Three young professionals have made the cut for this year's Forbes Under 30 list in the Energy and Green Tech list for 2025. Photos via Forbes

A handful of Houstonians have been named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 Energy and Green Tech list for 2025.

Kip Daujotas is an investment associate at Aramco Ventures, a $7.5 billion venture capital arm of the world's largest energy company. Houston is the Americas headquarters for Saudi Aramco. Since its inception in 2012, Aramco Ventures has invested in more than 100 tech startups. Daujotas joined the team over two years ago after studying for an MBA at Yale University. He led Aramco’s first direct air capture (DAC) investment — in Los Alamos, New Mexico-based Spiritus.

Also representing the corporate side of the industry, Wenting Gao immigrated from Beijing to obtain an economics degree from Harvard University, then got a job at consulting giant McKinsey, where she recently became the firm’s youngest partner. Gao works on bringing sustainability strategies to energy and materials companies as well as investors. Her areas of expertise include battery materials, waste, biofuels, and low-carbon products.

Last but not least, Houston entrepreneur Rawand Rasheed is co-founder and CEO of Houston-based Helix Earth. He co-founded the startup after earning a doctoral degree from Rice University and co-inventing Helix’s core technology while at NASA, first as a graduate research fellow and then as an engineer. The core technology, a space capsule air filtration system, has been applied to retrofitting HVAC systems for commercial buildings.

Each year, Forbes 30 Under 30 recognizes 600 honorees in 20 categories. The 2025 honorees were selected from more than 10,000 nominees by Forbes staff and a panel of independent judges based on factors such as funding, revenue, social impact, scale, inventiveness, and potential.

Specifically, the Energy & Green Tech category recognizes young entrepreneurs driving innovation that’s aimed at creating a cleaner, greener future.

“Gen Z is one of the fastest-growing groups of entrepreneurs and creators, who are reshaping the way the world conducts business, and our Under 30 class of 2025 proves that you can never begin your career journey too early,” says Alexandra York, editor of Forbes Under 30. “With the expansion across AI, technology, social media, and other industries, the honorees on this year’s list are pushing the boundaries and building their brands beyond traditional scopes.”

According to McKinsey data, more than $3.5 trillion will be invested in green hydrogen, carbon capture, renewable energy, and other projects that are working toward net-zero transition by 2050. Photo via ses-estimating.com

McKinsey acquires Houston-area co. to enhance sustainability services

M&A Moves

A global management consulting company has executed on an acquisition key to its plans amid the energy transition.

McKinsey & Company announced the acquisition of Strategic Estimating Systems, a Sugar Land-based consulting firm specializing in cost estimation for oil, gas, and chemical process industries. The acquisition provides McKinsey with enhanced benchmarking capabilities across capital project management — especially within the energy transition.

The terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"The capital projects ecosystem is presented with a once-in-a-generation chance to aid in transforming economies to achieve net zero," Justin Dahl, partner and global leader of McKinsey & Company's Capital Analytics, says in a news release. "By integrating SES's unmatched capabilities, we're not only enhancing our sustainability services, such as carbon capture, but also expanding the scope of our existing Capital Excellence capabilities to crucial industries and wider geographies."

"This allows our clients to gain an independent perspective on value, cost, and timing at every phase of the capital project lifecycle, thereby improving bottom-up estimating," Dahl continues. "Committed to innovation and excellence, this acquisition empowers us to explore new value dimensions and further refine our expertise in bottom-up estimating for our clients."

According to McKinsey data, more than $3.5 trillion will be invested in green hydrogen, carbon capture, renewable energy, and other projects that are working toward net-zero transition by 2050.

"We are thrilled to join McKinsey and expand our footprint to serve more clients on a larger scale," SES Founder and CEO Mike Monteith, who joins as Leader of McKinsey & Company's Capital Analytics, says in the release. "McKinsey is unparalleled in developing scalable and sustainable transformation strategies, leveraging industry leading insight and expertise in capital excellence.

"By working together, we will amplify our strengths, driving greater impact for clients at every stage of the capital project lifecycle, and delivering end-to-end transformations that create lasting value," he continues.

Nuclear could be a powerful tool to address rising greenhouse-gas emissions. But to get there, the industry needs to raise its game. Photo via Pexels

Houston expert explains what’s needed to bend the curve on nuclear power

guest column

I argued previously that nuclear power can help the world deal with two related challenges: energy security and climate change. I still think that is the case.

McKinsey & Company, where I worked for more than 30 years, also recently turned to the topic. The authors agreed that nuclear can play a significant role in decarbonization, and noted that there were some encouraging trends, even in markets, such as the United States, where new plants are thin on the ground. And then the authors asked a critical question: “Can the industry reverse the trend of exceeding budgets and timelines while scaling up fast enough to rise to the climate challenge?”

