very low value .



Look for professional market reviews . Google "% fieldname% industry report", "% fieldname% landscape", or "% fieldname% market analysis". For example, if you are interested in smart home technologies, try smart home market analysis or smart home industry report. Professional market reviews are the source of the highest quality and relevant information. Unfortunately, they are rarely available for free, and almost never without confirmation on the so-called. business e-mail, i.e. the box is not on a public service like Gmail.





The business areas listed below are sorted based on how directly business activities affect the balance of CO 2 in the atmosphere.



Direct carbon dioxide extraction from the atmosphere



This ā€œbusinessā€ is, so far, in the literal sense, air charges, but regulators are simply obliged to make it profitable if we do not want to warm the planet more than 2 degrees from the pre-industrial level.



A good signal is Stripe's promise to invest in capturing CO 2 from the atmosphere at any price .



Examples of companies: Carbon Engineering , Climeworks , Global Thermostat .



Planting trees : a natural way to extract CO 2 :) In this area, DroneSeed is worth mentioning.



Solar power



Categories at Crunchbase: Solar , Renewable Energy



energystartups.org/top/solarenergy



Some large companies: SunRun , Sunnova .



Wind power



Categories at Crunchbase: Wind Energy , Renewable Energy



energystartups.org/top/windenergy



The largest producer of wind turbines is Vestas . In Russia there is a company NovaVind .



Other renewable energy



Crunchbase categories: Clean Energy , Nuclear , Biofuel , Biomass Energy , Renewable Energy , Energy



energystartups.org/top/nuclear-energy

energystartups.org/top/waste-energy



Examples of Western companies: Statkraft , Enerkem .



In Russia, of course, there are Rosatom and RusHydro .



Energy storage and batteries



Crunchbase Categories: Energy Storage , Battery , Fuel Cell , Energy Management



energystartups.org/top/energystorage

energystartups.org/top/battery



Some large companies in this area: Tesla , Bloom Energy , Stem , Northvolt .



Specifically, Northvolt (a company with $ 1 billion in funding) is hiring a data architect and data engineer with cloud experience in Stockholm to build a data infrastructure with a bias in IoT / analytics. A vacancy with the possibility of relocation - checked personally, because I spoke with them.



Energy efficiency and cogeneration



Crunchbase categories: Power Grid , Energy Efficiency , Energy Management . You can combine one of these categories, or simply ā€œEnergyā€ with ā€œArtificial Intelligenceā€, ā€œPredictive Analyticsā€, ā€œMachine Learningā€, ā€œInternet of Thingsā€, or ā€œSaaSā€ to narrow your search. For example, see Energy + AI .



energystartups.org/top/energy-saving

energystartups.org/top/energy-iot



Companies: Itron , Enbala , Dexma , Actility , gridX



Smart grid and energy exchange trading



The contribution of companies in this area to the fight to reduce CO 2 emissions may not be as direct as the contribution of companies in some areas listed below. I simply put this category next to other ā€œenergyā€ categories.



Charles River Associates' An assessment of the economic value of demand-side participation in the Balancing Mechanism document provides a good overview of the market (with examples of specific companies).



energystartups.org/top/smartgrid



In Europe in recent years there have been a lot of IT startups in this area. Examples of companies: Landis + Gyr , Aclara , AutoGrid , Centrica Energy Trading , Enel X , Limejump , Moixa , Origami Energy , the aforementioned Tiko Energy .



In this post there is a good picture that outlines the landscape of the market.



We should also mention the blockchain for power systems . According to GreenTech Media, as of March 2018, there were at least 122 companies in this narrow direction only! There is a specialized blockchain2energy conference on this subject. You can also check out the combination of Energy + Blockchain tags on Crunchbase.



The notable Russian startup Insolar makes the blockchain more general-purpose, but also promotes its use in the energy sector .



Green energy suppliers



Large holding companies in this area: E.ON , Engie , Innogy , Centrica . Report prepared by Prospex Research Ltd. surveys the top 20 companies in Europe in terms of energy supply.



