Climate change isn’t just a threat multiplier, it’s arguably the world’s biggest threat, and companies and investors are fighting back with a barrage of innovation. Global investment in the low-carbon energy transition surged by 17% in 2023, to $1.77 trillion, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Even in a year of geopolitical turbulence, surging interest rates, and inflation, it was a record sum for clean-tech investments, from delivering power to rural communities to building batteries for flying cars. The urgency is growing: The rise of EVs, a surge in manufacturing, and the explosion of generative AI are all driving up demand for energy and threatening the ambitious climate goals of Big Tech companies, not to mention those of whole countries.
No one solution will be enough to cut our greenhouse gas emissions, and this year’s most innovative energy companies demonstrate the world’s multipronged response to the crisis. Some are trying to electrify transportation with new kinds of batteries, like Amprius and Lyten, which build powerful, high-density batteries that are cleaner than their lithium-ion counterparts and could help power energy-intensive devices like eVTOL aircraft. Others are building chemical reactors to produce low- and no-carbon fuels for hard-to-abate industries: Amogy aims to decarbonize shipping and heavy-duty transport, while Syzygy Plasmonics strives to disrupt chemical manufacturing with a reactor powered by light instead of traditional combustion.
Other companies are working on better ways to store and deliver electricity. Oregon-based ESS designed an iron “flow battery” that can help utilities store energy for hours longer than conventional batteries, and Houston-based Fervo Energy developed a so-called enhanced geothermal plant that can generate electricity and heat but also function as a kind of giant long-term battery. Utilities are innovating in their own ways. Minnesota’s Connexus is helping pioneer research around nature-friendly solar farms, where bees and butterflies can flourish; Vermont’s Green Mountain Power is decentralizing the grid with home-installed batteries, promoting a more resilient virtual power plant model; and Husk Power is electrifying villages across India and Nigeria, with the aim of displacing 700 million gallons of fuel for diesel generators by 2030.
1. Husk Power Systems
For decarbonizing the grid in places with historically unreliable power
2. Green Mountain Power
For making electricity customers—and the grid—more self-sufficient
3. Fervo Energy
For taking a deeper dive in search of even more powerful geothermal
4. Connexus Energy
For making renewables more compatible with the grid—and nature
5. 6K
For turning scrap metal into battery material
6. ESS
7. Amprius Technologies
For making powerful, fast-charging batteries for the most demanding uses
8. Lyten
9. Amogy
For using ammonia to more cleanly power heavy-duty transportation
10. Syzygy Plasmonics
For making chemicals like hydrogen without carbon emissions, using light instead of combustion
Explore the full 2024 list of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies, 606 organizations that are reshaping industries and culture. We’ve selected the firms making the biggest impact across 58 categories, including advertising, artificial intelligence, design, sustainability, and more.
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