Climate CEOs (formerly Entrepreneurs for Impact): Scaling Climate Tech Startups

Green Steel at No Premium: $85M for Electra’s Low-Temp Ironmaking — Sandeep Nijhawan, CEO


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Discover how Electra is decarbonizing ironmaking with $85M raised, partnerships with Nucor, and a breakthrough process that produces green steel at 60°C instead of 1,600°C — all with zero cost premium.


My guest today is Sandeep Nijhawan, the Cofounder and CEO of Electra.

Electra is decarbonizing ironmaking for green steel production using intermittent renewable energy and low-grade iron ores, and producing higher-quality steel at the same time. Backed by $85M of VC and corporate VC capital, they will do all this at zero cost premium to existing steel manufacturing.

In addition, Sandeep is the former:

  • President of AquaHydrex, which was focused on developing a novel electrolyzer for the hydrogen economy
  • Operating Partner for True North Venture Partners
  • President of Staq Energy, a distributed energy storage solutions developer

In this episode, we talked about:

  • Their new partnership with Nucor, the largest steel manufacturer in the U.S.
  • How he transitioned from a PhD in mechanical engineering to leading energy tech startups
  • Why his “midlife crisis” led to the clarity to build novel energy solutions among small teams of bonafide geeks
  • The importance of producing green steel at 60 degrees Celsius instead of 1,600 degrees
  • How they balanced strategic and financial investors, ignoring conventional wisdom in the process
  • The ways in which steel plants can get access to their solution as an OpEx, instead of just as a CapEx
  • The prioritization of self, family, and team – not the reverse order – and this is anti-selfish
  • Perspectives on really knowing the “why” in order to allow the “how” to be easier
  • And lots more

Hope you enjoy.

And give Sandeep and Electra a shout-out on LinkedIn, Slack, or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people.

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Entrepreneurs for Impact is on a mission to help climate innovators grow faster with new investment capital, share best practices among peers, expand their networks, and reach their full potential.

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  2. Newsletter — A 3-minute weekly summary of climate tech, startups, better habits, and deep work.

Programs are led by Dr. Chris Wedding — 4x founder, $1B of investment experience, and Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill professor, with 70,000+ professional students taught, 25 years of meditation, an obsession with constant improvement, and far too many mistakes to keep to himself.

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Climate CEOs (formerly Entrepreneurs for Impact): Scaling Climate Tech StartupsBy Dr. Chris Wedding — Climate Tech CEO Coach | CEO @ EFI

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