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Nonprofit looks to grow Houston’s urban farming movement from the East End

seeing green

Small Places grows a variety of vegetables at their East End based farm, selling them at a weekly farm stand. Photo courtesy Small Places

Small Places, a Houston-based urban agricultural nonprofit, is looking forward to putting down roots beyond the fresh vegetables they grow in the East End.

After securing a 40-year land agreement with Harris County, the organization, which provides produce to families facing food insecurity in the Second Ward, is expecting to open their new farm in February 2025. Small Places’ founders hope the 1.5 acres of land named Finca Tres Robles, located at 5715 Canal Street, will be the beginning of Houston’s urban farming movement.

Founded in 2014 by brothers Daniel, Mark, and Thomas Garcia-Prats, Small Places was born out of the latter brother’s desire to work on an organic farm in his hometown of Houston. After farming in Maine, Iowa, and Nicaragua, Thomas had hoped to manage an urban farm but was unable to find a place. He then roped his brothers, who had no agricultural background at the time, into creating one.

“I joke that my journey in agriculture started the day we started out there. We didn’t grow up gardening or farming or anything of the sort,” says Daniel, Small Places’ director of operations. “It was a big learning curve, but how we approached it to our benefit was through our diverse set of backgrounds.”

Brothers Mark, Daniel, and Thomas Garcia-Prats are the co-founders of Small Places, a Houston-based urban agricultural nonprofit growing fresh produce for families in the East End. Photo courtesy Small Places

Small Places began their need-based produce distribution programs through a partnership with nearby pre-school, Ninfa Lorenzo Early Childhood Center, providing food insecure families with fresh produce and later cooking lessons in 2017. When COVID-19 hit Houston in 2020, Daniel says Small Places pivoted towards becoming a redistribution center for their farming contacts who needed to offload produce as restaurants shut down, selling their crops through the organization. Their neighborhood produce program was then born, providing free boxes of produce to nearly 200 families in the East End at the pandemic’s peak.

“We found ourselves in the middle of two communities who were in need, one being people in our community who were losing jobs and were in need of food as well as our farming connections who were losing restaurant accounts,” Daniel explains.

Small Places currently assists 65 families living predominantly within two miles of their original location and they recently restarted their programming with Ninfa Lorenzo Early Childhood Center, and accepts Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits (SNAP) at their farm stand. Daniel says once Finca Tres Robles opens, Small Places plans to bring back cooking classes and educational seminars on healthy eating for which his brother Mark, a former teacher, created the original curriculum. The farm will also have a grocery store stocked with Finca Tres Robles' produce and eventually food staples from local vendors.

“Being social and preparing a meal can be fun, interesting, and delicious. Being able to pull all of that into a program was really important for us,” Daniel explains.

Farming successfully in the middle of Houston for their subsidized programs and produce market requires Small Places’ team to be strategic in their operations. Using his background in engineering and manufacturing, Daniel says they’ve closely monitored trends in which crops perform the best in Houston’s varied, humid climate over the past decade.

They also follow Thomas’s philosophy of allowing nature to work for them, planting crops at times when specific pests are minimal or integrating natural predators into their environment. And lots of composting. Daniel says they accept compostable materials from community members, before burying the raw organic matter in the earth in between their plant beds, allowing it to mature, then later using it to nourish their crops. Daniel says he and his co-founders hope to see more community-focused, sustainable operations like theirs spring up across Houston.

“Small Places is about hopefully more than one farm and really trying to turn urban agriculture and a farm like ours from a novel thing into something that’s just a part of communities and the fabric of Houston for generations to come,” Daniel says.

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This article originally ran on InnovationMap.

The City of Houston is aiming to have Arco del Tiempo installed in 2024. Photo courtesy of The City of Houston

Sustainable sculpture to power Houston multicultural arts building

arts meets energy transition

The City of Houston has unveiled the first look at the latest permanent public artwork that will be installed in the Second Ward in 2024. The sculpture is the first-ever environmentally sustainable art piece that will generate electricity for the nearby City-owned Latino multicultural performing arts theater.

Arco del Tiempo (Arch of Time) is a 100-foot tall arch designed by Berlin-based artist and architect Riccardo Mariano. Several years have been put into the making of this project, dating as far back as 2019. Mariano had entered the idea into a Land Art Generator Initiative (LAGI) design competition in the Houston sister-city of Abu Dhabi. From there, it was chosen to be developed full-scale and installed at Guadalupe Plaza Park.

According to a press release, the sculpture can measure time and cast beams of sunlight onto the ground, creating a connection between "the celestial and the terrestrial" through the geometry of the design.

