Venture capital loves a moonshot

Investors are drawn to stories of single, transformative breakthroughs that solve entrenched challenges. A new, dramatic story is easier to sell than incremental progress.

Scaling matters more than transformation

After fifteen years in climate technology, the author argues it is more important to scale than to transform an industry. Climate technology must focus on ensuring solutions are adoptable.

“it's more important to scale than it is to try transform an industry”

GHGSat's first satellite proved the concept

GHGSat launched Claire in two thousand sixteen, the first satellite capable of tracing emissions to individual facilities. It was cheaper and more frequent than existing technologies, creating a new market segment.

“The first satellite capable of tracing emissions to individual facilities.”

Building a second generation with discipline

When designing the second generation satellite, GHGSat chose features that mattered most and would still deliver market-leading improvement while remaining affordable for customers to renew year after year.

“We zeroed in on the features that mattered most, the ones that would still deliver a market-leading improvement”

Detection sensitivity over spatial resolution

GHGSat invested in detection threshold rather than finer spatial resolution. The company focused on seeing smaller emissions from space to catch more leaks for customers, providing more actionable data.

“We invested heavily into the metric our customers told us mattered most: detection threshold.”

Second generation delivers double the capability

GHGSat's second-generation constellation will provide double the detection sensitivity and double the daily coverage per satellite. It is a significant leap, though not the original whiteboard vision.

Ambition and humility drive lasting impact

The discipline to build adoptable products is not a failure of ambition. Ambition and humility are not opposites. This discipline makes ambition durable enough to make real impact on climate change.

“ambition and humility aren't opposites”