A Grimsby business leader at the forefront of green technology advances was granted an audience with Bill Gates and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.
Jordan Brompton, the award-winning co-founder of Myenergi, was part of a select panel to launch a new initiative to supercharge cleantech innovation in the UK market. The Stallingborough business she is chief marketing officer at is behind the Zappi electric vehicle charger and Libbi home battery, both designed to operate alongside solar and other generating methods to bring grid independence to householders.
Microsoft co-founder Gates flew into London to unveil the Cleantech for UK coalition programme, backed by his Breakthrough Energy organisation designed to support innovation on the journey to Net Zero. It launched at Imperial College, with a discussion on how to empower a new era of global cleantech champions.
Read more: Myenergi generates strong returns on phenomenal 216 per cent growth
Mrs Brompton, who launched with colleague Lee Sutton seven years ago, and now employs 400 people, exporting globally, said: “As one of the fastest-growing private companies in the UK, it was fantastic to be able to share Myenergi’s perspective on how to further accelerate growth in the cleantech sector, including a major focus on skills and training to ensure that - alongside the investments in technology we need to hit Net Zero - we are also investing in the people that we need to design, develop and install those technologies.”
UK cleantech venture capital investment totalled £3.2 billion in 2022, equalling the record-breaking amounts of 2021. However, as other countries enact increasingly ambitious climate packages such as the Inflation Reduction Act in the USA, and the Net Zero Industry Act in the EU, it was underlined that the UK must go further and faster to maintain competitiveness.
The UK would have to spend a total of £36 billion to reach the GDP equivalent of the IRA.
Ann Mettler, vice president for Europe at Breakthrough Energy, said: “The UK has all the ingredients to become a major player in the global push to build our net-zero emissions future, including world-class research facilities and forward-looking investors. I am confident that the Cleantech for UK coalition will become a key bridge between cleantech investors, innovators and policy makers.”
Cleantech for UK’s objective is to supercharge UK cleantech innovation.
Richard Youngman, chief executive of Cleantech Group, said: “To secure the enormous benefits on offer to those brave enough to lead the transformation of our industrialised economies to cleaner, decarbonised and resource-efficient versions of themselves will require innovation in all facets.
“Yes, technological, but equally in financial instruments and in policy-making. I believe a period of intense dialogue, experimentation and hyper-collaboration is needed for the UK to deliver on its net-zero goals, its economic growth ambitions, and its national security.”
Read next:
Humber Renewables Awards 2023 now open for entries
300 jobs on offer as Siemens Gamesa staffs up expanding Hull blade plant
£5.5m investment to aid engineering apprentices emerging - here's what will be on offer
Latest North Sea wind farm plan could power Humber hydrogen production as Equinor and SSE unite
All your Humber business news in one place - bookmark it now