The light beams are different based on the four seasons and the time of day, constantly shifting and responding to the latitude and longitude of the city from space. Mariano said that his sculpture is a "practical example" of how physical art can interact with the abstract, such as the Earth's movement around the sun.

"The apparent movement of the sun in the sky activates the space with light and colors and engages viewers who participate in the creation of the work by their presence," said Mariano. "Arco del Tiempo merges renewable energy generation with public space and into the everyday life of the Second Ward. Inspired by science and powered by renewable energy, the artwork is a bridge between art and technology and encourages educational purposes while improving public space. At night the space within the arch will be used as a stage for outdoor public events.”

"At night the space within the arch will be used as a stage for outdoor public events,” Riccardo Mariano said.Photo courtesy of The City of Houston

Arco del Tiempo will do more than just be an aesthetically pleasing sight for the community. Its meaningful, functional purpose will be to generate about 400,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity per year, and power the Talento Bilingüe de Houston. LAGI founding co-director Elizabeth Monoian said in the release the sculpture will generate over 12 million kilowatt-hours of power throughout its lifetime, which equals the removal of 8,500 metric tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

"Through the clean energy it produces, Arco del Tiempo will pay back its embodied carbon footprint," Monoian said. "In other words, all the energy that went into its making—from the smelting of the steel to the drilling that puts the final cladding into place—will be offset through the energy it generates. Beyond its break-even point, which we will track and celebrate with the community, the artwork will be a net-positive contributor to a healthy climate and the planet will be better off for its existence.”

In a statement, Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner praised the unique art piece as more than just a sculpture, but as a "monument to a new era of energy."

"The City of Houston has always stood at the vanguard of energy innovation and the Arco del Tiempo artwork stands in that tradition, highlighting Houston’s role as an art city and as global leader in the energy transition," Mayor Turner said. "We are inspired by the vision and creative thinking. Marrying clean energy, the built environment, and truly World Class art is Houston.”

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This article originally ran on CultureMap.

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Houston climatech incubator names new CFO

onboarding

Greentown Labs, a climatech incubator with locations in Houston and Somerville, Massachusetts, has hired Naheed Malik as its chief financial officer. In her new role, she oversees finance, accounting and human resources.

Malik previously worked at American Tower Corp., an owner of wireless communication towers. During her 12-year tenure there, she was vice president of financial planning and analysis, and vice president of corporate finance.

Before American Tower, Malik led financial planning and analysis at Wolters Kluwer Health, and was a management consultant at Kearney and an audit CPA at EY.

Kevin Dutt, Greentown’s interim CEO, says in a news release that Malik’s “deep expertise will be a boon for Greentown as we seek to serve even more climatech startups in our home states of Massachusetts and Texas, and beyond.”

“I am delighted to join Greentown at such an exciting time in its organizational growth,” Malik says. “As a nonprofit that’s deeply dedicated to its mission of supporting climatech innovation, Greentown is poised to build on its impressive track record and expand its impact in the years to come.”

Greentown bills itself as North America’s largest incubator for climatech startups. Today, it’s home to more than 200 startups. Since its founding in 2011, Greentown has nurtured more than 575 startups that have raised over $8.2 billion in funding.

Last year, Greentown’s CEO and president Kevin Knobloch announced that he would be stepping down in July 2024, after less than a year in the role. The incubator. About a month before the announcement, Knobloch reported that Greentown would reduce its staff by 30 percent, eliminating roles in Boston and Houston. He noted changes in leadership, growth of the team and adjustments following the pandemic.

Greentown plans to announce its new permanent CEO by the end of the month.

Being prepared: Has the Texas grid been adequately winterized?

Winter in Texas

Houstonians may feel anxious as the city and state brace for additional freezing temperatures this winter. Every year since 2021’s Winter Storm Uri, Texans wonder whether the grid will keep them safe in the face of another winter weather event. The record-breaking cold temperatures of Uri exposed a crucial vulnerability in the state’s power and water infrastructure.

According to ERCOT’s 6-day supply and demand forecast from January 3, 2025, it expected plenty of generation capacity to meet the needs of Texans during the most recent period of colder weather. So why did the grid fail so spectacularly in 2021?

  1. Demand for electricity surged as millions of people tried to heat their homes.
  2. ERCOT was simply not prepared despite previous winter storms of similar intensity to offer lessons in similarities.
  3. The state was highly dependent on un-winterized natural gas power plants for electricity.
  4. The Texas grid is isolated from other states.
  5. Failures of communication and coordination between ERCOT, state officials, utility companies, gas suppliers, electricity providers, and power plants contributed to the devastating outages.

