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These 5 trailblazing Houston startups are leading the energy transition

meet the finalists

This year's finalists range from a lower-emission steel producer to a diagnostics platform developer working to support batteries used in data centers. Photo courtesy Hertha Metals

Houston is home to a growing number of startups reshaping what it means to be called the "Energy Capital of the World."

As part of the 2026 Houston Innovation Awards, our Energy Transition Business category honors those innovative startups that are providing solutions within renewables, climatetech, clean energy, alternative materials, circular economy and more.

Five clean energy startups have been named finalists for the 2026 award. The finalists, selected by our esteemed panel of judges, range from a lower-emission steel producer to a diagnostics platform developer working to support batteries used in data centers.

Read more about these innovative businesses, their initiatives, and their inspirational founders below. The 2026 winners will be announced on InnovationMap.com in mid-November.

Capwell Services

Methane capture company Capwell Services works to eliminate vented oil and gas emissions economically for operators. According to the company, methane emissions are vented from most oil and gas facilities due to safety protocols, and operators are not able to capture the gas cost-effectively, leading operators to emit more than 14 million metric tons of methane per year in the U.S. and Canada. Founded in 2022, Capwell specializes in low and intermittent flow vents for methane capture.

The company began as a University of Pennsylvania senior design project led by CEO Andrew Lane. It has since participated in programs with Greentown Labs, the Rice Clean Energy Accelerator and the Creative Destruction Lab Energy Cohort at Texas A&M University. The company moved to Houston in 2023 and raised a pre-seed round. It deployed two commercial units this year, according to its application.

FlowCellutions

Energytech startup FlowCellutions is developing a chemistry-agnostic diagnostics platform for flow and metal-air batteries supporting data centers and critical infrastructure. The platform is designed to help reduce operating costs, prevent failures and costly downtime, and extend battery lifetime from approximately seven years to more than 30 years. It has deployed four paid pilots and plans to take insights from the programs to develop its next-gen sensor platform technology.

CEO Becca Segel founded the company in 2022. It is a member of Greentown Labs, and Segel was a 2025 Activate Fellow. The company has raised over $2 million in non-dilutive funding and received a $1.5 million NSF SBIR Fast-Track award earlier this year.

Hertha Metals

Hertha Metals produces lower-cost, lower-emission steel and high-purity iron. The company has developed a single-step process that uses natural gas as a direct reductant instead of metallurgical coal, which cuts production costs by more than 25 percent and emissions by up to 50 percent, according to the company. The same process produces high-purity iron needed for high-purity steels and rare earth magnets. The company says it aims to "re-industrialize America’s production of critical materials."

Hertha Metals was founded by CEO Laureen Meroueh in 2022 and emerged from stealth last year with more than $17 million in venture capital funding. The company closed a $133.65 million Series A this month and also broke ground on its $100M high-purity iron factory known as Chalyx in Conroe.

Mars Materials

Clean chemical manufacturing business Mars Materials is working to convert captured carbon into resources, such as carbon fiber and wastewater treatment chemicals. The company develops and produces its drop-in chemical products in Houston and uses an in-licensed process for the National Renewable Energy Lab to produce acrylonitrile, which is used to produce plastics, synthetic fibers, and rubbers.

Founded in 2019 by CEO Aaron Fitzgerald, CTO Kristian Gubsch, and vice president of operations Trey Sheridan, the company has secured over $7.2M in financing and is backed by Bill Gates’ Breakthrough Energy, Shell, Black & Veatch, and other organizations. It won in the Minority-founded Business Category in last year's Houston Innovation Awards.

Solidec

Chemical manufacturing company Solidec has developed autonomous generators that extract molecules from water and air and convert them into pure chemicals and fuels that are free of carbon emissions on-site, eliminating the need for transport, storage, and permitting. The company was founded around innovations developed by Rice University associate professor Haotian Wang.