That query got me thinking. To me, the case for nuclear is clear and compelling. Given that electricity demand could triple by 2050, the need for low-emission and constant power is acute. Nuclear fits that bill. Other sources either emit much more (coal, gas, oil) or are intermittent (wind, solar). Little new hydro is being built. Nothing else is at anything like scale.

But clearly, nuclear has not carried the day, particularly in Europe, Japan, and the United States. These markets are, at best, wary of nuclear power. They are willing to invest some money in next-generation technologies or maybe to extend an operating license. But they are not doing much about the conditions that make new construction so costly and difficult.

For that to happen, I think we need to go deeper—to change mindsets among two very different sets of players.

Anti-nuclear green activists. As the Rolling Stones wisely noted, “You can’t always get what you want.” To deal with something as complicated and wide-ranging as climate change, there will be trade-offs. But if you want reliable power and lower emissions and if you don’t want thousands of square miles of land coated with wind and solar farms, something has to give.

Consider France. It gets more than two-thirds of its power from nuclear, which is a huge part of the reason it ranks 60th in the world in per capita carbon-dioxide emissions (4.46 tons), a much better performance than global peers like Japan (8.5), Belgium (8.1), Germany (7.9), and Austria (7.3). Those four countries have all dialed back on nuclear. Here is the Austrian energy minister, Leonore Gewessler: “The attempt to declare nuclear energy as sustainable and renewable must be resolutely opposed.”

If the goal is to reduce emissions, though, why should that be the case? Well, one response is that championing nuclear power could reduce investment in renewables. But again, if the goal is to reduce emissions, then why not embrace technologies that do exactly that? Whether nuclear can be considered “renewable” seems to me to be almost a theological question, not a technical one. And certainly not a useful one. The goal should not be X or Y percent of renewables, but how to promote an energy transition that delivers reliable, low-emission power. Somehow that point is lost, or dismissed. Instead, major environmental groups such as the Sierra Club (“unequivocally opposed”), Greenpeace (“say no to new nukes”), the Climate Action Network Europe, the European Environmental Bureau (“We advocate for an exit from nuclear energy”) and so on don’t see a place for nuclear.

The mindset shift needed among these and other green groups is to see nuclear as one component of a diversified energy system that can be part of the climate solution, and then to turn their considerable power and creativity toward convincing the public. I just don’t see how shutting down nuclear plants before their time, and replacing them with higher-emissions sources, as is often the case, helps to reduce emissions.

I am not holding my breath on this, but stranger things have happened. Heck, nuclear has found an unlikely advocate in film-maker Oliver Stone. His new documentary, “Nuclear,” argues that the public “has been trained, from the very beginning, to fear nuclear power. The very thing that we fear is what may save us.”

Nuclear could be a powerful tool to address rising greenhouse-gas emissions. But to get there, the industry needs to raise its game. Stone’s nuclear-could-save-us scenario would be likelier if the industry made a better case for itself. Not in safety or reliability, where its record is remarkably good, but in frustration and economics. The stereotype of huge delays and budget over-runs is no myth. Georgia is the only US state building plants, and they are both running years and billions beyond the initial projections.

Granted, some things are beyond the industry’s control: legal challenges plus complex and shifting regulation add up. Some countries clearly do better than others on this. South Korea, for example, gets a third of its power from nuclear, is building three more plants, and is expanding its export market. It will be interesting to see if it could develop something like a nuclear assembly line that drives down its costs, which are already much lower than in the United States.

Like any other sector, nuclear needs to excel at competitiveness, cost control, and innovation—and it hasn’t. In the United States, the typical template has been to build really big plants, each unique, and each very expensive because of the size. The McKinsey report noted a number of things that the industry itself could do better, such as learning and applying best practices for large-scale projects; establishing standard designs; and using modular construction techniques. US construction productivity has stagnated for decades; the use of digitization and automation could help.

There are reasons to believe that the industry is improving. A cluster of companies is developing smaller, salt-cooled reactors; these are cheaper and safer. In January 2023, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission certified NuScale’s small modular reactor that uses natural water circulation, obviating the need for pumps and thus lowering capital costs. Compared to the 1,000 MW Georgia plants, NuScale’s are about 77MW, but can be added onto. No such plants have been built yet in the United States, though; advanced fission and fusion are even further away. So at the moment, this is all about potential. As one Department of Energy official put it, “It becomes truly real when electrons go on the grid.”

McKinsey concluded: “We believe a nuclear scale-up is achievable. It’s time for the industry to meet the challenge.” I agree,

Nuclear could be a powerful tool to address rising greenhouse-gas emissions. But to get there, the industry needs to raise its game. And it could use a little help from its enemies.

