Houston energy transition events not to miss, expert commentary on climate crisis, and more things to know

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Houston energy transition folks — here's what to know to start your week. Photo via Getty Images

Editor's note: Start your week off strong with three quick things to catch up on in Houston's energy transition: a roundup of events not to miss, a new Houston energy executive to know, and more.

Events not to miss

Put these Houston-area energy-related events on your calendar.

Future of Energy Summit is Tuesday, February 6, at AC Hotel by Marriott Houston Downtown. Register.
The 2024 NAPE Summit is Wednesday, February 7, to Friday, February 9, at the George R. Brown Convention Center. It's the energy industry’s marketplace for the buying, selling and trading of prospects and producing properties. Register.
The De Lange Conference, taking place February 9 and 10 at Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy, is centered around the theme “Brave New Worlds: Who Decides? Research, Risk and Responsibility” this year. Register.
The Future of Energy Across the Americas: Helping Lawyers Predict and Adapt — the 2024 Houston Energy Conference — is February 27 to March 1. Register.
CERAWeek 2024 is Monday, March 18, to Friday, March 22, in the George R. Brown Convention Center. Register.

Commentary: Chris Wood, co-founder of Moonshot Compost, on loving the climate apocalypse

Chris Wood knows that the last thing anyone wants to be reminded of in 2024 is the impending climate apocalypse, but, as he writes in his guest column, "There is a scientific consensus that the world climate is trending towards uninhabitable for many species, including humans, due in large part to results of human activity."

He cites a report that 93 percent “believe that climate change poses a serious and imminent threat to the planet.”

"Until recently reviewing this report, I was unaware that 93 percent of any of us could agree on anything," he writes. "It got me thinking, how much of our problem today is based on misunderstanding both the nature of the problem and the solution?" Read more.

New hire: Bracewell names new partner to advise clients on energy transition tax incentives

Bracewell announced that Jennifer Speck has joined the firm's tax department as a partner in the Houston office. Speck will advise clients on energy transition tax incentives.

Some of her experiences include onshore and offshore wind, solar, carbon capture, clean hydrogen and clean fuel projects. She recently served as senior manager of tax and regulatory compliance at Navigator CO2 Ventures LLC. She graduated in 2010 with a B.F.A. in mental health psychology from Northeastern State University, and received her J.D., with honors, from The University of Tulsa College of Law in 2012. Read more.

The De Lange Conference is taking place February 9 and 10 at Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy. Photo by Gustavo Raskosky/Rice University

Upcoming Houston conference to address biology, technology and climate change

on the radar

Every other year, Rice University hosts a conference that addresses "issues of great concern to society," and this year will look at the intersection of technology, biology, and climate change.

The De Lange Conference, taking place February 9 and 10 at Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy, is centered around the theme “Brave New Worlds: Who Decides? Research, Risk and Responsibility” this year. Chaired by Luis Campos, Baker College Chair for the History of Science, Technology and Innovation, the conference is an initiative of Rice’s faculty-led consortium Scientia Institute.

“We wanted to have a broad topic that would connect a lot of different disciplines and parts of campus,” Campos says in a news release. “Synthetic biology, the uses of data, climate change—whatever our field, job or profession, we have all heard of these things, and we all want to know more about them. So we’re bringing in scholars, scientists and artists to think about how these frontiers of scientific innovation and research relate to larger social contexts.

“Everybody is concerned with the future of their health, the future of their society, the future of the climate that they live in and the future of how their data is being used. This is a conference that weaves all those realms together with forms of artistic intervention and creative practice.”

Rice’s De Lange Conference explores future of synthetic biology, data technology and climate changewww.youtube.com

Attendees of the event can anticipate two days of discussions led by thought leaders, artistic interventions, screenings, and more from a roster of scientists, researchers, scholars, and artists. The full schedule is listed online.

The event is free to attend, but registration is required.

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Gold H2 harvests clean hydrogen from depleted California reservoirs in first field trial

breakthrough trial

Houston climatech company Gold H2 completed its first field trial that demonstrates subsurface bio-stimulated hydrogen production, which leverages microbiology and existing infrastructure to produce clean hydrogen.

Gold H2 is a spinoff of another Houston biotech company, Cemvita.

“When we compare our tech to the rest of the stack, I think we blow the competition out of the water," Prabhdeep Singh Sekhon, CEO of Gold H2 Sekhon previously told Energy Capital.

The project represented the first-of-its-kind application of Gold H2’s proprietary biotechnology, which generates hydrogen from depleted oil reservoirs, eliminating the need for new drilling, electrolysis or energy-intensive surface facilities. The Woodlands-based ChampionX LLC served as the oilfield services provider, and the trial was conducted in an oilfield in California’s San Joaquin Basin.

According to the company, Gold H2’s technology could yield up to 250 billion kilograms of low-carbon hydrogen, which is estimated to provide enough clean power to Los Angeles for over 50 years and avoid roughly 1 billion metric tons of CO2 equivalent.

“This field trial is tangible proof. We’ve taken a climate liability and turned it into a scalable, low-cost hydrogen solution,” Sekhon said in a news release. “It’s a new blueprint for decarbonization, built for speed, affordability, and global impact.”

Highlights of the trial include:

First-ever demonstration of biologically stimulated hydrogen generation at commercial field scale with unprecedented results of 40 percent H2 in the gas stream.
Demonstrated how end-of-life oilfield liabilities can be repurposed into hydrogen-producing assets.
The trial achieved 400,000 ppm of hydrogen in produced gases, which, according to the company,y is an “unprecedented concentration for a huff-and-puff style operation and a strong indicator of just how robust the process can perform under real-world conditions.”
The field trial marked readiness for commercial deployment with targeted hydrogen production costs below $0.50/kg.