The company was selected for the Chevron Technology Ventures’ Catalyst Program, Greentown Labs, NSF I-Corps and was part of the first cohort of the Activate Houston program. It won first place at the 2024 startup pitch competition at CERAWeek. Solidec was founded in 2023 by Wang, who serves as an advisor, CEO Ryan DuChanois, and CTO Yang Xia. It closed a $2.5 million seed round in 2025.

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Houston-based Flathead Forge Fund 1 has participated in Solidec's pre-seed funding round. Photo courtesy Greentown Labs

Solidec secures pre-seed funding from Houston VC firm

fresh funding

Houston-based Flathead Forge Fund 1 has invested in Houston startup Solidec, which specializes in modular onsite chemical manufacturing.

The investment was part of Solidec’s recent round of more than $2 million in pre-seed funding. The amount of Flathead Forge’s investment wasn’t disclosed.

“Flathead Forge brings exactly the kind of domain-specific capital and operational network that a company at our stage needs. Their focus on water and critical minerals makes this a genuinely strategic relationship,” Ryan DuChanois, co-founder and CEO of Solidec, said in a news release.

Other investors in the round included New Climate Ventures, Collaborative Fund, Echo River Capital, Ecosphere Ventures, Plug and Play Ventures, Safar Partners and Semilla Climate Capital.

Solidec produces industrial chemicals, including hydrogen peroxide, formic acid and acetic acid, using only air, water and electricity. Its modular reactors eliminate the need for energy-intensive production and long-haul distribution.

“Solidec’s platform cuts cost, emissions, and supply-chain fragility at the source,” Douglas Lee, managing director of Flathead Forge, added in the statement.

DuChanois said in an email that the company plans to use the funding to "scale (its) modular chemical manufacturing platform."

Solidec recently announced a pilot project with Lynas Rare Earths, the world’s only commercial producer of separated light and heavy rare earth oxides outside China, for production of hydrogen peroxide for a Lynas facility in Australia.

Solidec, a member of Greentown Labs Houston, spun out of associate professor Haotian Wang’s lab at Rice University in 2024. Wang focuses on developing new materials and technology for energy and environmental uses, such as energy storage and green synthesis.
Rice University scientists' “recharge-to-recycle” reactor has major implications for the electric vehicle sector. Photo courtesy Jorge Vidal/Rice University.

Houston scientists develop 'recharge-to-recycle' reactor for lithium-ion batteries

reduce, recharge, recycle

Engineers at Rice University have developed a cleaner, innovative process to turn end-of-life lithium-ion battery waste into new lithium feedstock.

The findings, recently published in the journal Joule, demonstrate how the team’s new “recharge-to-recycle” reactor recharges the battery’s waste cathode materials to coax out lithium ions into water. The team was then able to form high-purity lithium hydroxide, which was clean enough to feed directly back into battery manufacturing.

The study has major implications for the electric vehicle sector, which significantly contributes to the waste stream from end-of-life battery packs. Additionally, lithium tends to be expensive to mine and refine, and current recycling methods are energy- and chemical-intensive.

“Directly producing high-purity lithium hydroxide shortens the path back into new batteries,” Haotian Wang, associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, co-corresponding author of the study and co-founder of Solidec, said in a news release. “That means fewer processing steps, lower waste and a more resilient supply chain.”

Sibani Lisa Biswal, chair of Rice’s Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and the William M. McCardell Professor in Chemical Engineering, also served as co-corresponding author on the study.

“We asked a basic question: If charging a battery pulls lithium out of a cathode, why not use that same reaction to recycle?” Biswal added in the release. “By pairing that chemistry with a compact electrochemical reactor, we can separate lithium cleanly and produce the exact salt manufacturers want.”

The new process also showed scalability, according to Rice. The engineers scaled the device to 20 square centimeters, then ran a 1,000-hour stability test and processed 57 grams of industrial black mass supplied by industry partner Houston-based TotalEnergies. The results produced lithium hydroxide that was more than 99 percent pure. It also maintained an average lithium recovery rate of nearly 90 percent over the 1,000-hour test, showing its durability. The process also worked across multiple battery chemistries, including lithium iron phosphate, lithium manganese oxide and nickel-manganese-cobalt variants.

