Scaling Green-Tech

Episode summaryDarren Clifford, Co-Founder of Adapt [us] Capital, discusses the investment case for climate adaptation on Episode 28 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. Clifford argues that adaptation is more underfunded than mitigation, with roughly 0.25% of global capital flowing to it, despite demand for adaptation products rising predictably as the weather gets hotter and more volatil...

Freya Burton, Chief Sustainability Officer and Head of Europe at LanzaTech, discusses carbon recycling, sustainable aviation fuel, and the 20-year journey from a four-person startup to a public company on Episode 27 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. Burton describes how LanzaTech captures waste carbon from industrial sites such as steel mills and uses microbes to ferment it into ethanol...

Dr Robert Sorrell, CEO of the Royce Hydrogen Accelerator at the Henry Royce Institute, discusses materials innovation and the hydrogen value chain on Episode 26 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. Sorrell treats hydrogen as one part of the wider energy mix rather than a fix-all. The strongest near-term use is as a feedstock for ammonia, fertilisers and industrial chemicals. Long-duration...

Karen Polizzi, Co-Director of NAPIC (the National Alternative Protein Innovation Centre), and Prithvi Kodialbail, Head of Partnerships at Extracellular, discuss the commercialisation of cultivated meat on Episode 25 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. The first cultivated meat burger cost approximately $27,000 to produce. Since then, regulatory approvals have come through in Singapore and...

Mahima Sukhdev, Chief Growth Officer at GIST Impact, discusses the evolution from ESG 1.0 to ESG 2.0, nature value at risk, and what it takes to grow a data company in an emerging market on Episode 24 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. Sukhdev argues that ESG 1.0 was designed to produce glossy numbers for glossy reports, and was never intended to change how decisions are made. GIST Impac...

Rami El Geneidy, Technical Director at EnergyHub and exited co-founder of Kapacity.io, discusses energy flexibility, heat pump control, and the startup journey on Episode 23 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. El Geneidy traces how Kapacity.io grew from PhD research at the London-Loughborough Centre for Energy Demand Studies, through Conception X and Y Combinator, to acquisition by Energy...

Dr Simon Thomas, Co-Founder and CEO of Paragraf, discusses scaling graphene from a Cambridge University invention to a commercial semiconductor foundry on Episode 22 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. Thomas traces Paragraf's eight-year journey from university spin-out to opening the world's first graphene foundry in Huntingdon, UK. The company's core breakthrough is the ability to depos...

Theresa Hoffmann, CEO and Co-founder of Nanoplume, discusses bio-based aerogel insulation, deep tech commercialisation, and the realities of early-stage founding on Episode 21 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. Hoffmann explains how 80% of the insulation market remains dependent on petrochemical materials, despite the thermal insulation industry growing toward a $100 billion market by 20...

Martin SFP Bryant, Founder of PreSeed Now, discusses what investors and journalists look for from early-stage startups on Episode 20 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. Bryant draws on nearly 17 years as a technology journalist - including covering ElevenLabs before the launch of ChatGPT - to explain what separates pre-seed startups that attract backing from those that stall. He argues th...

Paul Domjan, Founder and Chief Policy and Global Affairs Officer at ENODA, discusses grid infrastructure modernisation and the energy trilemma on Episode 19 of Scaling Green Tech, a podcast by Adopter. Paul argues that the electricity grid designed by Nikola Tesla, George Westinghouse, and William Stanley 138 years ago was built for one-directional power flow from large centralised generators to p...

In Episode 18 of Scaling Green-Tech, Katherine Keddie and Matt Jaworski are joined by Cam Ross, CEO of Green Angel Ventures, one of the UK’s leading early-stage climate tech investors. Cam breaks down how Green Angel evaluates over a thousand companies each year to find those with the potential to deliver both strong financial returns and meaningful climate impact. They explore what makes a great...

In this episode of Scaling Green-Tech, Katherine Keddie and Matt Jaworski speak with Amandeep Kalra, Co-Founder and CEO of GreenFlip, about what it really takes to decarbonise homes at scale - and why leading with sustainability alone often misses the mark. Amandeep discusses his journey founding GreenFlip, which helps investors identify the homes that deliver the highest ROI from energy upgrades....

In this episode of the Scaling Green-Tech podcast, Katherine Keddie and Matt Jaworski speak with Federico Cristoforoni, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Net Zero Insights, to unpack the findings from his newly released ‘The State of Climate Tech 2025’ report. Federico shares what the data reveals about the climate tech ecosystem today - including the shift from hype to fundamentals and growing i...

