Uncategorized

Student Teams Can Win $100,000 in UC Clean Technology Competition

Published

10 years ago

August 19, 2015

By Robert Sanders, UC Berkeley News

UC Berkeley is encouraging students with game-changing ideas in clean energy technology to compete for a four-month-long campus bootcamp designed to shepherd the technology into the marketplace.

Between six and eight student-led groups will be chosen from around the country for the Berkeley Cleantech University Prize (CUP), which will fund the teams during the fall semester as they take advantage of the campus’s incubators and accelerators, which are now primarily helping UC Berkeley students launch start-ups.

“We will help the teams develop business plans, connections, mature their technologies in our fabrication spaces, provide legal, policy and business expertise that our community has to offer,” said Sean Wihera, the competition’s program director and an analyst with the Berkeley Energy and Climate Institute (BECI). “We are opening up the Berkeley community to national participation to accelerate, stimulate and facilitate collegiate cleantech entrepreneurship.”

The teams will work with UC Berkeley throughout the semester and then pitch their business plans to a panel of entrepreneurs in February 2016, with the winning team getting a $100,000 infusion to advance their technology further.

The final competition takes place during UC Berkeley’s annual BECI Philomathia Forum and the Berkeley Energy & Resources Collaborative (BERC) Energy Summit.

BECI is the coordinating hub for energy and climate research at UC Berkeley, encouraging collaboration inside and outside the university. BERC is a multidisciplinary network of UC Berkeley students, alumni, faculty, industry professionals and advisors who foster innovation to tackle the world’s energy and environmental challenges.

The Berkeley CUP competition is funded for three years by the U.S. Department of Energy as part of a national, $2.5 million program announced in June to commercialize new technologies that reduce carbon pollution and grow the clean energy economy.

UC Berkeley is one of eight universities hosting competitions like this, with cash prizes that aim to equip students with business skills to take clean-energy technologies from the laboratory to the marketplace.
“We really want the best collegiate cleantech teams from all over the country to apply to UC Berkeley’s program, and we want to get as many of these technologies into the marketplace as possible,” Wihera said.

The Cleantech University Prize program aims to inspire the next generation of clean energy entrepreneurs and innovators by providing them with competitive funding for business and commercialization training and other educational opportunities.

UC Berkeley already offers a wealth of services to aspiring student entrepreneurs, prominent among them the Haas School of Business’s Cleantech to Market (C2M) program, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s (LBNL) Cyclotron Road incubator, the Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society (CITRIS) Foundry, the American Jobs Project (AJP) and the BECI Energy Challenge.

UC Berkeley was selected as one eight collegiate hubs as the result of a joint proposal from BECI and BERC. UC Berkeley is seeking partners to support this and other collegiate cleantech entrepreneurship and innovation programs, both on campus and around the U.S.

“The Berkeley Cleantech University Prize (CUP) is an exciting opportunity for students across the U.S. to engage with Berkeley’s innovation ecosystem as part of the greater push to stimulate collegiate cleantech entrepreneurship,” Wihera said.

In addition to the eight local competitions run by universities, a national competition, the Cleantech UP National Hub, will be hosted by Spark Clean Energy, a national nonprofit focused on engaging students in clean energy.

The other DOE Cleantech UP Collegiate Competition hosts are the California Institute of Technology, Carnegie Mellon University, Clean Energy Trust, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Rice University, Rutgers University, The State University of New Jersey and University of Central Florida.

Oakland Post

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Oakland Housing and Community Development Department Awards $80.5 Million to Affordable Housing Developments

Published

6 months ago

June 17, 2025

Oakland Post

Special to The Post

The City of Oakland’s Housing and Community Development Department (Oakland HCD) announced its awardees for the 2024-2025 New Construction of Multifamily Affordable Housing Notice of Funding Availability (New Construction NOFA) today Five permanently affordable housing developments received awards out of 24 applications received by the Department, with award amounts ranging from $7 million to $28 million.

In a statement released on Jan. 16, Oakland’s HCD stated, “Five New Construction Multifamily Affordable Housing Development projects awarded a total of $80.5 million to develop 583 affordable rental homes throughout Oakland. Awardees will leverage the City’s investments to apply for funding from the state and private entities.”

