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The Newsletter

The quarterly digest from the database.

We track university climate tech ecosystems so you don’t have to. Quarterly deep-dives built around each episode — for VCs, practitioners, and students serious about the hard stuff.

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University climate tech ecosystems, mapped quarterly. Built around each episode we release.

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Each issue includes
Lab Watch — research worth tracking now
The Pairing — episode companion deep-dive
The Ecosystem — who’s building in this space
Signal vs. Noise — what’s real vs. what’s hype
Latest Issue
Issue 001 · SF Climate Week April 2026 · Live Taping Edition
Water Is the Crisis Nobody Is Funding

Our inaugural issue is built around SF Climate Week and our first live podcast taping — Water / MOF at the Yaghi Lab. This issue maps the water-climate research landscape, the founders trying to scale it, and the gap between what the science can do and what the market is actually funding.

Lab Watch
The Yaghi Lab MOF results from Death Valley
285g water/kg of MOF per day at 7% humidity. The science works. The scale-up doesn’t yet.
The Pairing
Water / MOF — SF Climate Week live taping
Behind the episode: what they disagreed on in the room.
The Ecosystem
Water-climate startup landscape at Berkeley
WaHa, Novnat, and the Yaghi Lab orbit — who’s closest to market.
Signal vs. Noise
Water tech: what’s real vs. what’s marketing
Atmospheric harvesting vs. desal vs. conservation — who’s right, who’s raising.
Read Issue 001 → Subscribe for Issue 002
What’s Inside Every Issue
🔬
Lab Watch

Plain English coverage of one or two research findings relevant to the episode — what was actually found, what it means for anyone building in that space, and what the paper doesn’t say.

The Pairing

The newsletter goes behind the episode conversation — what they actually disagreed on, what the founder really thinks about the science, and what question opened something up rather than closed it down.

🗺
The Ecosystem

A map of the sector at the moment the episode drops — early-stage companies, university spinouts, and labs that aren’t getting written about yet. Who’s early, who’s close, what’s unfunded.

📡
Signal vs. Noise

One thing getting more attention than the science warrants. One thing getting less. Short and opinionated — honest about the gap between what the research says and what the pitch deck says.