In this special episode of Scaling Green-Tech, Katherine Keddie sits down with Simon Zadek, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Morphosis, a Swiss-based adaptation solutions investment business. Morphosis exists to bridge the gap between public ambition and private action, catalysing scalable, inclusive, and market-based solutions that help societies adapt in a climate-impacted world.  A globally r...

In this episode of Scaling Green-Tech, Katherine Keddie speaks with Katherine Foster, Innovative Finance Lead at EIT Food and World Economic Forum Fellow, about what it really takes to build systems-level innovation. A pioneering Swiss-Canadian leader in digital sustainable finance and systems change, Katherine brings over 35 years of experience spanning diplomacy, technology, and climate innovati...

In this episode of Scaling Green-Tech, Katherine Keddie speaks with Juliette Devillard, Founder and CEO of Climate Connection - the UK’s largest community and events platform for climate tech founders, investors, and innovators. Juliette shares how Climate Connection grew from a small post-COVID meetup into a thriving ecosystem where partnerships are formed, investments begin, and teams are built....

In this episode of Scaling Green-Tech, Adopter’s Matt Jaworski and Katherine Keddie unpack what’s new on LinkedIn in 2025 - and how founders can use it to drive real growth. They explore the rise of TikTok-style video feeds, the value of authentic storytelling, and why founder voices consistently outperform brand posts. In 2025, the most effective content isn’t polished or AI-generated, but human,...

In episode 11 of the Scaling Green-Tech podcast, Katherine Keddie sits down with Anne Snelson and Becky Lane to explore how we can accelerate decarbonisation in the domestic built environment. Anne Snelson is a carbon literacy training specialist who works with major corporates to embed climate awareness and drive organisational change. With a background spanning transport, telecoms, and construct...

In this episode of Scaling Green-Tech, Katherine Keddie is joined by Tim Rault-Smith, a seasoned scale-up leader turned startup advisor, who now helps founders navigate growth in the EV technology space. Tim was one of the early employees at ForgeRock, the Identity and Access Management software company that rapidly scaled from a small European team to IPO on the New York Stock Exchange before its...

In episode 9 of the Scaling Green-Tech podcast, Katherine Keddie and Matt Jaworski share a hands-on guide to auditing your online presence. They break down where to start, from mapping your digital touchpoints and pulling data, to analysing website speed, SEO performance, and social media engagement. Along the way, they share practical tips for getting more from tools like LinkedIn, Google Analyti...

In episode 8 of the Scaling Green-Tech podcast, Katherine Keddie speaks with Mitesh Jagatia, founder of Eco Ventures Counsel, a pro bono initiative offering free legal support to early green-tech startups across the UK.  Mitesh unpacks the most common legal challenges climate founders face, from commercial contracts and employment law, to corporate governance and intellectual property. We discuss...

In episode 7 of the Scaling Green Tech podcast, Matt Jaworski speaks with Dr. Aled Roberts, founder of Dekiln, a startup cutting the carbon footprint of ceramic tiles by 94% through an innovative process that removes the need for kiln firing entirely.  Aled shares how nature-inspired design, recycled materials, and bio-based coatings are unlocking new possibilities in tile manufacturing - from vib...

In episode 6 of Scaling Green-Tech, we’re joined by Beth and Leo, co-founders of Feasibly (formerly Local Energy Systems) - a startup using machine learning to speed up how solar projects get off the ground. After two years of deep R&D and grant-backed development, Feasibly is now helping renewable energy developers assess solar sites in minutes, not months. We explore their startup journey fr...

In episode 5 of the Scaling Green Tech podcast, Katherine Keddie speaks with Rhea Dabriwala and Naveen Shivalingam, the co-founders of GroundUp, a pioneering startup transforming India’s agricultural residue into high-impact biochar. They unpack how GroundUp is building a new generation of industrial-scale biochar hubs that don’t just remove carbon from the atmosphere, but also regenerate soil, bo...

In episode 4 of the Scaling Green Tech podcast, Adopter co-founders Katherine Keddie and Mat Jaworski sit down with James Clench, founder, and Abigail Smith, director, or PR agency Harpswood and the team who supports Octopus Energy’s global comms strategy. They break down what PR  really  means for climate startups - from when to invest, how to land coverage, what journalists are actually looking...