Startup eradicating polystyrene waste wins top pitch at Greenhouse Demo Day

Carbon Cell wins top pitch at The Greenhouse Demo Day, voted for by investors, cleantech leaders and Imperial’s climate innovation community.

Carbon Cell is a carbon negative, non-toxic, fully compostable replacement for polystyrene and other polymer-based insulating foams, made with biochar. Its Co-founder, Elizabeth Lee, gave a winning pitch at Undaunted's recent Demo Day, which brings Imperial’s climate innovation community together to see early-stage founders present cutting-edge cleantech on the historic stage of the Royal Institution theatre.

There aren’t many accelerators out there that give you equity-free funding, which I think is symbolic of the whole mood on The Greenhouse – everyone really just wants you to succeed, and see your idea make a big impact at scale. Dan Ellis Founder of Decarbonite

Reflecting on the impact of receiving the first instalment of grant funding from The Greenhouse accelerator programme, Elizabeth said: “[It] felt so exciting, and gave us hope that our messy, weird design "project" could be a real, tangible business.”

Emphasising how The Greenhouse keeps its focus on equitable solutions that benefit the climate and humanity, she went on to say that “many tech programmes are focused [mainly] on scale and growth. While that is important to The Greenhouse, they don't question the fundamental values of your business around sustainability and eco-friendliness.” 

“The support we’ve received has played a huge part in the progress we've made,” she continued. “We're so glad to get the feedback at Demo Day that lots of people believe in what we're doing!”

Vuala, whose tech makes food waste recycling easy, won second place. Vuala X1 automatically separates food waste from other wastes, generating raw material for energy production on site, saving 95% on logistics and labour costs and reducing carbon emissions by 75%. “It was such a pleasure to share what Vuala and The Greenhouse have achieved over the last few months on Demo Day,” said its CEO and Co-founder, Abiel Ma. “The Greenhouse is one of the best programmes we’ve been on. It’s supported by a well-connected ecosystem which spans into legal, recruitment and much more.”

This was a sentiment echoed by Dan Ellis, Founder of Decarbonite, whose pitch won third place: “There aren’t many accelerators out there that give you equity-free funding, which I think is symbolic of the whole mood on The Greenhouse – everyone really just wants you to succeed, and see your idea make a big impact at scale.”

Decarbonite is developing carbon negative, non-toxic, and fully biodegradable fabrication materials as a radically green alternative to particle and fibre boards. “The Greenhouse workshops, trainings and exposure were first class,” Dan continues. “The programme connected us with the biggest player in our industry, and with all the legal, IP and business services we could possibly need.”

Dan also emphasises the invaluable support network built up within each cohort and across Undaunted’s alumni community: “The mood among the startups was really supportive, and we accelerated each others’ growth a lot by learning from each other. It was a great honour to come third on Demo Day, mostly because I’m so inspired and impressed by all the amazing teams – if I had more money I’d invest in some of them!”

The Greenhouse programme was recently recognised in the top 70 Financial Times list of startup hubs out of a pool of 2000 across Europe, based on alumni feedback, scoring particularly well for its mentoring support, with alumni feedback putting it in 14th place in Europe.

Climate at the core

Over the past 12 years The Greenhouse, the UK’s first climate-focused programme of its kind, has refined a proven model for accelerating applicable, practical and adaptable solutions to the climate crisis. “The excellent pitches from Cohort 5 this Demo Day really showcased the calibre, talent and passion of the startups in our cohorts”, says Dr Jim Shaikh, Head of The Greenhouse. “These founders will join more than 175 alumni startups who've gone on to raise upwards of $1bn in investment, operating across 30 countries and creating over 2000 jobs globally. It’s a fantastic and energising momentum to be part of.”

It’s critical that these early-stage innovators are supported beyond The Greenhouse... Our call to action to the climate, innovation and entrepreneurship community is to become part of their journey – to step in at the right time to nurture these innovators. Alyssa Gilbert Director of Undaunted & Director of Innovation at the Grantham Institute

The survival rate of Undaunted startups is 93% compared to the industry average of 10%. Alumni from the programme include Notpla (winners of the Earthshot Prize 2022), Breathe Battery Technologies (who are now partnering with Volvo), and Naked Energy (who recently partnered with E.ON on large-scale decarbonisation projects across Europe and the UK).

