Cleantech Group convened its first official Oil & Gas Innovation Summit on May 8-9, 2013, in Calgary, Canada, in partnership with the Government of Canada, Cenovus Energy, General Electric, and Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC). This small, invite-only gathering brought together some of the most important companies in the Canadian Oil Sands and a number of the world’s Oil & Gas majors to discuss the evolving ecosystem of venture-driven innovation in the sector, as well as to evaluate eight early-stage startups that we handpicked to present to the audience on diverse topics including upgrading, water treatment, and pipeline technologies. Based on strong feedback in favor of reconvening this group annually, if not more frequently, we are already planning a second Summit in 2014 and are exploring new formats to create additional value for the attendees. (Please let us know if you’d like to help guide this process!)

Over the course of this two-day event, three key themes stood out – together they point toward an overarching need to develop a collective vision for external innovation in the Oil & Gas sector and to build deeper alignment between all constituents within the ecosystem.

• Corporates must continue to clarify their strategic objectives.

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Dear friends, family, and colleagues who have only heard from me sporadically during the last month,

I want to sincerely apologize and finally explain why your emails and voicemails have sat unreturned beneath a mountain of backlog.  The truth is that we have been furiously scrambling to the finish line of what is a genuinely transformative corporate deal!!

Today, we are announcing the merger of Cleantech Group with GreenOrder, one of the best-known sustainability consulting firms in the country.  Together we will become one, new company dedicated to uniting the worlds of sustainability and cleantech innovation.

I will spare you a discussion of “synergies” and other press approved corporate-speak (you can find the official press release here if that type of stuff interests you).  I will get to the heart of why I am so excited about the potential for our newly formed company.

#1 We will make cleantech more relevant in corporate boardrooms: Helping to lead the Cleantech Group over the past three years, I have had a ringside seat to watch the clean technology sector develop.  I have watched breakthrough products come to life only to find them relegated to small, pilot demonstrations.  I have seen …

Outside of the office, and outside the lines of a professional forum such as this blog, I admittedly love talking politics.  I always have, and as excruciatingly frustrating as it is sometimes, I probably always will.

At the same time, I have tried to leave that game at home.  I genuinely believe that the long-term growth of the cleantech sector is tied to a number of underlying, inevitable shifts that are apolitical.  Aging & failing infrastructure must eventually be replaced, diverse resource shortages – from water to minerals to food – must be addressed, and toxic pollution – that represents a real and significant health risk in increasingly crowded and urban environments – must be mitigated.

For these reasons, I try to stay above the political fray and focus mainly on how commercial landscapes are developing.  That is until politicians act so egregiously wrong that it is impossible to not address the situation.   This week is one of those weeks.  As Rob Day wrote in response to the attempts by Republicans on the U.S. Senate Armed Service Committee’s to block U.S. military spending on biofuels programs:

This simply should not be a partisan political issue. It’s not even a

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