Carbon emissions. Broken food systems. Lack of access to information. These are some of the many problems being addressed by the Forbes social impact listers.
By Olivia Peluso and Igor Bosilkovski
I
n the summer of 2018, a report from the United Nations said human influence was "unequivocally" to blame for warming the planet, and that some forms of climate disruption were now locked in for centuries. U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres described the report as a "code red for humanity."
That’s the moment it all really clicked for 28-year-old Alisha Fredriksson. “It clarified that climate is this absolutely enormous problem that's going to affect everyone around the world within a shockingly short timeframe,” Fredriksson recalls. “The shortening of the timeframe in that report was really what sparked me to try to figure out what I could do about it.”
Along with cofounder Roujia Wen, 27, Fredriksson got to work building London-based Seabound, which is creating carbon capture equipment for ships. Commercial shipping remains one of the largest hard-to-abate industries, comprising 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to the European Commission. Seabound’s technology attaches directly to the boat and pulls carbon from the exhaust, which is then stored onboard the ship, carried back to port and sold to either be stored permanently underground or integrated into new products like fuels.
With $4.5 million in funding from investors, Fredriksson and Wen join 29 other changemakers on the 2023 Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe Social Impact list using cutting-edge innovation to make a difference. After receiving hundreds of nominations, members of this year's list were scored and selected by a panel of four judges: Dr. Anjhula Mya Singh Bias, chair of the International Board at Amnesty International; Mikkel Skovborg, senior vice president of Innovation at the the medical treatment-focused Novo Nordisk Foundation; Elodie Broad, head of Impact and Sustainable Future Goals at venture capital firm Balderton; and Under 30 Europe 2019 alum Anna Jones, cofounder of refugee support nonprofit RefuAid.
Climate remains a major theme for founders this year, though approaches vary from education to electrification. Alice Aedy, 28, Finn Harries, 29, and Jack Harries, 29, have parlayed their expertise as documentary filmmakers and designers to create Earthrise Studio, a multidisciplinary creative studio seeking to educate on the climate crisis. Based in London, their innovative approach to storytelling has landed them collaborations with David Attenborough, Jane Goodall and Barack Obama. Their videos have reached over 70 million people, and their online following of 3.5 million is still growing.
Over in Paris, Jimmy cofounders Antoine Guyot, 29, and Mathilde Grivet, 29, are building and operating thermal generators that use nuclear fission to create heat for industrial processes in manufacturing. Each reactor prevents 400,000 tons of carbon from being emitted over the course of their lifetimes, and the heat produced is cheaper than that generated from natural gas. The company has raised $21.3 million.
Others are tackling food systems. Hamza Qadoumi, 29, raised $1 million to create an intelligent crop monitoring system for commercial indoor farms. His Stockholm-based company, EcoBloom, monitors and controls the food production process from seed to harvest without the need for manual intervention, enabling farmers to manage their farms through the push of a button from anywhere in the world.
Like many entrepreneurs out to change things for the better, founder Alessandro Romano’s idea draws on personal experience. During a 40-day solo catamaran trip in 2020, the Rome resident saw firsthand the devastating effects of overfishing: major declines in biodiversity while nets continued to dredge the waters for whatever sardines and silverfish they could grab. Shortly thereafter, Romano, 28, started Ittinsect, a biotech startup that developed a sustainable alternative to aquaculture feeds.
His feeds for farmed fish and plants have eight times more bioavailability than the raw materials, resulting in a 15% improvement in growth and overall improved gut health in the fish. Every 10,000 tons of feed produced by Romano’s team can upcycle 10,000 tons of agricultural byproducts, reduce carbon emissions by 17,000 tons from the aquaculture value chain and replace the need for fishing 300 million units of fish from the ocean.
This year’s list was edited by Olivia Peluso and Igor Bosilkovski. For a link to our complete 2023 30 Under 30 Europe Social Impact list, click here, and for full 2023 30 Under 30 Europe coverage, click here.
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