Pittsburgh’s innovation efforts don’t prioritize climate tech. Leaders are trying to change that.

A vibrant yellow electric RV is traveling the region to promote climate tech efforts in key cities — and it’s hard to miss, even in the dark of night. 

It arrived in Pittsburgh earlier this month to bring together climate tech entrepreneurs and founders at the Avenu workspace to make connections and map out Pittsburgh’s future in the climate tech industry.

Self-described climate warrior Matt Myers of Climate Tech Cocktails (CTC) partnered with InnovatePGH, Third Derivative, Technical.ly and Pittsburgh Innovation District for the recent stop on his Here We Are Electric RV Roadshow. It aims to jumpstart local efforts to ferment an innovation ecosystem here for climate tech at a pivotal time to make a difference.

“This could be a moment really where you look back in two or three years and you’re like, ‘Oh wow, that was a really great moment that helped kick things off to a place where you might not imagine,” Myers told Technical.ly. 

Pittsburgh already has many of the building blocks needed to build an innovation ecosystem for climate tech here, panelists said at the event. Its history as a center of the steel industry and its subsequent transformation into a hub for innovation in medicine and technology set that foundation.

But what the city needs now, according to panelist Ryan Kushner, cofounder of Third Derivative, is to build out the ecosystem with regular gatherings and networking events that foster social connectivity and help entrepreneurs and founders find the opportunities and connections they need. 

The talk also featured InnovatePGH’s president and CEO Sean Luther and community and research manager Charles Mansfield.

“Whether you’re a founder or funder, climate tech team or not, please get connected,” Mansfield said. “We can make it happen.”

A gap in the innovation ecosystem for climate technology

Despite Pittsburgh’s well-integrated robotics, precision and personalized medicine, connected medical devices and advanced manufacturing ecosystems, nothing like that exists here for climate tech, Luther said at the event. 

Given the entrepreneurship and commercialization potential at local universities like the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), there is a significant gap where deep tech and climate tech could converge.

“I hope that’s why many of you are here – to start filling that gap,” Luther said. “You are all at the very first step that we are taking to start building that infrastructure that is the intersection of entrepreneurship and climate tech in Pittsburgh.”

Indeed, one prospective founder looking to help fill that gap is Paul L. Grech, a second-year master’s of business administration student at CMU’s Tepper School of Business who wants to found a startup focused on the intersection of underwater robotics and ocean conservation.

Grech came to Pittsburgh for CMU’s robotics program and strong tech connections, believing robotics to be a promising but so far underutilized tool in solving ocean issues. Though the robotics institute is thriving, Grech said there aren’t many there focusing on underwater robotics.

“I think this idea of bringing forums to connect people that are interested in climate tech is big because for my own focus of ocean,” Grech said. “We’re landlocked in Pittsburgh. There’s almost zero people that care about those efforts. But I did meet one person here that’s working on [something similar], Priscilla [Prem].” 

Prem, a chemical engineering doctorate candidate at the University of Pittsburgh, is the innovation lead for Pittsburgh Coastal Energy, a startup focused on engineering power sources for at-sea apps.

Those connections are exactly the point of an event like CTC, Kushner said. Connecting with more potential climate tech founders to offer them “funding, mentorship, [and] timely and appropriate introductions to our corporate and venture capital partners” will grow the scene, he said. 

“We want people to understand,” Kushner said, “who are the startups that are here, who are the corporate partners that you could be working with, who are the funders, where’s innovation coming from?”