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GreenBiz SVP and VERGE Executive Director, Shana Rappaport, welcomes participants to VERGE 22.

For the past seven years, Mayor Liccardo has been a leading voice among big-city mayors on climate-resilient cities, promoting clean energy use, sustainable mobility, transit-oriented development and other aspects of a climate-forward city. As the leader of America’s 10th largest city, and given its location in the heart of Silicon Valley, Mayor Liccardo represents the ideal leader to welcome the VERGE community to San Jose.

Tackling the climate crisis requires deploying bold solutions with urgency and magnitude. Ryan Panchadsaram, co-author alongside venture capital icon John Doerr, of Speed & Scale, offers a bold plan to help the world decarbonize in time, including the challenges and opportunities surrounding the greatest opportunity of our time: transitioning to a clean, sustainable and equitable future.

Upshots are signs of things going right — the steps we’ve taken, collectively, that will keep global temperature rise to under 1.5 degrees Celsius. The good news is that the promise and potential of climate tech around the world is being realized, poised to meet this challenge. Here’s a fresh take on the upshots already well underway.

Powered by Future Keepers and New Energy Nexus.

We have learned much about human behavior through our reaction (or lack thereof) to climate change and the COVID pandemic. None of what has transpired in terms of human decision making in response to both crises is surprising to behavioral and communications scientists. Human behavior is predictable, which means humans can be encouraged to better align decisions and actions with science, evidence and facts. Here’s how to leverage science, technology and thoughtful communications to effectively address these and other pressing challenges of our time.

Hear from GreenBiz analysts Jim Giles and Theresa Lieb with their take on the most over- and under-hyped trends in carbon and food.

This inspiring conversation will delve into the spiritual dimensions of climate leadership in this decisive decade, including the deep collaboration that’s needed to raise our collective ambition and action. Christiana Figueres, who led the historic COP21 conference and Paris Agreement, and veteran journalist, coach and Zen mindfulness practitioner Jo Confino, will discuss the critical importance of inner sustainability as we work to actualize it in the external world.

This intergenerational conversation — between a leader at the forefront of the youth climate movement and C-suite executive at one of the world’s most climate-forward companies — will model how each can support the other to bring climate education and awareness campaigns to a broad, global audience. And, along the way, catalyze collective action, behavior change and policy advocacy.

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GreenBiz CEO, Eric Faurot, kicks off the second day of VERGE 22.

Data is making it possible to address the climate crisis more swiftly and effectively than ever before. From the power sector to transportation and other carbon-intensive industries, actionable data intelligence is unlocking new forms of impact not previously possible, giving us the knowledge to know which actions yield the most beneficial outcomes.

In a book that's teeming with worldchanging ideas, one of the most radical storylines in Kim Stanley Robinson’s sci-fi novel “Ministry for the Future” revolves around the "carbon coin": a new currency, backed by the world's central banks, earned by removing or avoiding emissions.

Carbon coin is more than one writer’s speculation. Developed by Australian researcher Delton Chen, who fleshed out the idea in academic papers, the concept is quietly gaining support. Join Chen and Robinson as they discuss “Ministry,” the game-changing potential of a carbon coin and plans to test the currency in the real world.

The U.S. Energy Secretary describes how a new wave of laws, together with President Biden’s executive orders, set the stage for accelerated clean energy and climate action in communities across the United States — including key roles for the VERGE community to play.

The just transition from an extractive economy to a regenerative one will require the knowledge, wisdom and lived experience of frontline communities who are already the most impacted by environmental injustice and the climate crisis. There is no just transition without local and indigenous expertise about the causes of climate change and the right tools to manage and adapt to its impacts. Learn from communities who, against all odds, use deep knowledge of place to advance innovative climate solutions.

Hear from GreenBiz analysts Sarah Golden and Isaac Knipfing with their take on the most over- and under-hyped trends in energy and buildings.

The vast depths of the ocean remain a largely untapped resource in addressing the climate crisis. Oceans absorb roughly a quarter of human-generated carbon emissions. How can new scientific expeditions and digital mapping exercises protect and enhance that potential, and how can we layer that knowledge with age-old wisdom from Indigenous communities? What are the implications of planned deep-sea mining for minerals critical to the clean energy transition, and what will it take to catalyze global partnerships and cross-sector collaboration to achieve widespread conservation?

Regenerating vital ecosystems is a daunting task. Enabling local communities and economies to thrive at the same time raises the bar even higher. But a global coalition is showing that it can be done — helping coral reefs flourish while improving the lives and livelihoods of those among the most vulnerable to climate change. The secret: leveraging the power of art, science and community engagement.

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GreenBiz SVP and VERGE Executive Director, Shana Rappaport, kicks off the third day of VERGE 22.

Empowering women is not just about social change — it’s a climate solution and a business growth strategy, too. This includes rural women, who already hold tremendous power and social influence to galvanize their communities around climate solutions — and create marketplaces for them, too. It’s long been known that gender equality is a gateway to meeting the Sustainable Development Goals and achieving climate progress. This grassroots entrepreneur wants to reframe this, showing how gender equity, economic prosperity and climate resilience can go hand-in-hand.

More than 80 percent of future greenhouse gas emissions will come from outside the United States and the European Union. It’s not just about China, but also the rest of Asia. Meet a new generation of climate tech entrepreneurs working to change that, from building the world’s largest solar farm to training tens of thousands of women solar entrepreneurs.

The business community has an obligation and an opportunity to address the increasing impact of climate change on vulnerable communities. For its part, Verizon is supporting startups as they develop and scale technology-based solutions that mitigate against the effects of climate change, while also strengthening community infrastructure and local ecosystems. Learn how Verizon is investing in cutting-edge innovations — ones that will help communities more effectively adapt to climate change, and also prepare for and respond to climate events, while reducing their overall impact.

Learn more about these efforts here.

Hundreds of companies are working to achieve a circular economy for plastic packaging by 2025. To make it easier to identify scalable, circular solutions, the U.S. Plastics Pact launched the Sustainable Packaging Innovation Awards in collaboration with Walmart. The awards leverage Walmart’s Circular Connector, a platform that matches innovators with sustainable packaging solutions with the brands needing them. Learn about the inaugural awards winners and how the collaboration is helping to reimagine a waste-free world.

Hear from GreenBiz analysts, Vartan Badalian and Sherrie Totoki, with their take on the most over- and under-hyped trends in transport and climate tech innovation.

Twenty-five startups were chosen to pitch at VERGE 22. Today, the winners from each VERGE program — representing buildings, carbon, energy, food and transport – will pitch on the main stage, where audience voting will determine one with the most game-changing potential. The five finalists will compete to win $10,000 in funding from GreenBiz.

It’s easy to think that technology will save us from the climate crisis. But it’s even more important to go to the root of the cause: our divorce from all life on this planet. Join youth activist Clover Hogan and entrepreneur Mo Gawdat as they explore the intersection of tech, culture and climate, and share their advice for healing our relationships with people and nature.