“This breakthrough isn’t just a step forward, it’s a leap toward climate impact at scale,” Jillian Evanko, CEO and president at Chart Industries Inc., Gold H2 investor and advisor, added in the release. “By turning depleted oil fields into clean hydrogen generators, Gold H2 has provided a roadmap to produce low-cost, low-carbon energy using the very infrastructure that powered the last century. This changes the game for how the world can decarbonize heavy industry, power grids, and economies, faster and more affordably than we ever thought possible.”

Rice University spinout lands $500K NSF grant to boost chip sustainability

cooler computing

HEXAspec, a spinout from Rice University's Liu Idea Lab for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, was recently awarded a $500,000 National Science Foundation Partnership for Innovation grant.

The team says it will use the funding to continue enhancing semiconductor chips’ thermal conductivity to boost computing power. According to a release from Rice, HEXAspec has developed breakthrough inorganic fillers that allow graphic processing units (GPUs) to use less water and electricity and generate less heat.

The technology has major implications for the future of computing with AI sustainably.

“With the huge scale of investment in new computing infrastructure, the problem of managing the heat produced by these GPUs and semiconductors has grown exponentially. We’re excited to use this award to further our material to meet the needs of existing and emerging industry partners and unlock a new era of computing,” HEXAspec co-founder Tianshu Zhai said in the release.

HEXAspec was founded by Zhai and Chen-Yang Lin, who both participated in the Rice Innovation Fellows program. A third co-founder, Jing Zhang, also worked as a postdoctoral researcher and a research scientist at Rice, according to HEXAspec's website.

The HEXASpec team won the Liu Idea Lab for Innovation and Entrepreneurship's H. Albert Napier Rice Launch Challenge in 2024. More recently, it also won this year's Energy Venture Day and Pitch Competition during CERAWeek in the TEX-E student track, taking home $25,000.

"The grant from the NSF is a game-changer, accelerating the path to market for this transformative technology," Kyle Judah, executive director of Lilie, added in the release.

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This article originally ran on InnovationMap.

Houston renewable energy retailer expands nationally and more news to know

Trending News

Editor's note: The top Houston energy transition news of June 2025 includes Rhythm's national expansion, CenterPoint's grid resiliency efforts, and an exciting research discovery. Get the details on the most-read EnergyCapitalHTX stories from June 15-30 below:

1. Houston's Rhythm Energy expands nationally with clean power acquisition

PJ Popovic, founder and CEO of Houston-based Rhythm Energy, which has acquired Inspire Clean Energy. Photo courtesy of Rhythm

Houston-based Rhythm Energy Inc. has acquired Inspire Clean Energy for an undisclosed amount. The deal allows Rhythm to immediately scale outside of Texas and into the Northeast, Midwest and mid-Atlantic regions.

Inspire offers subscription-based renewable electricity plans to customers in Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Ohio, Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. By combining forces, Rhythm will now be one of the largest independent green-energy retailers in the country. Continue reading.

2. CenterPoint reaches agreement on SRP to significantly reduce outages

CenterPoint says it will cut storm-related outages by 1 billion minutes with its new Systemwide Resiliency Plan. Photo via Getty Images

CenterPoint Energy has reached a settlement agreement with parties to its 2026-2028 Systemwide Resiliency Plan (SRP), which will represent the largest single grid resiliency investment in CenterPoint's history.

The plan is expected to reduce storm-related outages by 1 billion minutes for its 2.8 million customers by 2029 and build on the first two phases of the company's Greater Houston Resiliency Initiative (GHRI). This SRP is designed to further address the impacts of extreme weather threats. Continue reading.

3. Enbridge activates first solar power project in Texas

Enbridge Inc. is now generating 130 megawatts of energy from its Orange Grove solar project near Corpus Christi. Photo courtesy Enbridge

Canadian energy company Enbridge Inc., whose gas transmission and midstream operations are based in Houston, has flipped the switch on its first solar power project in Texas.

The Orange Grove project, about 45 miles west of Corpus Christi, is now generating 130 megawatts of energy that feeds into the grid operated by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT). Orange Grove features 300,000 solar panels installed on more than 920 acres in Jim Wells County. Construction began in 2024. Continue reading.

4. Texas drivers continue to pump the brakes on EVs, shows new report

Texas falls among the middle of the pack when it comes to EV adoption, according to a new report. Photo via Unsplash

Even though Texas is home to Tesla, a major manufacturer of electric vehicles, motorists in the Lone Star State aren’t in the fast lane when it comes to getting behind the wheel of an EV.

U.S. Department of Energy data compiled by Visual Capitalist shows Texas has 689.9 EV registrations per 100,000 people, putting it in 20th place for EV adoption among the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Continue reading.

5. Houston team’s discovery brings solid-state batteries closer to EV use

Houston researchers have uncovered why solid-state batteries break down and what could be done to slow the process. Photo via Getty Images.

A team of researchers from the University of Houston, Rice University and Brown University has uncovered new findings that could extend battery life and potentially change the electric vehicle landscape.

The team recently published its findings in the journal Nature Communications. The work deployed a powerful, high-resolution imaging technique known as operando scanning electron microscopy to better understand why solid-state batteries break down and what could be done to slow the process. Continue reading.

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