The Day Climate Became My Mission
Twenty-five years after September 11, the people and ideas that shaped my life’s work—and an invitation to engineer what comes next.
Read the essayModel the possible. Scale the proven.
I build companies, coalitions, and infrastructure that put technology to work. Let’s surface the stories, people, and solutions that help the next team go further.
People · Experience · Shared progress
Surfacing
Solutions.
What changed? Who made it possible? What can someone else build from it? Your experience may hold a piece another person needs.
A starting dashboard · September 11, 2026
What counts as progress?
Capital and capacity tell part of the story. What changes for people—and what makes the next solution easier to deliver?
Technology changed the economics.
Lower hardware costs opened new possibilities. Capital, markets, and integration turn those possibilities into operating infrastructure.
Solar modules · 2001–2024
Cost per watt
2001$6.282024$0.27
96% lower
Inflation-adjusted, in 2025 US dollars. Module hardware—not an installed solar system.
Our World in Data · source series ↗Battery storage systems · 2010–2024
Installed cost per kWh
2010$2,5712024$192
93% lower
Global fully installed and commissioned storage projects, in 2024 US dollars—not battery packs alone.
IRENA · 2024 cost report ↗Lithium-ion battery packs · 2025
Global average per kWh
$108
8% lower than 2024
Volume-weighted across applications. Stationary-storage packs averaged $70/kWh. Neither includes a complete installed system.
BloombergNEF · 2025 survey ↗The longer arc—and what these prices measure
The solar series begins at $132.38/W in 1975, in constant 2025 dollars. Its 2001 and 2024 observations are $6.284449 and $0.26518628/W: a calculated decline of 95.78%, rounded above to 96%. The full 1975–2024 decline is 99.80%. The series combines historical research with IRENA data; recent observations reflect the European module market, not the lowest global spot offer. Data and methodology ↗
Sub-$0.20 modules are also real: the laboratory’s 2025 Annual Technology Baseline uses a 2024 global module spot price of $0.10/W. That is a different benchmark—not the endpoint used to calculate the percentage above.
IRENA reports installed battery-storage costs falling from $2,571 to $192/kWh between 2010 and 2024, a calculated 92.53% decline rounded to 93%. Early-year values are modeled estimates. BloombergNEF’s separate $108/kWh figure measures battery packs in 2025; it must not be substituted for an installed-system cost.
These outcomes reflect research, venture-backed commercialization, manufacturing investment, policy, and learning through deployment. They do not isolate any one contributor’s effect. Research on the drivers of solar cost reductions ↗
The global build-out
An industry built through shared knowledge—and now deploying at planetary scale.
Global · end of 2025
Renewable power capacity
5,149GW
+692 GW during 2025
Installed capacity—not electricity generated.
IRENA · 2026 ↗Global · 2025
Capital into renewable energy
$690B
9.5% below 2024
Annual investment—not cumulative capital.
BloombergNEF · 2026 ↗Global · 2025 report
Climate-tech venture + growth
$40.5B
+8% versus 2024
Announced deals through December 11, 2025.
Sightline / CTVC · 2026 ↗Global · 2024
People working in renewables
16.6M
+2.3% versus 2023
Employment across the renewable-energy industry.
IRENA / ILO · Annual review 2025 ↗Beyond renewables: $483 billion went into power grids in 2025. Total energy-transition investment was $2.3 trillion—including transport and other sectors. China accounted for $800 billion; the US, $378 billion. These are annual flows, not cumulative infrastructure spending since 2001.
The US delivery challenge
Ideas and capital are not enough. Connecting projects and building lasting capabilities are the next test.
United States · end of 2025
Solar, wind + storage in the queue
1,742GW
Solar 773 · wind 220 · storage 749 GW
Proposed capacity—not a construction-ready pipeline.
Berkeley Lab / GridTracker · 2026 ↗United States · end of 2024
People working in clean energy
3.5M+
Nearly 100,000 jobs added in 2024
Employment—not jobs created since 2001.
E2 Clean Jobs America · 2025 ↗For projects that reached operation in 2025, the median wait exceeded five years in regions with available data. A smaller queue can reflect withdrawals—not just successful delivery.
Sources, definitions & comparison limits
Selected published observations, checked September 11, 2026; not a live feed or a continuous 2001–2026 series. Dates and coverage differ. These measures are not additive and do not attribute industry outcomes to any one person or institution.