In December, the office of Rebecca Kaplan, interim District 2 City Councilmember, worked with HCD to allocate an additional $10 Million from Measure U to the funding pool. The legislation also readopted various capital improvement projects including street paving and upgrades to public facilities.

The following Oakland affordable housing developments have been awarded in the current round:

Mandela Station Affordable

238 Affordable Units including 60 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $15 million + previously awarded $18 million
Developer: Mandela Station LP (Pacific West Communities, Inc. and Strategic Urban Development Alliance, LLC)
City Council District: 3
Address: 1451 7th St.

Liberation Park Residences

118 Affordable Units including 30 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $28 million
Developer: Eden Housing and Black Cultural Zone
City Council District: 6
Address: 7101 Foothill Blvd.

34th & San Pablo

59 Affordable Units including 30 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $7 million
Developer: 34SP Development LP (EBALDC)
City Council District: 3
Address: 3419-3431 San Pablo Ave.

The Eliza

96 Affordable Units including 20 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $20 million
Developer: Mercy Housing California
City Council District: 3
Address: 2125 Telegraph Ave.

3135 San Pablo

72 Affordable Units including 36 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $10.5 million
Developer: SAHA and St. Mary’s Center
City Council District: 3
Address: 3515 San Pablo Ave.

The source of this story is the media reltations office of District 2 City Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan.

Oakland Post

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Activism

Oakland Housing and Community Development Department Awards $80.5 Million to Affordable Housing Developments

Published

11 months ago

January 30, 2025

Oakland Post

Rebecca Kaplan, interim District 2 city councilmember. File photo.

Special to The Post

The following Oakland affordable housing developments have been awarded in the current round:

Mandela Station Affordable

238 Affordable Units including 60 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $15 million + previously awarded $18 million
Developer: Mandela Station LP (Pacific West Communities, Inc. and Strategic Urban Development Alliance, LLC)
City Council District: 3
Address: 1451 7th St.

Liberation Park Residences

118 Affordable Units including 30 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $28 million
Developer: Eden Housing and Black Cultural Zone
City Council District: 6
Address: 7101 Foothill Blvd.

34th & San Pablo

59 Affordable Units including 30 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $7 million
Developer: 34SP Development LP (EBALDC)
City Council District: 3
Address: 3419-3431 San Pablo Ave.

The Eliza

96 Affordable Units, including 20 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $20 million
Developer: Mercy Housing California
City Council District: 3
Address: 2125 Telegraph Ave.

3135 San Pablo

72 Affordable Units including 36 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $10.5 million
Developer: SAHA and St. Mary’s Center
City Council District: 3
Address: 3515 San Pablo Ave.

The source of this story is media reltations office of District 2 City Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan.

Oakland Post

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Alameda County

Oakland Acquisition Company’s Acquisition of County’s Interest in Coliseum Property on the Verge of Completion

The Board of Supervisors is committed to closing the deal expeditiously, and County staff have worked tirelessly to move the deal forward on mutually agreeable terms. The parties are down to the final details and, with the cooperation of OAC and Coliseum Way Partners, LLC, the Board will take a public vote at an upcoming meeting to seal this transaction.

Published

11 months ago

January 11, 2025

Oakland Post

Alameda County Board of Supervisors Chairman David Haubert. Official photo.

Special to The Post

The County of Alameda announced this week that a deal allowing the Oakland Acquisition Company, LLC, (“OAC”) to acquire the County’s 50% undivided interest in the Oakland- Alameda County Coliseum complex is in the final stages of completion.

Oakland has already finalized a purchase and sale agreement with OAC for its interest in the property. OAC’s acquisition of the County’s property interest will achieve two longstanding goals of the County:

The Oakland-Alameda Coliseum complex will finally be under the control of a sole owner with capacity to make unilateral decisions regarding the property; and
The County will be out of the sports and entertainment business, free to focus and rededicate resources to its core safety net

In an October 2024 press release from the City of Oakland, the former Oakland mayor described the sale of its 50% interest in the property as an “historic achievement” stating that the transaction will “continue to pay dividends for generations to come.”

The Board of Supervisors is pleased to facilitate single-entity ownership of this property uniquely centered in a corridor of East Oakland that has amazing potential.

“The County is committed to bringing its negotiations with OAC to a close,” said Board President David Haubert.