Fraunhofer

• China’s State Grid now controls over half of Chile’s regulated energy distribution, enough to raise concerns in the Chilean government.
• China’s growing influence over global clean energy supply chains and its leverage over countries’ energy systems have raised international concerns.
• Alongside international investments, Latin American countries are fostering energy innovation cultures that are homegrown, dynamic, creative, often grassroots and frequently overlooked.

Chile looks to the future

• Chile is an example of how Latin America is embracing renewable energy while trying to plan a more self-reliant future.
• New geothermal, solar and wind power projects – some built with Chinese backing, but not all – have pushed Chile far past its 2025 renewable energy goal.
• In April 2023, Chile’s president announced a national lithium strategy to ensure that the state holds partial ownership of some future lithium developments.

Learning from foreign investors

• It invited and co-financed foreign research institutes, such as Europe’s influential Fraunhofer institute and France’s ENGIELab, to establish branches in Chile and conduct applied research.
• The government expected that the centers would work with local businesses and research centers, transferring knowledge to feed a local innovation ecosystem.
• The foreign institutions brought their own trained personnel.

Chile’s startup incubator and frugal innovation

• Chile is home to one of the largest public incubators and seed accelerators in Latin America, StartUp Chile.
• Often in South America, this kind of innovation is born and developed in a resource-scarce context and under technological, financial and material constraints.
• For example, the independent Chilean startup Reborn Electric Motors has developed a business converting old diesel bus fleets into fully electric buses.
• Bolivia’s “tiny supercheap EV” developed by homegrown startup Industrias Quantum Motors is another example of frugal innovation in the electric vehicles space.

Looking ahead to green hydrogen

• Using its abundant solar and wind power to produce green hydrogen for export as a fossil fuel replacement has become a government priority.
• Some questions surround the partnership, including Chile’s lack of experience administering such a large project and concerns about the environmental impact.
• The government claims Chile’s green energy production could eventually rival its mining industry.

• Capture6 (Oakland, California, U.S.) removes carbon from the atmosphere while producing clean water and other industrial products from seawater or other saltwater inputs.
• Carbon To Stone (Ithaca, New York, U.S.) is developing a carbon mineralization technology coupled with high-value minerals and metals recovery.
• Dioxycle (Paris, France / Menlo Park, U.S.) is building an electrolysis platform to convert carbon emissions into chemicals and fuel building blocks.
• We look forward to helping this exceptional startup cohort engage with the CLC and make meaningful progress toward commercializing their carbon capture and conversion technologies."

• The data center will be located at IBM's facility in Ehningen, Germany, and will serve as IBM Quantum's European cloud region.
• The data center is being designed to help clients continue to manage their European data regulation requirements, including processing all job data within EU borders.
• The facility will be IBM's second quantum data center and quantum cloud region, after Poughkeepsie, New York.
• "We are happy and proud to support the IBM Quantum team's decision to set up their European quantum data center in Ehningen, Germany," said Dr. Raoul Klingner, Director Research, Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft.

• Rock Tech compared the results against an International Energy Agency (IEA) special report showing a carbon footprint 30 percent lower than the average for LHM from hard rock.
• According to the LCA base case scenario, the carbon footprint of battery-grade LHM from Guben is 10.5 kg per kilogram.
• When compared against an International Energy Agency (IEA) special report, Rock Tech's base case footprint for LHM from hard rock is 30 percent lower.
• When compared against the International Energy Agency's (IEA) special study on "The Role of Critical Minerals in Clean Energy Transitions" (also see Table 1), Rock Tech's base carbon footprint is 30 percent lower.