The domino effect resulted in power outages for millions of Texans, the deaths of hundreds of Texans, billions of dollars in damages, with some households going nearly a week without heat, power, and water. This catastrophe highlighted the need for swift and sweeping upgrades and protections against future extreme weather events.

Texas State Legislature Responds

Texas lawmakers proactively introduced and passed legislation aimed at upgrading the state’s power infrastructure and preventing repeated failures within weeks of the storm. Senate Bill 3 (SB3) measures included:

  • Requirements to weatherize gas supply chain and pipeline facilities that sell electric energy within ERCOT.
  • The ability to impose penalties of up to $1 million for violation of these requirements.
  • Requirement for ERCOT to procure new power sources to ensure grid reliability during extreme heat and extreme cold.
  • Designation of specific natural gas facilities that are critical for power delivery during energy emergencies.
  • Development of an alert system that is to be activated when supply may not be able to meet demand.
  • Requirement for the Public Utility Commission of Texas, or PUCT, to establish an emergency wholesale electricity pricing program.

Texas Weatherization by Natural Gas Plants

In a Railroad Commission of Texas document published May 2024 and geared to gas supply chain and pipeline facilities, dozens of solutions were outlined with weatherization best practices and approaches in an effort to prevent another climate-affected crisis from severe winter weather.

Some solutions included:

  • Installation of insulation on critical components of a facility.
  • Construction of permanent or temporary windbreaks, housing, or barriers around critical equipment to reduce the impact of windchill.
  • Guidelines for the removal of ice and snow from critical equipment.
  • Instructions for the use of temporary heat systems on localized freezing problems like heating blankets, catalytic heaters, or fuel line heaters.

According to Daniel Cohan, professor of environmental engineering at Rice University, power plants across Texas have installed hundreds of millions of dollars worth of weatherization upgrades to their facilities. In ERCOT’s January 2022 winterization report, it stated that 321 out of 324 electricity generation units and transmission facilities fully passed the new regulations.

Is the Texas Grid Adequately Winterized?

Utilities, power generators, ERCOT, and the PUCT have all made changes to their operations and facilities since 2021 to be better prepared for extreme winter weather. Are these changes enough? Has the Texas grid officially been winterized?

This season, as winter weather tests Texans, residents may potentially experience localized outages. When tree branches cannot support the weight of the ice, they can snap and knock out power lines to neighborhoods across the state. In the instance of a downed power line, we must rely on regional utilities to act quickly to restore power.

The specific legislation enacted by the Texas state government in response to the 2021 disaster addressed to the relevant parties ensures that they have done their part to winterize the Texas grid.

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Sam Luna is director at BKV Energy, where he oversees brand and go-to-market strategy, customer experience, marketing execution, and more.

This article first appeared on our sister site, InnovationMap.com.

Halliburton names 5 clean energy startups to latest incubator cohort

clean team

Halliburton Labs has named five companies to its latest cohort, including one from Texas.

All of the companies are working to help accelerate the future of the energy industry in different ways. The incubator aims to advance the companies’ commercialization with support from Halliburton's network, facilities and financing opportunities.

The five new members include:

  • 360 Energy, an Austin-based in-field computing company with technology that is able to capture flared or stranded gas and monetize it through modular data centers
  • Cella, a New York-based mineral storage company that provides end-to-end services, from resource assessment to proprietary injection technology, and monitoring techniques to provide geologic carbon storage solutions
  • Espiku, an engineering services company based in Bend, Oregon, that finds solutions that advance water and minerals recovery from brines and industrial-produced water streams
  • Mitico, based in Los Angeles, that offers technology services to capture carbon dioxide by using its patent-pending granulated metal carbonate sorption technology (GMC) that captures more than 95% of the CO2 emitted from post-combustion point sources
  • NuCube, a Pasadena, California-based company with a nuclear fission reactor under development

“We welcome these innovative energy startups,” Dale Winger, managing director of Halliburton Labs, said in a news release. “We are eager to help these participant companies use their time and capital efficiently to progress new solutions that meet industry requirements for cost, reliability, and sustainability.”

Halliburton Labs also announced that it will host the Finalists Pitch Day on March 26, 2025, in Denver for energy and decarbonization industry innovators, startups and investors ahead of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) Industry Growth Forum. The pitch event will precede registration and the opening reception of the NREL forum. Find more information here.

Adena Power, an Ohio-based clean energy startup, was the latest to join Halliburton Labs prior to the new cohort. The company used three patented materials to produce a sodium-based battery that delivers clean, safe and long-lasting energy storage.

The incubator also named San Francisco-based venture capital investor Pulakesh Mukherjee, partner at Imperative Ventures, which specializes in hard tech decarbonization startups, to its advisory board last spring.

Read more about the incubator's 2023 cohort here.

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