Looking ahead, the team plans to scale the process and consider ways it can sustain high efficiency for greater lithium hydroxide concentrations.

“We’ve made lithium extraction cleaner and simpler,” Biswal added in the release. “Now we see the next bottleneck clearly. Tackle concentration, and you unlock even better sustainability.

Houston-based Solidec has closed an oversubscribed pre-seed round led by New Climate Ventures. Photo courtesy Greentown Labs.

Houston clean-chemicals startup Solidec raises $2M to scale tech

fresh funding

Solidec, a Houston startup that specializes in manufacturing “clean” chemicals, has raised more than $2 million in pre-seed funding.

Houston-based New Climate Ventures led the oversubscribed pre-seed round, with participation from Plug and Play Ventures, Ecosphere Ventures, the Collaborative Fund, Safar Partners, Echo River Capital and Semilla Climate Capital, among other investors.

Solidec’s approach to chemical manufacturing replaces centralized infrastructure with modular on-site production using only air, water and electricity. Solidec’s platform is powered by modular reactors capable of producing widely used chemicals such as hydrogen peroxide, formic acid, acetic acid and ethylene.

“We’ve known the Solidec team for almost two years and have developed a high degree of conviction in the team, their technology, and their go-to-market strategy,” Eric Rubenstein, managing partner at New Climate Ventures, said in a news release. “We’re particularly excited about Solidec’s ability to produce many different widely used chemicals. It gives them critical flexibility to expand and serve a broad customer base.”

Solidec is initially focusing on hydrogen peroxide.

“Traditionally, hydrogen peroxide is produced in centralized, energy-intensive facilities using carbon-intensive inputs, then transported long distances, resulting in a significant carbon footprint,” Ryan DuChanois, co-founder and CEO of Solidec, said in the release. “Solidec’s modular reactor produces clean chemicals like hydrogen peroxide on-site, in fewer steps, and with less energy, slashing emissions, supply-chain risk, and cost.”

Solidec said its technology “is poised to disrupt the multibillion-dollar commodity and chemical industries.” The company has already signed up several customers.

The startup, a Rice University spinout, is a graduate of the Chevron Catalyst Program and a member of Greentown Labs Houston. It was cofounded by DuChanois, Haotian Wang and Yang Xia.

New research from Rice and UH has helped boost the lifespan of CO2RR systems, a newer technology used for carbon capture. Photo via htxenergytransition.org

Rice University and UH labs team up to improve emerging carbon capture technique

new findings

A team of researchers led by professors from two Houston universities has discovered new methods that help stabilize an emerging technique known as carbon dioxide reduction reaction, or CO2RR, that is used for carbon capture and utilization processes.

The team led by Rice University’s Haotian Wang, associate professor in chemical and biomolecular engineering, and Xiaonan Shan, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at University of Houston, published its findings in a recent edition of the journal Nature Energy.

CO2RR is an emerging carbon capture and utilization technique where electricity and chemical catalysts are used to convert carbon dioxide gas into carbon-containing compounds like alcohols, ethylene, formic acids or carbon monoxide, according to a news release from Rice. The result can be used as fuels, chemicals or as starting materials to produce other compounds.

The technology is used in commercial membrane electrode assembly (MEA) electrolyzers to convert carbon dioxide into valuable compounds, but the technology isn’t perfected. A significant challenge in CO2RR technology has been the accumulation of bicarbonate salt crystals on the backside of the cathode gas diffusion electrode and within the gas flow channels. The salt precipitates block the flow of carbon dioxide gas through the cathode chamber, which reduce the performance and can cause a failure of the electrolyzers.

The goal in the study was to understand why and how bicarbonate salts form during this reaction. The Rice and UH teams worked together using operando Raman spectroscopy, which is a technique that allows researchers to study the structure of materials and any precipitates that adhere to them while the device is functioning.