“Climate has been an absolute standout in the UK innovation economy,” said Bailey Morrow, Head of Climate Tech, Consumer Internet and Frontier Tech at HSBC Innovation Banking UK in her Demo Day keynote. “30 per cent of UK venture capital investment went to climate tech last year. That’s 40 per cent year-on-year growth, an unbelievable feat that we should be incredibly proud of,” she continued. “The support that Undaunted provides is an absolutely crucial enabler. The companies on The Greenhouse are going to be moving the sector forward, taking us all on an amazing journey.” The Greenhouse has been supported since 2021 by HSBC UK, through the bank's global Climate Solutions Partnership.

“The climate is at the core of everything we do,” reiterates Director of Undaunted, Alyssa Gilbert. “The ventures we support are working on transformative solutions that will help us realise our vision for a sustainable, equitable future.”

“It’s critical that these early-stage innovators are supported beyond their time on The Greenhouse programme as they inevitably face challenges that will test their resilience as they develop and scale up”, she continues. “Our call to action to the climate, innovation and entrepreneurship community is to become part of their journey – to step in at the right time to nurture these innovators.”

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Meet the teams from Cohort 5 and watch them pitch...

First prize: Carbon Cell 

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Carbon Cell is a carbon-negative, non-toxic, fully compostable replacement for polystyrene and other polymer-based insulating foams, made with biochar.

Second prize: Vuala

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Vuala X1 makes food waste recycling easy by automatically separating food waste from other wastes, generating raw material for energy production on site, saving 95% on logistics and labour costs, and 75% lower carbon emissions.

Third prize: Decarbonite

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Decarbonite is creating carbon negative, non-toxic, and fully biodegradable fabrication materials as a radically green alternative to particle and fibre boards.

CLIP Energy

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CLIP Energy is powering down home energy use with smart sensors and AI. 

Econya

Econya is developing a methodology to drastically reduce carbon emissions in the built environment by using sustainable materials and designing for disassembly so that resources can have multiple lives.

Epicue

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Epicue provides heat stress management for workers in high heat environments, via low-cost wearable sweat monitoring.

Fibe

Fibe is a materials startup developing the world’s first textile fibres out of potato harvest waste.

Fiiba 

Fiiba identify and scale unsung bio-textiles for the fashion industry and beyond. The team achieves game-changing carbon reductions through material innovation and a unique end-to-end network.

Guerrilla.Co

Guerrilla.Co is a retrofittable device enabling roadside drains to capture runoff pollution which would otherwise be washed into the ocean, without using any membranes, electricity or moving parts while maintaining high flow rates.

Ki Hydrogen 

Ki Hydrogen is a deep-tech venture developing novel waste-to-hydrogen technology that produces green hydrogen using 75% less energy compared with water electrolysis

Nium 

Nium uses nanotechnology to decarbonise chemistry, beginning with the most polluting chemical industrial process on earth: ammonia production

PulpaTronics

PulpaTronics has created recyclable carbon-based RFID tags made to preserve more of our world's resources.

Samudra Oceans 

SamudraOceans is developing AI and Robotics to scale seaweed aquaculture.

TAZAAR

TAZAAR bridges the gap between manufacturers and consumers with a digital service record that offers product traceability and customer engagement throughout the product lifecycle.

Zori Tex

Zori Tex optimises textile waste sorting, combining vision and AI-powered technologies to drive circularity in fashion textile recycling.

Thank you

Thank you to all those who joined us for Demo Day, and to our partners and funders who make The Greenhouse programme possible.

Our funders

The Greenhouse programme is supported by the Greater London Authority via the Mayor of London, and HSBC UK, through the bank’s global Climate Solutions Partnership.

Notes to Editors: Imperial College London is part of HSBC’s global Climate Solutions Partnership, which aims to unlock barriers to finance for companies and projects that tackle climate change to bring them to scale while also delivering for people and nature. The global initiative is backed by $100m of philanthropic funding from HSBC over five years.

Our partners

Undaunted is a partnership between the Royal Institution and the Grantham Institute - Climate Change and the Environment at Imperial College London.