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Scott Nyquist is a senior advisor at McKinsey & Company and vice chairman, Houston Energy Transition Initiative of the Greater Houston Partnership. The views expressed herein are Nyquist's own and not those of McKinsey & Company or of the Greater Houston Partnership. This article originally ran on LinkedIn.

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7 innovative startups fueling the energy transition in Houston

Meet the Innovators

Houston has long been touted as the energy capital of the world, and it's now it's also a leading player in the energy transition — home to numerous startups and innovators working toward a cleaner future.

As part of the 2025 Houston Innovation Awards, presented by InnovationMap, the Energy Transition Business category honors innovative startups that are providing solution within renewables, climatetech, clean energy, alternative materials, circular economy, and more.

Seven energy transition companies have been named finalists for the 2025 award. They range from a spinoff stimulating subsurface hydrogen from end-of-life oil fields to a company converting prickly pear cactus biogas into energy.

Read more about these climatetech businesses, their founders, and their green initiatives below. Then join us at the Houston Innovation Awards on Nov. 13 at Greentown Labs, when the winner will be unveiled at our live awards ceremony.

Tickets are now on sale.

Anning Corporation

Clean energy company Anning Corporation is working to develop geologic hydrogen, a natural carbon-free fuel, using its proprietary stimulation approaches and advanced exploration modeling. The company said that geologic hydrogen has the potential to be the lowest-cost source of reliable baseload electricity in the U.S.

The company was founded by CEO Sophie Broun in 2024 and is a member of Greentown Labs. Last month, it also announced that it was chosen to participate in Breakthrough Energy’s prestigious Fellows Program. Anning raised a pre-seed round this year and is currently raising a $6 million seed round.

Capwell Services

Houston-based 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 current CEO Andrew Lane. It has since participated in programs with Greentown Labs and Rice Clean Energy Accelerator. The company moved to Houston in 2023 and raised a pre-seed round. It has also received federal funding from the DOE. Capwell is currently piloting its commercial unit with oil and gas operators.

Deep Anchor Solutions

Offshore energy consulting and design company Deep Anchor Solutions aims to help expedite the adoption of floating offshore energy infrastructure with its deeply embedded ring anchor (DERA) technology. According to the company, its patented DERA system can be installed quietly without heavy-lift vessels, reducing anchor-related costs by up to 75 percent and lifecycle CO2 emissions by up to 80 percent.

The company was founded in 2023 by current CEO Junho Lee and CTO Charles Aubeny. Lee earned his Ph.D. in geotechnical engineering from Texas A&M University, where Aubeny is a professor of civil and environmental engineering. The company has participated in numerous accelerators and incubators, including Greentown Labs, MassChallenge, EnergyTech Nexus LiftOff, and others. Lee is an Activate 2025 fellow.

Eclipse Energy

Previously known as Gold H2, Eclipse Energy converts end-of-life oil fields into low-cost, sustainable hydrogen sources. It completed its first field trial this summer, which demonstrated subsurface bio-stimulated hydrogen production. According to the company, its 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.

Eclipse is a spinoff of Houston biotech company Cemvita. It was founded in 2022 by Moji Karimi (CEO and chairman of Cemvita), Prabhdeep Sekhon (CEO of Eclipse), Tara Karimi, and Rayyan Islam. The company closed an $8 million series A this year and has plans to raise another round in 2026.

Loop Bioproducts

Agricultural chemical manufacturing company Loop Bioproducts leverages the physiology of prickly pear cactus grown in Texas to produce bioenergy, food, and remediate industrial wastewater streams. The company uses its remote sensing technology, proprietary image-based machine learning model, and R&D innovation to capture raw biogas from the cactuses and is focused on scaling cactuses as an industrial crop on land.

Rhiannon Parker founded Loop Bioproducts in 2023.

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. The company reports that it plans to open its first commercial plant in the next 18 months.

Founded in 2019 by CEO Aaron Fitzgerald, CTO Kristian Gubsch, and lead engineer Trey Sheridan, the company has raised just under $1 million in capital and is backed by Bill Gates’ Breakthrough Energy, Shell, Black & Veatch, and other organizations.

Solidec

Chemical manufacturing company Solidec has developed autonomous generators that extract molecules from water and air and converts them into pure chemicals and fuels that are free of carbon emissions onsite, 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 chief scientist, CEO Ryan DuChanois, and CTO Yang Xia. It closed a $2.5 million seed round earlier this year.

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The Houston Innovation Awards program is sponsored by Houston Community College, Houston Powder Coaters, FLIGHT by Yuengling, and more to be announced soon. For sponsorship opportunities, please contact sales@innovationmap.com.

