CLEAN TECH INNOVATION WITHOUT BORDERS

Cleantech Group announces APAC Cleantech 25 offering insights into market trends amidst global trade tensions and a global energy shift

“The fast acceleration of global trade fractures is making the possibility of ‘regional technology spheres’ even more likely. Given that so many of this year’s APAC Cleantech 25 are innovating in technologies crucial to the next decades of sustainable industry, we expect to see these trends intensify even further.”

-- Anthony DeOrsey, Research Manager, Cleantech Group

The APAC (Asia Pacific) Cleantech 25 is an annual list of private sustainable innovation companies that have gained the attention of market experts. The APAC Cleantech 25 recognizes forward-thinking companies that are developing and deploying breakthrough solutions from fusion to near-term energy efficiency savings, from battery swapping to battery materials, from improving crop yields to generating valuable products from waste. These companies are at the forefront of addressing the world’s most pressing environmental challenges while driving economic growth and technological advancement in the region.

Interview with Anthony DeOrsey

By Suzanne Forcese

WT: According to the APAC Cleantech 25 Report: "Theworld order is being rewritten right now -- and that is not just a comment on the isolationist “America First” ideology of the new Trump administration."

Anthony, you work with corporate and government clients to formulate strategies for leveraging cleantech to achieve growth and reduce environmental impact.

What are you observing in the current global trade fractures? How is this dynamic affecting regional technology world-wide?

DeOrsey: It is early to tell exactly what the effects will be, but generally speaking there is a clear trend of innovation to keep key supply chains and manufacturing onshore.

WT: With the recent announcement of the APAC Cleantech 25 the following statement was made: "Security and independence are at the fore of strategic thinking everywhere today. Access to the key enabling resources of energy, water and critical materials at affordable prices, will be fundamental to a country’s future economy."

North America is seeing this push. Is Asia also poised to be a major force as far as critical materials are concerned?

DeOrsey:  It is not just a U.S. phenomenon, there is an observable push across the world to extract, refine, and recycle critical materials. That said, there is a large climb for any country other than China to reach a level of onshore supply that meets full demand. Nonetheless, this will be an area of innovation that continues to grow.

Some examples in Asia Pacific can be seen in this year’s APAC Cleantech 25:

• Fleet Space (Australia): Provides satellite-based critical mineral detection
• Element Zero (Australia): Offers non-aqueous electrochemical processing of ores (iron, nickel, silica) into high value materials
• 3DC (Japan): Produces three-dimensional graphene material sponge applicable in current lithium-ion batteries and future chemistries (e.g., solid state)
• Poen (Korea): Specializes in spent and damaged battery assessment, remanufacturing, and re-purposing
• Lohum (India): Focuses on battery recycling and recovery of lithium, cobalt, nickel, and graphite through a hydrometallurgical process

WT: And how are you seeing energy security and independence manifesting throughout the world looking at fossil fuels and renewables?

DeOrsey: There is certainly a shift in the idea of energy security & independence, one that is manifesting differently across the world. The United States has made announcements mostly in favor of fossil fuels the past few months, although there is still an enormous grid interconnection queue for renewables that remains in question.

In the Asia Pacific, one can certainly see varying interpretations of energy security. While China still relies on coal for around 60% of its electricity generated, there has been an exponential increase in electricity production from renewables.

China’s energy system overall still demands a significant number of imports as a result, the electrification of the mobility system and increasing electrification of the grid is a matter of energy independence in China.

WT: In WT’s previous discussions with Cleantech Group’s research team, water innovation has been waiting for ‘its moment’. What are you observing currently?

DeOrsey: Water has been a relatively sleepy area of cleantech innovation over the past few years. If we look at using venture investment figures as a proxy, water investments never make up even 2% of all cleantech investments.

However, we saw an encouraging sign here earlier this year. Our 2025 GlobalCleantech 100 featured 6 water innovators – the most on the list since the Global Cleantech 100’s inception 15 years before.

Encouragingly, we saw an APAC-based water innovator (Indra Water – an electrochemical treatment approach).

This year’s APAC Cleantech 25 features Singaporean water innovator Atera Water, who has developed novel ultrafiltration materials.

WT: We are in an age of AI and robotics and yet in Asia cheap labour has been the traditional competitive advantage. How do you see this juxtaposition of AI and it's intersect with energy and the industrial world evolving?

DeOrsey: The major centers of activity in AI for cleantech have been in North American cities over the past few years, but there is certainly opportunity and growing capabilities in APAC.

One thing to note is that while manufacturing has generally become more efficient in Asia Pacific, even those countries that have experienced significant efficiency gains (China, India, Vietnam) still are far behind the most efficient (on a $ per hour worked basis) in APAC. This represents an enormous opportunity for process and resource efficiency in APAC.

Indeed, many innovators in Asia Pacific are getting the message and aiming to tackle efficiency with AI.

Some examples from this year’s Cleantech APAC 25, include:

• Cosmos Innovation (Hong Kong SAR) is leveraging an internal AI (“Mobius”) for materials discovery and process optimization in perovskite / tandem solar cells production, increasing solar cell performance but controlling R&D cost
• Ecolibrium (India) is an industrial efficiency AI platform, aimed at reducing process waste and operational costs in high-volume, low-margin industries such as commodity manufacturing and mining. Working to optimize high-load sites such as data centers as well

WT: What shifts in the innovation landscape are you noticing between China and the other APAC regions?

DeOrsey: The most observable shift in China is that, while solar and energy storage innovation have been the major underpinning of cleantech growth over the past few years, those technologies have rapidly moved into maturity (now able to access debt and project finance).

As a result, this reduces the venture investment numbers for the region, but this is misleading.

We are seeing a new “wave” of Chinese innovators taking aim at future challenges. Perhaps most notable is fusion energy, which in theory could become the most significant source of energy in the world someday. This year’s Cleantech APAC 25 saw a venture and private equity investment growth that fusion experienced in 2024 by as much as $1B.

Fusion innovation is inspiring enthusiasm not just in China. Two fusion examples from this year’s Cleantech APAC 25 (and one additional from last year), include:

• Startorus Fusion (China): Spherical tokomak company launched out of Tsinghua University, in 2024 reported being the first in the world to achieve an optimized spherical tokamak plasma configuration
• Openstar Technologies (New Zealand): Levitated dipole reactor, achieved first plasma in November 2024
• Kyoto Fusioneering (Japan) (2024 APAC 25): While not a reactor company, is developing components and providing fusion plant design & engineering for multiple reactor types (magnetized target, magnetic confinement, inertial confinement). Multiple testing facilities planned

WT: How is the 2025 investment landscape shaping up?

DeOrsey: What will be surprising to many people is that in Q1 of 2025, venture investments in cleantech innovation did not decrease, and instead stayed on par with Q3 and Q4 of 2024. Underneath the numbers there were certainly a few shifts.

We saw fewer deals in energy storage as many of the grid-scale battery companies are now well-established and doing less fundraising

In energy, investments in future nuclear fission and fusion technologies remain strong. The promise of these technologies to provide clean baseload power in a high-power demand future is inspiring enthusiasm.

The investments in critical materials and mining technologies this year already is about 30% of last year’s total, demonstrating the increased interest in domestic supply chains across the world.

Perhaps more telling, the investments in these spaces for Q1 2025 exceeds their entire year of investments in 2020. This is a testament to how quickly these technologies have become important.