Over the past 16 years, I have been involved in 5 successful startup companies ranging from an energy company, to several .com companies. Now I am focusing all of my attention on creating the tipping point in the sustainability movement by pushing initiatives in government, business and the broader social landscape. 
Many people are curious, what I am doing since I left Powerset. Well, the short story is that I have decided to dedicate myself to what I call the new Green Economy and I am working on several initiatives with other leaders in government and businesses that all fall under the responsibility of non-profit that I am founding called SF Green. 
In September of 2007, I attended a political collaboration event called Renaissance Weekend. It is a 4 day event, held once every 3 months or so, that brings together young business and politically-minded people like me with senior level political and business leaders from across the globe. It is quite an honor to be nominated to go and anyone that has gone can tell you that it is a truly humbling experience. Over the years, it has inspired many people to change their lives and I am proud to say that I am now part of that group of people.
What did it for me was a conversation where I was boasting about how proud I was about being a positive force in the lives of the 72 people at Powerset to a senior political figure. I expected him to congratulate me, but instead his reaction completely flattened, stunned and humbled me. He said "How dare you... if you truly think you have the special ability to bring about a positive change in peoples' lives then how dare you limit your talent to only 72 people. You have made your money, now be done with it. Dedicate yourself to changing thousands of peoples lives and I will congratulate you then."
In my first day back to work after the weekend I told my fellow founders this exact story and told them I was eventually going to leave. That was September and in October I left Powerset. After reflecting on my research in the new Green economy, and after reflecting upon an admitedly up and down relationship with my fellow founder Barney Pell, I decided that the best way I could affect thousands of peoples lives was to dedicate myself to Green. Why Green? Because I had come to the conclusion that the Green revolution will cause a larger impact on society, government and business than the Internet and the industrial revolution combined and I believed that I could play a role in causing some of the tipping points in government and in business.
Now it's been 5 months since that day and I thought I owed it to you to let you know what I have been up to.
Today I am proud to talk about 2 initiatives that I am deeply involved in that are now going to be part of the San Francisco June ballot (hint, please vote them through). Additionally, I wanted to let you know that I am in the earliest stages of developing a startup concept called GreenFund and it is a crowd-source venture capital/carbon fund that I am developing with a private network of advisers. My goal in GreenFund is not to be the CEO, but rather the person who drives the vision and brings the team together - thus I will still be able to divide my time between legislative and business issues.
The Green Campus Initiative
The first initiative, which I call the Green Campus Initiative, is part of the overall plan to bring the Hunter's Point region in San Francisco back to life. As part of this larger initiative, the ballot initiative proposes to set aside 2,000,000 square feet for a green zone. To give you an idea of how large 2,000,000 square feet is, the Mission Bay BioTech Campus is 3,000,000 square feet and there has been about $2 billion dollars raised to build it.
Why do I believe this project is so important? Because, for the last 10,000 years, the human race has been building a society that never contemplated running out of resources. This project can be much more than another technology incubator, it can be a place where we can bring together the greatest minds in the world to shed unbiased light on the ways in which our current societal infrastructures are unsustainable and a place where we can bring to light the changes necessary to define and foster sustainable socio-economic infrastructures that carry us for the next 10,000 years.
What I am trying to do is to try to shape what goes into the campus and help to bring awareness about the project to corporations and people alike. I would like to see San Francisco not just create a "green zone" of green buildings, but rather create a world leading campus that helps to define Green for the world and helps to put San Francisco in the forefront of the Green revolution. I believe that the campus needs to have 1) higher education involved (similar to the Biotech Campus at Mission Bay) 2) corporate sponsors 3) research and development 4) media and 5) venture capital and startup infrastructure support.
If you want to keep up to date then sign up for my rss feed and if you want to know more, please feel free to email me at newcomb.steve@yahoo.com.
The Solar initiative
Another initiative that I am getting behind is the new Solar Initiative in San Francisco. This initiative provides for an additional $3-6 thousand in incentives for people to install solar panels. What makes me get excited is that the plan isn't just about giving people money and that's it - the plan actually helps to create a solar business ecosystem that becomes somewhat self sustaining. The way it does it is by building in higher incentives for people who use services and materials that come from San Francisco. Here are the basics of the initiative:
- Creates a solar energy incentive program by providing cash grants to residential and
commercial, industrial or manufacturing property owners to offset part of the cost
of installing photovoltaic panel solar systems on existing buildings. - 10 year program that would provide between $2,000,000 and $5,000,000 for
incentives per year. - Incentive payments for residential property owners are as follows:
- $3,000 – Base incentive payment for system that generates at least 1kw of energy.
- $4,000 - If system is installed by a San Francisco based solar installer
- $5,000 – If system is installed in an Environmental Justice District (94107 &94124 area codes)
- $6,000 – If system is installed by an individual trained under the City workforce development program.
- Incentive payments for commercial, industrial or manufacturing property owners are:
- $1,500 per kilowatt of electric power generated up to a maximum of $10,000 per applicant.
- Each property with a separate electricity meter may apply for the incentive, up to the applicant maximum of $10,000.
The Green Campus and Solar initiatives are just two of the many legislative efforts I'm trying to help shape. Expect to hear a lot more from me regarding carbon funds, plug-in electric vehicles, and many other iniatives taking form in San Francisco. If you have ideas about these or any new initiatives, as always, contact me, I'd love to hear from you.
Comments
Changing the lives of 72 people can have radical effects! Who knows, maybe I'll have been inspired by you to run for Governor of California someday with a plan to secede and create Pacifica. . .
More seriously, companies can effect huge amounts of change. Wal*Mart has created massive economic efficiencies with their advances in supply chain management; FedEx has improved logistics; Google has changed our relationship to information access. Big companies can have massive, far reaching effects that move beyond their employees, revenue, and customers.
Posted by: Mark Johnson | February 26, 2008 11:40 AM