GreenTech Noir is a community for Black people globally who are working in the business of sustainability and climate tech. This platform was designed to support everyone from founders to corporate leaders, to investors, and beyond.
Thomas Edison is credited with the invention of the light bulb. This feat of engineering ushered in the age of electricity which helped America flourish to become the economic power that it is today. The technology that perfected light bulbs to become widespread was invented by Lewis Latimer, a prolific Black inventor, whose company was acquired by Edison. Black, Latino, and Indigenous People are deeply embedded in the history and business of energy in the United States and worldwide.
More than 100 years later BIPOC founders and investors are still struggling to get the resources to magnify their impact. This network is designed to capture the value of Black and Brown Brilliance- an underutilized asset.
Under-represented and often underestimated founders have built-in equity and a diverse stakeholder perspective in their business models as a result of lived experience. GreenTech Noir’s goal is to elevate every Black person who is working to redefine the future of our planet.
Our Perspective
The climate challenge is urgent and Black and Brown people are disproportionately impacted by climate change. This will require the most significant human collaborative effort to solve.
Corporations and capital markets can make a meaningful change while making a profit and innovation can be accelerated by funding technology development and commercial deployment by investors.
The demographic of venture backed companies don’t match the landscape of America. There are many reasons as to why but one of the best ways to solve this is to “Make the hire, send the wire”.
Nneka Uzoh | Founder
Nneka Uzoh is Director of Energy Innovation at Elemental Excelerator. She leads Elemental’s energy vertical and supports their energy portfolio companies on their path to scale, leveraging her experience incorporating innovation and new technology into PG&E and NextEra Energy Resources.
She has a unique skill set in connecting disparate data sets to tell a story and creating inventive solutions to address the underlying issues. In her roles, she has successfully ushered billion-dollar deals and projects related to mergers and acquisitions, capital investments, energy and sustainability, customer strategy and experience, innovation, and organizational design. Which helps her in supporting companies in her consulting business Intentional Ideation. Nneka also serves as an advisor to companies like CleanTek Capital, UtilityAPI, KIGT, and Instagas.
Nneka holds an MBA from Kellogg School of Management, a Masters in Energy Finance from Tulane and a BS in Finance from Hampton University.
Nneka is passionate about the arts and sits on the board of African American Shakespeare Company in San Francisco and loves to host dinner parties when there is not a pandemic.
Taj Ahmad-Eldridge | Advisory Circle
Taj currently serves as Senior Director of investments at the Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator (LACI) focusing on companies in the energy, transportation, and the circular economy. Taj is also General Partner with Include Ventures, a $100M fund of funds launching in 2021.
Prior to LACI, Taj was the Director for the Incubator at the University of California in Riverside, California. During his tenure there, Taj was part of the team to bring a $10M venture fund (Highlander Fund) to the Inland Empire region as well as made Riverside, California the #4 city in the United States for minority entrepreneurs via Entrepreneur Magazine.
Taj began his career as a banker and economist with Wells Fargo Bank, UBS investment Bank, and TRW Investments. Taj has also been a Founder, Board Member, and Investor in companies such as ILTG Media, Boswell Official apparel, Voter, Xtopoly, Rookielook, iListen, KYC Hospitality, KIGT, Majira Project, CleanTek Capital and ConCreates. Taj also serves on the board of the Homeboy Ventures Fund and VC Include, a fund manager fellowship program.
For fun Taj is an avid audiobook bibliophile and a lover of music of all genres.
Amy Duffuor | Advisory Circle
Amy Duffuor is a Principal at Prime Impact Fund, with responsibility to identify and evaluate investment opportunities, lead investments, and serve on the boards of portfolio companies. Her professional background spans business, finance, and impact across three continents.
Prior to Prime Impact Fund, Amy was a renewables and power investment banker at Bank of America. There, she worked with CEOs of public and private companies to raise investment
capital including the IPO of Sunnova (NYSE: NOVA), a residential solar company initially valued at approximately $1 billion. Before her stint on Wall Street, Amy ran early-stage social venture accelerators around Southeast Asia for a Singapore-headquartered impact investing firm called
Impact Investment Exchange. Earlier in her career, Amy was a management consultant at State of Flux, a London-based consulting firm that specializes in supply chain and procurement. She serves as a board member for Prime Impact Fund portfolio companies Clean Crop Technologies and Noon Energy, in addition to serving on the board of the Northeast Clean Energy Council (NECEC).
Amy holds a B.A. from Columbia University, an M.Phil with Distinction from the University of Oxford, and an MBA from The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.
Jamila Jarmon, Esq. | Advisory Circle
Jamila was raised in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, and is a graduate of the George Washington University and William S. Richardson School of Law at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. As a practicing attorney, Jamila has experience in civil litigation, real estate, poverty law, and environmental law. She has served on numerous boards, and currently serves on the Pōpolo Project and Aloha Harvest Boards, and has worked with many community organizations, including the Medical-Legal Partnership for Children in Hawai‘i and at the Domestic Violence Action Center.
She is currently In-House Counse at Elemental Excelerator, a cleantech growth accelerator based in Honolulu. In 2019, Jamila was named one of Hawai‘i’s most influential young leaders by Pacific Business News as one of the 40 Under 40 and she was selected as a Pacific Century Fellow to be part of a cohort of emerging leaders creating innovative solutions to Hawai‘i’s problems.
Christian Okoye | Advisory Circle
Christian Okoye is a Director of Venture Investments at Emerson Collective. He focuses on managing venture and growth equity investments in energy and environmental solutions. He sits on the boards of MycoTechnology - a food-tech company, Nithio - a fin-tech company focused on enabling consumer credit in emerging markets, and PosiGen – developer of solar and energy efficiency solutions for LMI homeowners. Prior to joining Emerson Collective, Christian worked for Denham Capital's Energy infrastructure platform investing in infrastructure development in emerging markets. He started his career in Goldman Sachs' Natural Resources group. Christian holds an MBA and MS in Energy Resources from Stanford University and a BA in Economics from the University of Chicago.
Devin Hampton | Advisory Circle
Devin Hampton is the Chief Executive Officer at UtilityAPI, a software company that is building the data network for the new energy economy by providing a fast and secure platform for exchanging energy data. He is also the founder of Empowering Diversity in Climate Tech (EDICT), a collective of over 50 companies committed to building stronger businesses through diversity.
Prior to UtilityAPI, he worked as a consultant for clean energy startups and investors. He also served President Barack Obama’s White House as Chief of Staff at the U.S. Trade and Development Agency, leading work investing in infrastructure, smart cities, and energy projects in emerging markets. Before that, his work for the Obama Administration included a number of leadership positions at the U.S. Department of Energy, including as Senior Adviser for Emerging Markets where he spearheaded the development of guidelines for the fundamentals of the liquified natural gas trade.
Before his time in federal service, Devin worked in city and state political organizing in his home state of Washington. He is a graduate of the University of Washington and has been recognized by the Atlantic Council as an Emerging Leader in Environment and Energy Policy.