“By utilizing operando Raman spectroscopy and optical microscopy, we successfully tracked the movement of bicarbonate-containing droplets and identified their migration pattern,” Shan said in the release. “This provided us the information to develop an effective strategy to manage these droplets without interrupting system stability.”

Next, the team worked to prevent the salt crystals from forming. First, they tested lowering the concentration of cations, like sodium or potassium, in the electrolyte to slow down the salt formation. This method proved to be effective.

They also coated the cathode with parylene, a synthetic polymer that repels water, like Teflon, which also notably improved the stability of the electrolyzer and prevented salt accumulation.

“Inspired by the waxy surface of the lotus leaf which causes water droplets to bead up and roll off, carrying off any dirt particles with it and leaving the leaf’s surface clean, we wondered if coating the gas flow channel with a nonstick substance will prevent salt-laden droplets from staying on the surface of the electrodes for too long and, therefore, reduce salt buildup.” Wang said in the release.

According to Wang, these relatively simple discoveries can extend the operational lifespan of CO2RR systems from a few hundred hours to over 1,000 hours.

The findings also have major implications for commercial applications, Shan added.

“This advancement paves the way for longer-lasting and more reliable (CO2RR) systems, making the technology more practical for large-scale chemical manufacturing,” Shan said in the release. “The improvements we developed are crucial for transitioning CO2 electrolysis from laboratory setups to commercial applications for producing sustainable fuels and chemicals.”

Rice professor and Solidec co-founder Haotian Wang's research enables CO2 to be converted into valuable chemicals and fuels. Photo courtesy Welch Foundation.

Houston clean energy pioneer earns prestigious Welch Foundation award

Awards Season

A Rice University professor has earned a prestigious award from the Houston-based Welch Foundation, which supports chemistry research.

The foundation gave its 2025 Norman Hackerman Award in Chemical Research to Haotian Wang for his “exceptionally creative” research involving carbon dioxide electrochemistry. His research enables CO2 to be converted into valuable chemicals and fuels.

The award included $100,000 and a bronze sculpture.

“Dr. Wang’s extensive body of work and rigorous pursuit of efficient electrochemical solutions to practical problems set him apart as a top innovator among early-career researchers,” Catherine Murphy, chairwoman of the foundation’s Scientific Advisory Board, said in a news release.

Wang is an associate professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Rice. The department’s Wang Group develops nanomaterials and electrolyzers for energy and environmental uses, such as energy storage, chemical and fuel generation, green synthesis and water treatment.

Wang also is co-founder of Solidec, a Houston startup that aims to turn his innovations into low-carbon fuels, carbon-negative hydrogen and carbon-neutral peroxide. The startup extracts molecules from water and air, then transforms them into pure chemicals and fuels that are free of carbon emissions.

Solidec has been selected for Chevron Technology Ventures’ catalyst program, a Rice One Small Step grant, a U.S. Department of Energy grant, and the first cohort of the Activate Houston program.

“Dr. Wang’s use of electrochemistry to close the carbon cycle and develop renewable sources of industrial chemicals directly intersects with the Welch Foundation mission of advancing chemistry while improving life,” Fred Brazelton, chairman and director of the Welch Foundation, said in the release.

Ramamoorthy Ramesh, executive vice president for research at Rice University, added: “We are proud to (Dr. Wang) at Rice. He’s using chemical engineering to solve a big problem for humanity, everything that the Welch Foundation stands for.”

Last year, the Hackerman Award went to Baylor College of Medicine's Livia Schiavinato Eberlin, who's known for her groundbreaking work in the application of mass spectrometry technologies, which are changing how physicians treat cancer and analyze tissues. Read more here.

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Solid-state generator company secures $9M in financing, names CTO

fresh financing

ATS Energy has secured a $9 million investment to help commercialize its solid-state generator technology, a representative from the company tells Energy Capital.

