James McWalter is the host of the Carbotnic cleantech podcast which focuses on conversations with founders and investors across cleantech. James previously held senior roles at a number of software and data technology companies including FactSet, Respondent.io and Hello Vera. James has also founded and been an early employee at several startups including a recent exit to Google.

James has led startup and research efforts across multiple cleantech domains from an ARPA-E grant for soil carbon markets to product development for clean energy site selection software. Today, James advises several cleantech startups on go to market strategy and expansion.

Giordano (“Gio'') Sordoni is Co-Founder and COO of Xos, Inc., a manufacturer of fully electric Class 5 through Class 8 commercial vehicles. He organizes and executes the company’s vision from an operational perspective, ensuring administrative, engineering, and operational functions run and scale smoothly. With national fleet customers like FedEx Ground contractors, Loomis, Wiggins Lift Co., Gio and the team continue to lead the charge to provide fleets with versatile, scalable electric solutions that benefit businesses’ bottom lines without sacrificing sustainability.

Prior to founding Xos, Gio worked internationally in non-profits and in venture capital, eventually founding his own consultancy to advise early-stage businesses. He worked with his co-founder Dakota Semler on scaling his fleet business before launching Xos. He has a personal mission to improve air quality by addressing one of the largest urban polluters: medium- and heavy-duty commercial vehicles.

Alex Dehgan is the CEO of Conservation X Labs.  He is also Professor of the Practice of Sustainability at Arizona State University. CXL builds novel technologies through its labs, and harnesses open innovation, to create transformative solutions to prevent the sixth mass extinction.  Alex previously served as the Chief Scientist of USAID, with rank of Assistant Administrator, and created the Agency’s “DARPA for Development”, and worked in multiple positions in the Office of the Secretary at the State Department.

Alex was also the founding country director of the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Afghanistan Program and helped create Afghanistan’s first national park.  Alex is the author of the book, The Snow Leopard Project, which describes the effort, which won the Gold 2020 Nautilus Book Prize.  Alex has won multiple awards from the Departments of State and Defense, was named an Icon of Science, the World Technology Award, and in 2020, was given the University of Chicago’s Medical and Biological Alumni Association’s highest honor. 

Tim Janssen is CEO and co-founder of Sofar Ocean, where he leads the development of the world’s largest real-time ocean intelligence platform. Under his leadership, Sofar deploys its dense open ocean weather sensor network and leverages its next-generation ocean models to increase efficiencies and reduce emissions for ocean industries. Raised in the Netherlands, a country mostly below sea level, Tim was inspired to study Physical Oceanography for his PhD at Delft University before continuing his research at the Naval Postgraduate School in California.