The trucks that drop off your online shopping are running constantly—at least 12 hours a day, as opposed to the one hour a day most cars are used. And they get terrible fuel economy: 5 or 6 mpg, versus 28 for a typical car. So how do we mitigate the climate crisis? It starts with a delivery truck.
Seems simple, right? Switch the fleets to electric—cheaper, quieter, and cleaner than trucks powered by fossil fuels—and we can still get our stuff shipped at the swipe of an app.
Money is plentiful—Silicon Valley startups raising $100 million mega-rounds are becoming more common—and you’ve got many high-profile financing partners to choose from.
Have you ever thought about finding a partner in the energy industry? That might not have been your first instinct. But believe it or not, teaming up with us might well be the best move you’d never considered making. Here’s why.
Great ideas in an untapped market
But this decentralized database technology still suffers from a perception issue. Much of the public confuses blockchain with bitcoin—which makes some sense, as the cryptocurrency remains blockchain’s first and best-known application.
Regulated utilities, after all, have not historically been known as hotbeds of market disruption.
In fact, the typical utility’s core business model primarily entails making large capital investments in physical infrastructure—and then maintaining that infrastructure over time to optimize efficiency and minimize risk. That certainly isn’t the classic formula for birthing a disruptive unicorn.
The massive volume of data being generated by industrial systems, vehicles, consumer goods, sensors in public spaces, and the like has tremendous potential value.
But data only has potential value. Actual value is realized in marketplaces where transactions occurs between buyers and sellers. And that value is agreed upon by the parties to each transaction, who use information to negotiate transaction pricing and terms.
The company sells electric vehicle chargers to homeowners. Fast forward one year, and we are now working with the eMotorWerks to supply charging equipment to National Grid employees who drive EVs—of which there are many!
You can also see the face of disruption.
On Revere Street, tucked next to a nail salon and pizza place, is the last Blockbuster Video store in the United States. A company that once had 9,000 stores and commanded an $8.4 billion price tag is now a lonely outpost in an Oregon strip mall.
You know the end of the story: Netflix and other video-rental services decimated Blockbuster’s business model. But it’s the middle part of the tale that bears scrutiny.
You may also think about other use-cases, such as leveraging large volumes of clinical data to enable better medical care.
But an especially exciting and disruptive Big Data market opportunity is now being driven by the exploding implementation of IoT. It’s a market that Accenture predicts will reach $3.6 trillion by 2030. And it’s a market that you can capitalize on in multiple ways at once—including as a buyer, a seller, an aggregator, and an investor.
Beyond First-Generation IoT
Solar will clearly be a key element to this decarbonizing effort. The sun is essentially a massive fusion reactor in the sky that provides enough energy to power our planet with clean, renewable energy many times over. And the cost of this energy is continuously being driven down by incremental improvements in photovoltaic technology and economies of scale.
We are building our clean energy future that will be increasingly Electrified, Decentralized, and Digital – see the graphic from WEC below:
