Clean Energy Spotlight: Mateo Jaramillo

This week’s #cleanenergyspotlight is an experienced innovator and change maker in the energy storage industry. But first, do you know someone who should be celebrated for their #cleanenergy leadership? Name them in the comments below and they might be featured in our next Clean Energy Spotlight! This week’s energy spotlight is Mateo Jaramillo, the co-founder and CEO of Form Energy, an energy storage company with a mission to develop, manufacture, and commercialize low-cost, multi-day energy storage that will transform the reliability and accessibility of the renewable electric grid.

Before co-founding Form Energy, Mateo spent 7 years working at Tesla and served as the Vice President of Products and Programs for the company’s stationary energy storage program. After leaving Tesla, he joined a group of energy storage veterans with the shared goal of creating a new class of low-cost, multi-day energy storage systems. Earlier this year, Form Energy announced its partnership with Georgia Power to test its innovative 100-hour iron-air battery technology. The iron-air battery has the potential to be manufactured at a fraction of the cost of lithium-ion batteries.

Mateo told Utility Dive, “this is an indicator of the progress we’re making in the market … and how fast the market is moving for multi-day storage. ”Why did Mateo go into clean energy? He credits both his outlook and his mission to advance renewable energy to his family and his upbringing in Salinas, California. “My parents were public servants. My father was a lawyer for farmworkers, and the environmental justice work that he and his firm did was one of those inspiring moments for me,” he told EnergyWire. “I just saw renewable energy as a way not just to be stewards of the world but to be stewards of each other.”

Thank you, Mateo, for your commitment to stewardship and innovation in #cleanenergy, and congratulations on being this week’s #cleanenergyspotlight.