Between large companies and consumers there is still a layer of distributors who compete with each other, including the convenience and efficiency of digital services, so they actively hire programmers: OVO Energy , Bulb , Ecotricity , Octopus Energy , Xcel Energy , Holaluz



Heating, ventilation and air conditioning



energystartups.org/top/hvac

energystartups.org/top/heating

energystartups.org/top/cooling



Examples of companies: Aeris , Honeywell , tado



Smart home, smart buildings



Crunchbase Categories: Smart Home , Smart Building , Green Building



energystartups.org/top/smarthome

energystartups.org/top/smart-building



Some notable companies: Nest , ecobee , Leanheat , Carbon Lighthouse , Bidgely



Optimization of production and supply chain



Crunchbase Categories: Manufacturing , Industrial , Industrial Automation . You can also combine one of these categories, or simply Energy with Artificial Intelligence, Predictive Analytics, Machine Learning, Internet of Things, or SaaS to narrow your search. For example, see Industrial + Predictive Analytics .



energystartups.org/top/enterprise-energy



Examples of companies: o9 solutions , Stottler Henke , Flexciton , SparkCognition , Sight Machine



Electric transport



Crunchbase Categories: Electric Vehicle , Automotive



energystartups.org/top/electric-cars



Some large companies: Tesla , NIO , Rivian , Proterra



Electric planes : it is still difficult to call this direction a practical, real business, but it must become one if we want to continue traveling around the earth for hours. See a comparison of modes of transport for CO 2 emission rates in this material .



Pioneer Companies: Lilium , Eviation



Exchange of used things



Companies in this area are helping to reduce excess consumption.



Examples: OLX , letgo , OfferUp , Avito . In some countries, Ebay is more used as a direct sales channel (that is, it works more for overclocking than for reducing consumption), in some it is used as a platform for announcements about the sale of used things.



Foodsaving



A lot of information about foodsaving (food sharing) in Russian can be found in the diary of Yana Frank .



Check out Karma and Too Good To Go vocations.



Cargo and delivery optimization



Crunchbase Categories: Freight Service , Shipping , Logistics , Supply Chain Management , Transportation



Companies: Convoy , Freightos , Flexport , Einride



Efficient regional transport



BlaBlaCar and FlixBus are the two largest companies in this field. Both hire a huge number of IT people.



The trains



The train is the most ā€œlow-carbonā€ mode of transport over long distances. In addition to national carriers (Russian Railways, Ukrainian UZ, Belarusian Railways, Deutsche Bahn, etc.), it is worth noting the same FlixBus (operating FlixTrain trains) and The Boring Company .



There are two online businesses specializing in the sale of train tickets : Trainline and Rail Europe (as mentioned above, the only company in this post that is clearly remote).



Fleet management



Crunchbase Category: Fleet Management



Example companies: Wunder Mobility , Bestmile



Electric bicycles and scooters



It must be borne in mind that this area can be overheated and not require more working hands right now.



Crunchbase Category: Last Mile Transportation



energystartups.org/top/electric-bike



Largest companies: Lime , Bird , Skip Scooters , Uber's New Mobility



Personal Mobility Optimization



Categories Crunchbase: Navigation , Public Transportation . Perhaps the largest company in this sector is the Israeli Moovit .



Agricultural Optimization



Crunchbase Categories: AgTech , Agriculture , Farming



Examples of companies: The Climate Corporation , Indigo AG



Construction optimization



Crunchbase Category: Construction



Examples of companies: Procore , PlanGrid



Local offline delivery



Nuro (on the road) and Starship (on the sidewalks) are the two leading companies in the area.



Drones



Delivery by drones should be more efficient (in terms of energy consumption) than any type of delivery on land. Drones also have interesting applications in the fields of agriculture and tree planting (see DroneSeed ).



Crunchbase Categories: Drones , Drone Management



Some companies: Zipline , Flytrex



Smart city



Crunchbase Categories: Smart Cities , GovTech



energystartups.org/top/smartcity



Examples of companies: Sidewalk Labs , Worldsensing , Spacemaker



Energy and climate analytics, data collection and reporting



Examples of companies: Wood Mackenzie , Sustainalytics , T REX , Tomorrow





Search for similar companies



If any of the companies mentioned above, or any other, seemed to you a very interesting option, it makes sense to also look at its direct competitors and similar companies in other countries. The following services may come in handy in this:





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