The Colorado-based company is a member of Houston's Greentown Labs climatech community and was named the second most-promising startup in the Innovations for Traditional Energy, Electricity, & the Grid track during CERA Week's Energy Venture Day and Pitch Competition in March.

ATS's technology converts industrial waste heat into electricity via its proprietary thermoelectric cartridges, according to a news release. The cartridges convert the otherwise wasted thermal energy directly into usable electricity with no turbine, no moving parts and no emissions.

"We have spent years building a proven track record of breakthrough technology," Doug Hudson, CEO of ATS Energy, said in the release. "What has developed over the past year is that markets are moving toward ATS Energy, said in the release. We've moved well beyond early interest to commercial commitments, active proposals and a pipeline that continues to expand across multiple industrial sectors. That puts us in a tremendous position to meet the moment in delivering energy to industry. This investment responds to real commercial opportunity, and it positions ATS Energy to scale production, meet customer demand faster, and drive commercial deployments."

According to the release, ATS plans to complete and deploy its first commercial generator using the thermoelectric cartridges by mid-2027. The company shared that it plans to begin revenue-generating operations next year, as well.

ATS has also named Edward Ganja as its new CTO. Ganja previously served as a technology advisor for ATS and spent more than 30 years at Shell, most recently as vice president of catalyst and analytical technology in Houston, according to LinkedIn.

"Having worked closely with the team as a Technology Adviser, I am thrilled to step into the Chief Technology Officer role to lead our technology strategy and advanced materials scale-up," Ganja shared in a LinkedIn post. "ATS is tackling crucial energy challenges, and I look forward to working with our talented team, partners, and industry colleagues to accelerate our commercial development and technological footprint."

A representative from the company shares that ATS has three employees in Texas, including two in Houston. The company is targeting industrial facilities, including Gulf Coast refineries and petrochemical plants, for its production model, which will leverage established manufacturing capabilities to help quickly scale its commercial pipeline.

"We are scaling manufacturing with the discipline required for commercial-grade industrial deployment, moving beyond proof-of-concept to deliver mission-critical equipment," Terry Hill, COO of ATS, added in the release. "We've been building the supply chain, identifying the right manufacturing partners and putting the processes in place to move toward repeatable production. By leveraging contract manufacturing, we can focus our capital on the technology, the product and our customers rather than building factories. Just as importantly, we're working to reduce the time between installations so we can respond to the demand we're seeing in the market."

ATS won the prestigious Earthshot Prize in the Fix Our Climate category in 2024. The Earthshot Prize, founded by Prince William, awards £1 million to five energy startups each year over a decade.

Trump says he's ending restrictions on methane emissions from oil drilling

In the News

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that his administration is “terminating” a Biden-era rule that aimed to cut planet-warming emissions of methane from oil and gas drilling.

Trump said during a campaign rally in Texas that the change would save companies and consumers billions of dollars and unlock 210 million barrels of oil. That’s equivalent to about 10 days of U.S. petroleum consumption.

The move aims to encourage more domestic drilling as Trump faces criticism over high fuel prices amid the war in Iran.

Methane is responsible for about a third of planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions, scientists estimate.

Cuts in methane emissions have emerged in recent years as a global priority to slow the rate of climate change. Oil and gas operations are the largest industrial source of methane, which is the main component in natural gas and far more potent to the atmosphere than carbon dioxide in the short term.

The invisible gas leaks from equipment and is released into the atmosphere or burned off as a waste product by oil drillers.

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin previewed the changes last month, saying they would eliminate the agency’s “Super Emitter Program” that requires companies to investigate and repair major methane releases from oil and natural gas facilities. The agency would also set less restrictive standards for small oil and gas wells.

Trump said during Tuesday's rally in Lubbock for Texas Republican Senate candidate Ken Paxton that Biden's plan “crushed the small operators” with crippling regulations.

“I’m officially terminating Biden’s expensive and unnecessary methane regulations to save consumers and energy producers $45 billion in costs,” Trump said.

