Initiative (2c2i)
The Exelon Foundation elevates solutions to climate change
through its Climate Change Investment Initiative
The Exelon Foundation elevates solutions to climate change
through its Climate Change Investment Initiative
an Investment Approach
million, joint commitment between Exelon Corporation and its
philanthropic arm, Exelon Foundation, to invest in and cultivate
innovative start-ups focused on advancing climate change
mitigation, adaptation and resiliency efforts, while also promoting
social equality and economic prosperity, in Exelon’s service
territories. These service territories include Chicago, IL ;
Philadelphia, PA; Baltimore, MD; Washington D.C.; Atlantic City, NJ
and Wilmington, DE.
joint commitment between Exelon Corporation and its philanthropic arm,
Exelon Foundation, to invest in and cultivate innovative start-ups focused
on advancing climate change mitigation, adaptation and resiliency efforts,
while also promoting social equality and economic prosperity, in Exelon’s
service territories. These service territories include Chicago, IL;
Philadelphia, PA; Baltimore, MD; Washington D.C.; Atlantic City, NJ and
Wilmington, DE.
to learn more about the application
criteria and selection process.
Read the FAQ to learn more about the application criteria and selection process.
commitment), 2c2i supports innovative start-ups that catalyze solutions to climate change challenges within Exelon’s major market areas, while
advancing social equality and economic prosperity.
Upon selection, 2c2i start-ups realize a number of benefits to accelerate their ventures while delivering real-world impact. These benefits include:
- A minimum of $100,000 equity investment from Exelon Foundation
-
In-kind services from Exelon Corporation. These services may include but may not be limited to:
- Brokering of relationships between the start-ups and key organizations/ stakeholders in Exelon territories that can support the start-up’s activity and mission
- Subject matter expertise-based guidance and advice
- Business plan review and guidance
- Networking opportunities with other 2c2i ventures and alumni
- Exposure to external sources of follow-on capital
- Regulatory and financial feedback
- Exelon commits to work with each selected start-up on an Impact Project.
An Impact Project is an effort driven by the start-up that supports the environmental goals of the Exelon community it operates in
while benefitting the underserved segments of the community.
An Impact Project helps to advance the start-up’s ultimate mission and business goals and can be everything from an organic extension
of the start-up’s pre-existing work in the territory to an entirely new effort scoped in collaboration with Exelon.
The goal is for the start-up to begin and make as much progress around the Impact Project as possible in partnership with Exelon
within 12 months of receiving investment under 2c2i.
- Environmental: Advancing GHG emissions mitigation and climate change resiliency.
- Social: Supporting economic growth and opportunity for low-income or underserved communities while promoting environmental justice and equality.
- Governance: Supporting underrepresented women and minority founders: While 2c2i invests in start-ups with leadership teams from all backgrounds, it welcomes
participation from and is committed to supporting start-ups that have women or minority representation among its founder or leadership teams.
- Environmental: Advancing GHG emissions
mitigation and climate change resiliency. - Social: Supporting economic growth and
opportunity for low-income or underserved communities while promoting environmental
justice and equality - Governance: Supporting underrepresented
women and minority founders: While 2c2i
invests in start-ups with leadership teams
from all backgrounds, it welcomes participation
from and is committed to supporting start-ups
that have women or minority representation
among its founder or leadership teams.
with the United Nations Sustainability Developmental
Goals and IRIS+ Core Metrics and Catalogue of Metrics.
following areas:
Building Energy Efficiency Improvement
Industrial Process Energy Innovation
Renewable Energy Growth
Electrification of Transportation
Building Energy Efficiency Improvement
Industrial Process Energy Innovation
Renewable Energy Growth
Electrification of Transportation
into Planning Enhance Flood Mitigation
Improve Stormwater Management
Respond to Increasing
Temperatures
into Planning
Enhance Flood Mitigation
Improve Stormwater Management
Respond to Increasing Temperatures
start-ups that operate across the
functional areas:
start-ups that operate across the
functional areas:
Environments
The Washington, DC-based startup designs, develops and delivers solar and battery storage solutions for affordable housing communities. Including the first resiliency center in the District installed at the Maycroft Apartments affordable housing complex in partnership with PEPCO, the company has already completed 25 installations in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, Amidus Resilience plans to expand to more affordable housing resiliency centers, giving residents electricity to access to critical services like refrigeration, lighting, communications (internet and cell phones), food heating, ventilation, medicine refrigeration, and charging capabilities for life-saving medical devices during power outages caused by extreme weather and other grid failures. While helping underserved communities with access to clean and resilient energy, the startup’s projects will also rely on local trades for installation jobs. Amidus Resilience will work with Exelon to identify new affordable housing communities for resiliency centers in D.C.
ATP-MD, LLC (ATP-MD), an African-American-owned and Maryland-based startup, uses two innovative, patented, and cost-effective processes that generate multiple environmental benefits from specially-bred crops and their resulting material, or biomass. The startup’s Vertical Bio-Crop Farms will capture carbon dioxide (CO2) from large emission sources, and its crops, when planted in brownfield sites and vacant lots, will filter atmospheric pollutants, as they also remove contaminants from the soil. ATP-MD’s torrefaction process then converts biomass into a variety of environmentally-beneficial bio-products, including filler powders, which make better-performing plastics, superior animal bedding, and biochars, which improve soil productivity. The company’s field tests have proven their crops' ability to also remove excess nutrients from Chesapeake Bay watershed farmland, to help improve the health of the Bay’s ecosystem. Working with Exelon, ATP-MD plans to make a difference in Baltimore’s under-resourced communities, by creating a safer and healthier environment and creating new green manufacturing jobs, as it collaboratively advances the city’s ambitious climate and sustainability goals.
