The Brooklyn Waterfront: The Innovation Coast?

Brooklyn Waterfront: Innovation Coast?

In the year before the Covid pandemic, there was the possibility that Amazon would open a second headquarters in New York City. Developers from around the city tried many different ways to attract the company to their boroughs. There were some in Brooklyn, for instance, who thought labeling parts of the waterfront as the “Innovation Coast” might help in their efforts. It didn’t; Amazon didn’t locate its headquarters in New York. But given what is happening these days in places like the Brooklyn Navy Yard and the Brooklyn Army Terminal, that name, Innovation Coast, might be useful as climate-related startups are encouraged and incentivized to locate there.

Join us on the evening of May 1 to hear a panel of speakers from some of these startups, led by the Chief Strategy Officer of the New York City Economic Development Corporation, speak about the City’s program to promote the development of climate-related companies. We will learn about the City’s reasons for promoting clean-energy and other climate-related companies, and we will hear from representatives of some of those companies who will explain their reasons for choosing the Brooklyn waterfront as a place to begin their efforts.

You can also attend via Zoom!
The meeting starts at 5:30 p.m. for online attendees, the first 30 minutes are for refreshments and socializing prior to the event. Please register at the link bellow:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_7x-317S2QHGT11iKx71-Hg

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.

Also, save the date for our upcoming events:

May 10 — Annual Full-Day Conference: The Brooklyn Waterfront and Offshore Wind

May 17 — Powerhouse Arts Breakfast Talk

Meet the speakers:

Cecilia Kushner is Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer at the NYC Economic Development Corporation. As Chief Strategy Officer, Kushner leads multidisciplinary teams to deliver projects and programs focused on developing emerging sectors equitably and building neighborhoods of economic success. Prior to her current role, she spent over a decade working for the City on a range of infrastructure, transit operations, land use, and community development programs and policies, most recently as the Executive Vice President for Planning and NYC Ferry at NYCEDC, and earlier at the Department of City Planning in the Brooklyn, Resiliency, and Executive Offices.

Prior to immigrating to New York City in 2005 from France, Kushner lived in London for two years, working on economic analysis for historic preservation. She received her bachelor’s degree from La Sorbonne and holds a master’s degree in historic preservation from the Bartlett School of Planning at University College London, and a master’s degree in city planning from Hunter College, where she has taught planning as an adjunct. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and two children.

Jon Carbajal is NineDot’s Senior Director of Product Development with over 15 years of experience in the renewable field. Carbajal has led the technical and commercial design of dozens of battery storage projects located throughout New York and Ontario. He leads NineDot’s new product development initiatives from expanding the applications of outdoor stationary storage system, to also adding business models such as deploying V2G systems. He is a trained energy engineer, having earned a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Cornell and a MS in Sustainability Management from Columbia. He enjoys modernizing old infrastructure from his NYC home and small sailboats.

Shannon Dulaney is the Director of Public Affairs at itselectric, an urbanist with a decade-long commitment to sustainable transportation. Prior to joining itselectric, she led the community partnerships team at Spin, a shared micromobility company, and worked as a federal lobbyist for Honda. Dulaney holds dual master’s degrees from the Yale School of Management and the Yale School of the Environment.

Alec Turnbull is Director of Product at Thalo Labs. Thalo's real-world solutions combine proprietary sensing, software, and capture systems to bring tools previously reserved only for utility-scale power plants to buildings everywhere. Before transitioning to climate work, Turnbull was VP of Product and Engineering for growth at Dotdash Meredith, where he transformed an aging media company into the world’s largest digital and print publisher. Outside of work, Turnbull is a community builder, and is co-founder of Climate Tech Cities and the Climate Film Festival NYC.

Vince Wong is the Co-founder and COO at ElectricFish where he leads B2B sales, partnerships, and operations at ElectricFish. He has over a decade of experience in strategy and operations as a management consultant, enterprise product marketer, and second-time founder. Wong holds an MBA from Cornell Tech and a BA in International Relations from NYU.