The future of Australian innovation was on full display as seven emerging startups pitched at EnergyLab’s first Climate Tech Charge Program showcase.
Last week, EnergyLab hosted its first-ever Climate Tech Charge program showcase, bringing together a virtual room audience packed with climate tech investors, industry leaders, and ecosystem champions. Seven of our early-stage startups pitched their solutions, demonstrating the incredible depth of talent entering the Australian climate space.
Proudly funded by the NSW Government, the Climate Tech Charge program was launched in 2023 as EnergyLab’s pre-accelerator program. It is purposefully designed to provide dedicated, long-term support to early-stage founders at the beginning of their journeys - helping them build market traction and best position themselves for initial capital.
From Megan Fisher, EnergyLab CEO and Director - “When we review applications for our late stage accelerator programs, we frequently see brilliant founders with incredible tech who just aren’t quite investment-ready yet. Crossing that ‘valley of death’ between building a minimum viable product and landing your very first commercial customer is really tough. It requires a completely different set of skills to go from a prototype to a validated business model. We built the Charge program to focus on this gap - giving early-stage innovators the 12 months of consistent mentorship, traction building, and community backing they need to turn great tech into an investment-ready company.”
Designed as an 'always-on' initiative, the Climate Tech Charge program provides early-stage founders with 12 months of dedicated support to navigate the challenging 'valley of death'. This is achieved through a combination of industry mentorship, expert-led workshops, and access to our community and coworking space. By offering both flexibility and longer-term support, the program empowers founders to establish and reach significant milestones, network with fellow innovators and investors, and refine their product and growth strategy within a consistent and supportive environment.
Over the past few years, EnergyLab alumni have achieved massive milestones. 2025 was a record-breaking year, with our Australian alumni raising a staggering $348 million in equity investment, including historic rounds from Infravision and Amber Electric. But to keep creating the next generation of success stories in Australia, we must nurture the early stages of the innovation pipeline.
Meet the 2026 Showcasing Startups
Since the program’s inception, EnergyLab has now supported over 60 early-stage startups to test, iterate and grow their vision. On June 10th, seven of our most promising founders pitched their visions:
- Found Power - driving the travel industry away from fossil fuels (Founder: Chelle Norris)
- Air2Energy - a retrofittable solution turning pollution into power (Founders: Kirah Godsell & Andrew Smithyman)
- Surya - accelerating utility-scale solar construction with tech (Co-founder & CEO: Jenna Connellan)
- Thermal Dawn - Australian-made thermal storage that captures solar and runs heating, cooling, and hot water (Founder: Nick Zeniou)
- Square by Square - enabling anyone to own and protect tiny squares of conservation land (Founders: Henk Kleynhans & Emely Junker)
- Environmental Solar Recycling Australia - enabling end of life solar panel management (Founder: Chris Mohen)
- Alpine Energy - electric vehicle-to-vehicle fast charging (Founder & Managing Director: Mark Wexler)
Missed the pitches? You can watch the full recording of the showcase to see these founders in action.
Looking ahead
To meet Australia’s net zero targets, there still remain complex challenges to overcome - whether that’s unlocking decarbonisation of industry and hard-to-abate sectors, improving grid infrastructure or speeding up renewable rollout. These hurdles may well be solved by the entrepreneurs, researchers, and early-stage innovators in rooms like the one we saw last week.
Are you a founder? Applications for the Charge program are open all year round. If you are looking for dedicated guidance, community, and support to take your climate solution to the next level, find out more here.
Interested in connecting with startups from the cohort? Get in touch with our Program Lead.
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