Blustery outside, buzzing inside. Elemental Interactive 2026 gathered a room full of builders and backers wrestling with the same question: what does it really take to be bold and build?
From the main stage microphone to the face-to-face conversations where ideas turn into action, we captured some of the most memorable moments for you.
A Front Row View: reflections from the main stage
The Interactive main stage brought together a dynamic mix of tech talks from Elemental and Earthshot Ventures portfolio companies and candid interviews led by top media voices. The day opened and closed with a gift from Hawaii—hula from Hālau O Keikialiʻi—offering a powerful reminder to ground our work in compassion, mutual respect, and aloha.
Take a look at the lineup:
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- Amy Harder (Axios) joined Dawn Lippert to discuss how a volatile global backdrop and surging AI demand are both challenging and accelerating climate innovation. Dawn underscored a central tension: the gap between what’s possible and what actually is getting built. In a rapid-fire game of “would you rather”, she pointed to fixing permitting as a top priority, and chose seeing the future over changing the past.
- Elemental portfolio founder Arcady Sosinov shared a deeply candid post‑mortem of FreeWire’s rise and fall, from rapid growth and nine‑figure fundraising to a hard reckoning with the dangers of “growth at all costs.” Arcady offered an honest look at failure, resilience, and the importance of enduring relationships. Read the full story here.
- Amanda Peterson Corio (Google), Melanie Nakagawa (Microsoft), and Robinson Meyer (HeatMap News) pulled the data‑center story out of the cloud and into physical reality, emphasizing that we already have much of the generation capacity we need in today’s grid; the opportunity is to unlock underused capacity through smarter grid utilization and authentic local engagement.
- Tony Martens traced Plantible’s journey from breaking ground on its first commercial facility to a roller-coaster regulatory fight to remove a highly-productive duckweed strain from Texas’s “banned exotic species” list so they could cultivate it at scale, using humor to underscore just how personal local policy and permitting can be. Watch the replay here.
- Alex Modon highlighted how today’s construction industry is structurally misaligned with decarbonization, noting that 92% of large construction projects run over on either budget or schedule. He showed how Unlimited Industries’ AI engineering platform automates design for large‑scale energy and data‑center projects.
- Leila Banijamali spotlighted permitting as a quiet bottleneck slowing residential improvements. She showed how Symbium’s AI-powered instant permitting flips that constraint into a catalyst—cutting review time by up to 75% and helping cities move faster on the solar, roof, and efficient improvements that comprise most projects.
- Kevin Noertker waxed poetic — and practical — about the opportunity of hybrid‑electric aviation, explaining how Ampaire’s retrofit strategy meets the industry where it is—upgrading existing aircraft to reduce fuel use 50% in a sector that accounts for ~2.5% of global emissions. Read the whole talk here.
- Tom Wilson explained how Atana uses AI and subsurface data to find “flowing minerals” like lithium brines, translating oil‑and‑gas skill sets into a new critical‑minerals frontier. He showed how smarter exploration has already led Atana’s team to discover an estimated 2–3% of the world’s new lithium resources.
- Chloe Songer spotlighted textile waste as a fast‑growing climate and supply‑chain risk, noting that roughly 60% of clothing manufactured hits a landfill within 12 months. She shared how SuperCircle’s sorting and logistics platform uses data to route garments to their best next life—resale, recycle, or donation—while opening new revenue streams for brands.
- Anukool Lakhina, one of Elemental’s newest portfolio founders, stepped out of the audience to describe how BurnBot’s robotic vegetation‑management platform is already treating tens of thousands of acres of high‑wildfire‑risk land at half the cost and 10× the speed of traditional crews.
Melissa Rouse, Elemental’s Director of Marketing Communications, captured the feeling:
“I stepped into the theater for my fourth annual Interactive thinking I knew what to expect. Instead, the day surprised me with its emotional range: intimate yet expansive, polished yet personal. We moved from massive hyperscaler opportunities to the truly terrible Yelp reviews of San Jose’s building department. And somehow it all revealed the same thing: the invisible middle of our economy is deeply human. I’ve never cheered so loudly for permitting innovation, laughed so hard at a story about local policy, or felt so invested in the daily grind of a Goodwill clothing sorter.”
Beyond the Stage: Where ideas meet action
Throughout the week, our community gathered for both casual connection and dedicated networking—from the Portfolio Welcome Gathering at the bowling alley to the Founder & Funder Meet and Greet where Elemental facilitated more than 150 double-opt-in investor introductions.
A cornerstone of our off-stage programming is the Deal Room, where entrepreneurs pair up with dedicated capital providers to collaborate on real opportunities. This year, we brought in four companies: Bedrock Energy, Nth Cycle, Terviva, and Vaulted Deep. Camille Bangug, Elemental, who choreographed the Deal Rooms, reflected:
“One of the most valuable aspects of our Deal Rooms each year is the diversity of perspectives in the room, spanning philanthropy, venture capital, project finance, and institutional investors, all digging into what actually unlocks scale. A clear theme that emerged across conversations was how often the biggest unlocks sit outside the technology itself. Investors consistently pointed to factors like local partnerships, siting dynamics, and stakeholder alignment as critical to whether projects move forward or stall. It was a strong signal that scaling requires as much innovation in real-world deployment as it does in the technology itself.”
In Gratitude: Hear from our partners
“Elemental is a bridge—sitting between technology and community, intertwined and yet often far apart. But wherever you have tension, you have opportunity. And that’s where Elemental has been digging in for many years.”
ANNE MARIE BURGOYNE | WAVERLEY STREET FOUNDATION
We kicked off Interactive with our first-ever joint Annual Investor and Donor Meeting for Elemental and Earthshot Ventures. As Christian Rasnake, who works on our Growth team at Elemental, put it:
“The event gave investors and donors a chance to see behind the curtain of how Elemental and Earthshot have grown—both on their own and together.”
“Climate problems can’t be solved by philanthropy alone. You need different steps along the way and different types of capital — and Elemental and Earthshot have evolved to meet that challenge.”
JOYCE CHUNG | MAKAHAMA FOUNDATION
Across Interactive, one thing was clear: Being bold is just the start. Building is what brings it to life.
The post Inside Interactive 2026: What it Really Takes to be Bold and Build appeared first on Elemental Impact.