Renewable power capacity
Total renewable electricity generation capacity worldwide at year-end 2025, including hydropower. IRENA reports 692 GW of additions and 15.5% annual growth. Capacity does not establish utilization, reliable supply, access, or emissions avoided. Read the source ↗
Capital into renewable energy
BloombergNEF's renewable-energy investment category for 2025, in US dollars. It is one part of the broader $2.3 trillion energy-transition total, not a measure of all infrastructure investment. Spending is not equivalent to completed operating assets or social benefit. Read the source ↗
Climate-tech venture + growth
Sightline Climate's 2025 report, published through CTVC (now by Currence), covers publicly announced venture-capital and growth-equity deals through December 11, 2025. This is not a full December 31 close or a pure early-stage VC series. Do not add it to deployment investment: populations and financing stages differ. Read the source ↗
People working in renewables
IRENA and ILO estimate 16.6 million renewable-energy jobs globally in 2024. The report was released in January 2026. This is employment, not cumulative jobs created. Its renewable-energy scope differs from E2's broader US clean-energy scope, which also includes efficiency and clean vehicles; the figures are not directly comparable or additive. Read the source ↗
Solar, wind + storage in the queue
Calculated from Berkeley Lab's 2026 Queued Up release: 773 GW solar + 220 GW wind + 749 GW storage = 1,742 GW. These are generation and storage power ratings, not annual energy output or storage duration. The complete US queue, including gas and other resources, exceeds 2,060 GW. Many requests are withdrawn. Median time from request to operation exceeded five years for projects completed in 2025 in regions with available data. Coverage represents about 98% of installed US generating capacity. Read the source ↗
People working in clean energy
E2 reports over 3.5 million US clean-energy workers at end-2024 and 2.8% employment growth during 2024. Coverage includes efficiency, renewable generation, clean fuels, clean vehicles, storage and grid modernization. This is an employment estimate, not a climate-tech-only count or a cumulative count of jobs created. Display retains the source's rounded lower-bound wording. Read the source ↗
Help decide what matters.
My former boss at Kleiner Perkins, John Doerr, literally wrote Measure What Matters. Here, let’s ask the question together.
Lower bills? Reliable power during an outage? Faster delivery? Local ownership? Less pollution? A capability another community can reuse?
Suggest a measureWhat would you measure, for whom, over what period—and what decision would it change? Bring a source, a story, or a better question.
See the connections.
A measure tells us what changed. A model helps us explore why—and what could happen next.
My former professor and collaborator John Sterman helped develop En-ROADS with Climate Interactive, MIT Sloan, and other collaborators. It lets people explore how policy, technology, and behavior interact to shape energy and climate outcomes.
Explore En-ROADS ↗An independent global scenario simulator—not the source of the observations above or a project-level forecast.
Model. Build. Scale.
Physical systems take too long and cost too much when technology, capital, policy, infrastructure, and stakeholder decisions are modeled separately.
Model
Use system dynamics, geospatial analytics, 3D simulation, and AI to compare integrated scenarios and align stakeholders before capital is committed.
Build
Turn the strongest scenario into an integrated, place-based demonstration that compresses design, development, and delivery.
Scale
Measure performance and value, retain what was learned, and convert the proof into a platform that improves with every deployment.
Measure + learn ↺Results from every deployment improve the next model.
One continuous build.
Innovation, ecosystems, and infrastructure—connected by a drive to create capabilities that others can carry forward.
01InnovationMove consequential ideas into use.
Invested in, commercialized, and helped build advances across computing, materials, energy, and the built environment—from MIT and UT through Silicon Valley, Stanford, NREL/NLR, and global innovation centers.
Investments · commercialization · companies02EcosystemsCreate the conditions for markets to form.
Austin became a living laboratory where CleanTX, Pecan Street, policy, research, Austin Energy, capital, competitions, and customers converged. Colorado extended the model around NREL and Boulder.
CleanTX · Pecan Street · NREL03DemonstrationsTurn a thesis into measurable proof.
Brightman advanced gigawatt-scale Texas renewables. Catalyze used analytics to locate distributed energy across commercial real estate. New York work modeled net-zero pathways for transit and a 60-acre community.
Renewables · real estate · transit · communities04PlacesIntegrate value where life happens.
Since 2012, applied integrated design across properties, communities, campuses, transit, infrastructure, tribal lands, and new developments—using power and heat to unlock affordability, resilience, and development capacity.
Power · heat · buildings · mobility · water · compute05PlatformsBuild once. Learn. Repeat 1,000 times.
Turn proof into playbooks and playbooks into repeatable platforms. Each deployment measures results, retains learning, and improves the next model.
Measure → learn → improve → repeatJoel Serface.
Builder and collaborator.
My work connects Silicon Valley innovation, Texas energy development, and communities and collaborators around the world.
I help leaders and investors turn complex opportunities into integrated projects and repeatable platforms. I’m still building—and sharing what the work teaches me.
Explore my background on LinkedIn →What could we make possible together?
A breakthrough, a policy, a partnership, a lesson from failure. Share the story behind the result—or bring a problem that needs more people working on it.
Start in your own words. We’ll follow up before publishing. Explore people, tools, and resources →