BlocPower is a Brooklyn based energy technology startup rapidly greening American cities. BlocPower has developed a software platform for analyzing, financing, project managing and monitoring clean energy projects, allowing building owners to identify and complete energy efficiency and electrification upgrades in urban communities. These projects help lower energy bills for residents, provide good local construction and installation jobs, and reduce carbon emissions while increasing resiliency. BlocPower has completed energy projects in over 1,000 buildings in New York State and, with Exelon’s support, aims to complete thousands of similar projects in underserved communities across the country. The clean energy projects that BlocPower completes have the added benefit of helping cities and states advance their climate goals and creating jobs in vulnerable communities in need of environmental justice.
With a recently opened field office location in Baltimore, minority-owned startup Dynamhex has developed a software platform leveraging complex energy consumption data that enables close collaboration among a range of city, community, and utility stakeholders to achieve local carbon-reduction goals. The Kansas City-based startup is currently partnering with the City of Baltimore to enhance implementation, execution, and progress-tracking in support of the city’s Climate Action Plan. Working with Exelon, Dynamex plans to expand the application of its platform in Baltimore and eventually to other cities within Exelon’s service territories. By facilitating enhanced modeling, communication, engagement, education, and cooperation, their powerful platform can help local jurisdictions and state achieve ambitious climate goals.
Based in Chicago, Greenprint Partners is a certified WBE/B-Corporation that reduces water pollution and flooding by working with water utilities and landowners to design, build, finance, and maintain high-impact green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) programs that reduce water pollution and flooding. Greenprint is already working with the Philadelphia Water Department’s Green City, Clean Waters initiative seeking to more equitably disburse funds and high-impact stormwater management projects to underinvested areas. GSI improvement projects like building bioswales, rain gardens, and tree trenches–particularly in low- to moderate-income communities—provide healthier environments and local contractor jobs. Greenprint plans to work with Exelon and local government to expand its project development to communities in Chicago, Philadelphia, and eventually other cities, helping them to meet their climate and resiliency goals.
Philadelphia-based startup GrowFlux is a horticultural tech company that specializes in data-driven cultivation technology and offers an ecosystem of commercial-scale, wireless controls and sensors that work together to enable emerging indoor farms and automated greenhouses. GrowFlux has deployed its technology at Second Chances urban farm in Wilmington, DE, who hires formerly incarcerated people, providing training and green collar jobs to economically distressed communities. Building on the Second Chances Farm project, GrowFlux will seek to further deploy their technology for CEA farms in Philadelphia and other cities in Exelon’s service area to meet their sustainability goals. The projects will help reduce GHG emissions and water consumption, provide sustainable, locally-grown healthy food, repurpose disused commercial buildings, and provide job creation and training through agri-tech afterschool programs.
Based in Chicago, NETenergy is a thermal energy storage company that has created a unique hybrid energy storage-air conditioner technology with the potential to reduce peak energy demand by over 50%, reduce peak energy consumption by 20%, and overall energy consumption by more than 10% over standard air conditioners, while significantly reducing GHG emissions by taking advantage of renewable energy and more efficient conventional primary energy sources. Deployment of Net Energy’s storage technology will enable small businesses to save money on energy bills while reducing emissions. The startup will initially work with Exelon to identify potential project locations in underserved communities for the storage technology in Chicago to help small businesses save money on energy bills while reducing emissions. With growth, NETenergy plans to expand into other cities, helping them to meet climate goals, expand access to energy storage, and reduce urban heat islands - often located in underserved communities – with their innovative, cost-effective cooling technology.
With offices in Baltimore and Wilmington, DE, Boston-based startup New Ecology has developed a remote monitoring and optimization (ReMO) system to improve performance of buildings with central boilers. New Ecology seeks to deploy this technology primarily to the oft-overlooked affordable, multifamily housing sector. Partnering with Exelon, New Ecology will scale the installation of ReMO by extending outreach efforts into Chicago, Philadelphia and Wilmington, thus helping each city meet sustainability goals while providing owners with superior operational insight and reduced utility costs.
Propagate Ventures has developed an analytics and project development platform to reduce the cost and resources needed for agroforestry, which involves the strategic addition of tree crops to farmland to ensure long term resiliency of the farm. Propagate Ventures solution contributes to the economic sustainability of rural communities through enhanced and more stable crop yields on agroforestry-based farms. In partnership with Exelon, Propagate Ventures will expand beyond current projects in the Chesapeake Bay and Pennsylvania, investing in agroforestry farmland areas surrounding one or more of the cities in Exelon’s service territory. These projects will help both urban and rural communities achieve their goals to sequester carbon, create a secure food supply, improve community health through the provision of fresh food and increase biodiversity.
Radiator Labs invented the Cozy™, a wireless, low-cost, and easily installed retrofit that drops on top of steam heat radiators, providing a solution to the chronic problem of imbalanced heat in apartment buildings by providing more even distribution. Installation throughout a building can save up to 45 percent in heating costs and reduces GHG emissions by an average of 25 percent. In partnership with Exelon, Brooklyn-based Radiator Labs plans to deploy their innovative solution in steam-heated multi-family housing units – often located in under-served areas - in Baltimore, Chicago, and Philadelphia, helping these cities to meet their ambitious climate goals and improving the health and comfort of tenants.
Click for press coverage on 2c2i and its
startups.
to learn more about the application
criteria and selection process.
Read the FAQ to learn more about the application
criteria and selection process.
Vice President, Corporate Relations
Exelon Corporation
Exelon Corporation
Exelon Corporation
Climate Change Investment Initiative (2c2i)
Energy Education & Workforce Development
Employee Engagement