New report rates best electric companies and renewable energy plans

energy plans

Choose Texas Power—a marketplace that allows users to view and compare electricity plans, providers and rates in the state—has compiled its Best Texas Electric Companies report.

The data-driven list considers pricing, providers and consumer trends, and rates for companies listed on its marketplace. The report was updated earlier this month.

Choose Texas Power rated the Texas energy companies using its proprietary data and online reviews, and gave each company a score from zero to five based on customer service, accessibility and plan variety.

Houston-based Express Energy tied for first place on the list with DFW-based TXU Energy, 4Change Energy and Veteran Energy. Eight other Houston-area companies made the 10. The companies all received a rating of 5 out of 5.

The full list includes:

  • Houston-based Gexa Energy (4.9)
  • Irving-based TriEagle Energy (4.9)
  • Houston-based Frontier Utilities (4.8)
  • Spring-based Atlantex Power (4.6)
  • Houston-based Rhythm Energy (4.6)
  • Houston-based Green Mountain Energy (4.5)
  • Houston-based Reliant Energy (4.3)
  • Houston-based Direct Energy (4.2)
  • Houston-based APG&E Energy (4.2)
  • Houston-based Discount Power (4)
  • Plano-based Cirro Energy (4)
  • Fort Worth-based Payless Power (3.9)

Choose Texas Power also broke down the best companies for specific customer needs.

  • Best for affordable green energy: Gexa Energy
  • Best for 100% renewable energy: Rhythm Energy
  • Green energy plans for low usage: Green Mountain Energy
  • Best for smart home upgrades: Discount Power
  • Best for straightforward energy plans: TriEagle Energy
  • Best for plan variety: TXU Energy
  • Best for simple contract terms: Express Energy

Find the full report here.

Chevron names latest cohort of energy transition fellows at Rice University

energy fellowship

Chevron and Rice University have named 10 graduate students to the second cohort of the Chevron Energy Graduate Fellowship.

The students come from various departments at Rice and are working on innovations that reduce emissions or improve upon low-carbon technology. Fellows will each receive a $10,000 award to support their research along with the opportunity to connect with "industry experts who can provide valuable insight on scaling technologies from the lab to commercial application," according to Rice.

The fellows will present projects during a cross-university virtual symposium in the spring.

The 2025-26 Chevron Energy Graduate Fellows and their research topics include:

  • Cristel Carolina Brindis Flores, Molecular Simulations of CO₂ and H₂ for Geostorage
  • Davide Cavuto, Intensification of Floating Catalyst Chemical Vapor Deposition for Carbon Nanotubes Synthesis
  • Jaewoo Kim, Distributed Acoustic Sensing for In-situ Stress Monitoring in Enhanced Geothermal Systems
  • Jessica Hema Persaud, Understanding Tin Perovskite Crystallization Dynamics for All-Perovskite Tandems
  • Johanna Ikabu Bangala, Upcycling Methane-derived Zero-Valent Carbon for Sustainable Agriculture
  • Kashif Liaqat, From Waste to Resource: Increased Sustainability Through Hybrid Waste Heat Recovery Systems for Data Centers and Industry
  • Md Abid Shahriar Rahman Saadi, Advancing Sustainable Structural, Energy and Food Systems through Engineering of Biopolymers
  • Ratnika Gupta, Micro-Silicon/Carbon Nanotube Composite Anodes with Metal-free Current Collector for High Performance Li-Ion Batteries
  • Wei Ping Lam, Electrifying Chemical Manufacturing: High-Pressure Electrochemical CO₂ Capture and Conversion
  • William Schmid, Light-Driven Thermal Desalination Using Transient Solar Illumination

“Through this fellowship program, we can support outstanding graduate students from across the university who are conducting cutting-edge research across a variety of fields,” Carrie Masiello, director of the Rice Sustainability Institute, said in a news release. “This year, our 2026 Chevron Fellows are working on research that reflects the diversity of the sustainability research at Rice … and these scholarly endeavors exemplify the breadth and depth of research enabled by Chevron’s generous support.”

The Chevron Fellows program launched at Rice last year, naming 10 graduate students to the inaugural cohort. It is funded by Chevron and was created through a partnership between the Rice Sustainability Institute. Chevron launched a similar program at the University of Houston in 2023.

“Rice University continues to be an exceptional partner in advancing energy innovation,” Chris Powers, director of exploration commercial and portfolio at Chevron, added in the release. “The Chevron Energy Fellows program showcases the brilliance and drive of Rice graduate students, whose research in areas like carbon conversion, solar materials and geothermal sensing is already shaping the future of sustainable energy. We’re proud to celebrate their achievements and look forward to the impact they’ll continue to make across the energy landscape.”