The loosening of the emissions rule comes as Trump and Republicans in Congress have been methodically dismantling climate policies enacted under former President Joe Biden. That's included the revocation of a scientific finding that was central to U.S. action on greenhouse gas emissions, lower fuel economy standards for vehicles and a move to repeal emission restrictions for coal and natural gas power plants.

Environmental groups said the latest rollback will let companies continue polluting the atmosphere with gas that could be captured and provide energy to millions of households.

Environmental Defense Fund President Fred Krupp said it gives a “free pass” to companies at the expense of American consumers.

“EPA should be fighting this waste, not making it easier,” he said.

Zeldin has said the methane rule would have cost $18 billion and was holding back the U.S. energy industry.

The Biden methane rule was announced by officials including former Vice President Kamala Harris during a 2023 U.N. climate conference in the United Arab Emirates.

Federal officials under Biden said it would prevent an estimated 58 million tons (52.6 million metric tonnes) of methane emissions by 2038 and reduce other pollutants that cause health problems.

By 2034, the rule was projected to yield $98 billion in benefits. That figure was derived by calculating the future “social costs” of greenhouse gas emissions on public health and the environment, an approach rejected by Trump's EPA.

While previous regulations focused only on new oil and gas wells in the U.S., the Biden rule regulated existing wells. Operators also would have needed to plug leaking methane from smaller wells that produce just 6% of the nation’s oil and gas while accounting for up to half of all methane emissions from oil and gas fields.

The final rule was published in 2024. The EPA last year imposed an 18-month delay to give companies time to meet new inspection requirements and other provisions.

The rule was crafted to be coordinated with a methane fee, approved in the 2022 climate law. The fee program would have levied a “waste emissions charge” of as much as $1,500 per metric ton of methane on energy producers that exceed a certain level of methane emissions.

The fee marked the first time the U.S. government directly imposed a fee, or tax, on greenhouse gas emissions. Congress repealed it weeks after Trump took office.

Officials also tried to rein in methane from oil and gas under former President Barack Obama, but that effort was scaled back during Trump's first term.

Houston energy company expands battery storage deal with Samsung

battery boost

Houston-based Alpha Omega Power, which develops, invests in and runs utility-scale battery energy storage systems, has signed a deal to add more storage capacity from a subsidiary of South Korean tech giant Samsung.

The latest deal adds 1 gigawatt-hour of storage capacity to Alpha Omega’s existing contract with Samsung SDI America, bringing total storage capacity to 1.5 gigawatts.

The Michigan-based Samsung subsidiary is manufacturing the systems’ cells and modules at a plant in Indiana, Alpha Omega said. Samsung SDI plans to deliver them by the end of this year.

“This second agreement strengthens our domestic supply chain supporting the next generation of energy infrastructure,” Paul Choi, CEO of Alpha Omega, said in a press release.

Houston-based Fengate Asset Management owns Alpha Omega. In 2023, they formed a partnership to build, acquire, and operate utility-scale battery energy storage projects in the U.S. Their 200-megawatt Vertus battery facility in Galveston County came online this month.

Alpha Omega plans to use the Samsung SDI systems to improve grid reliability and meet greater demand for power in markets served by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) and the Salt Lake City-based Western Electricity Coordinating Council.

ERCOT covers 90 percent of power customers in Texas. The Western Interconnection grid covers all or part of 14 states, as well as parts of Canada and Mexico.

Samsung SDI is the only non-Chinese supplier of rigid-metal “prismatic” energy storage batteries in North America, according to Alpha Omega.

“With strong durability and fire safety compared with pouch-type batteries, its prismatic batteries have helped the company meet the stringent requirements of U.S. energy companies,” Alpha Omega said.

The Samsung Battery Box 1.7 equipment being purchased by Alpha Omega offers AI-powered algorithms and 25 years of continuous use, along with greater energy density than its predecessor. It also features the ability to directly inject fire-extinguishing agents on a module-by-module basis.

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