Cleantech Business Pioneer Martin Turock Retires

Cleantech San Diego’s first and longest-serving worker made a transformative impression on the area’s clear vitality transition

SAN DIEGO, CA, December 6, 2023 – Martin (Marty) Turock, founder and government director of Cleantech San Diego‘s Southern California Vitality Innovation Community (SCEIN) has retired from the group after spending 16 years spearheading vitality effectivity and clear vitality initiatives that catalyzed tons of of recent jobs and injected tons of of tens of millions of {dollars} into the area’s cleantech financial system whereas creating financially-viable avenues for cities and colleges to cut back greenhouse fuel emissions and advance local weather motion targets.

Turock was the primary and longest-serving worker of regional business affiliation Cleantech San Diego. Throughout his tenure with Cleantech San Diego, he led a collection of strategic subject initiatives designed to speed up adoption of vitality effectivity and renewable vitality applied sciences throughout native public businesses and educational establishments. These included the Greening San Diego Program, the DOE Vitality Effectivity & Conservation Block Grant Program, the IRS Clear Renewable Vitality Bonds Program, the San Diego Regional Road Lighting Working Group, and the San Diego Regional Okay-12 Faculties Sustainability Collaborative, amongst others. 

In 2016, Cleantech San Diego was awarded a $5 million grant from the California Vitality Fee to launch the Southern California Vitality Innovation Community (SCEIN), one of many state’s 4 innovation clusters. Turock assumed the position of Government Director to design and develop SCEIN as an accelerator program for clear vitality startups based mostly in San Diego, Riverside, San Bernardino, and Imperial counties which are growing applied sciences to assist California meet its clear vitality targets. This system, which gives free enterprise providers by way of a consortium of regional accomplice organizations to assist vitality entrepreneurs efficiently carry their improvements to market, has since grow to be the flagship initiative of Cleantech San Diego for the previous seven years.

“Marty was the plain option to launch and lead this program,” stated Cleantech San Diego President and CEO Jason Anderson. “Marty’s imaginative and prescient and perception in establishing SCEIN with multi-year engagements and customised service plans has led to excellent outcomes for SCEIN member corporations and the worldwide fame that it has garnered as one of many high vitality innovation clusters within the nation. Due to Marty, SCEIN is making tangible strides in driving an equitable clear vitality transition for the advantage of all California ratepayers.”

Beneath Turock’s management of SCEIN, startup corporations in this system attracted over $500 million in follow-on funding, representing a tripling of the capital that these corporations got here into this system with, and an 80-fold return on funding on this system expenditures offered by the California Vitality Fee’s grant. All whereas driving market transformation with new vitality applied sciences that can allow the state of California to realize its 2045 zero internet carbon objective.

Throughout Turock’s tenure, 73 corporations had been served by SCEIN, 36 of that are energetic in this system in 2023. Collectively, these startups make use of 812 folks, and have had 469 patents accredited since being accepted into this system. Moreover, 86 p.c of SCEIN corporations have feminine, minority, or veteran illustration on their C-Suite management groups. 

“Marty was the primary member of the SCEIN and Cleantech San Diego workforce that UCAP Energy met. From the preliminary go to, we knew that it was the correct determination to hitch. The extent of professionalism, honest perception in serving to others get forward, and sharing of data has been unmatched in different incubators we’ve got been a member of,” stated UCAP Energy President and CEO Gordon Schenk. “As a small startup, UCAP Energy joined SCEIN in July of 2020. A tricky time to do enterprise with the pandemic simply beginning, however with Marty’s and SCEIN help, UCAP Energy has been very profitable since that early starting. After becoming a member of SCEIN we’ve got gone from a workforce of three to almost 120. Income has grown over 6000% and our merchandise have by no means been extra wanted out there.”

In 2013, Turock launched, and for 9 years led, Cleantech San Diego’s Okay-12 Faculties Sustainability Collaborative, which was established in partnership with SDG&E to assist San Diego County faculty districts to fund vitality effectivity retrofits, clear vitality installations, and the event of vitality administration capabilities by way of Proposition 39 funds. The initiative made the San Diego area a high winner of those funds by expediting the method and fostering the sharing of vitality effectivity and clear vitality greatest practices throughout the 45 faculty districts in SDG&E’s service territory. Beneath Marty’s management, the collaborative course of enabled native Okay-12 colleges to safe $121 million in Proposition 39 grant funding that was used to implement vitality effectivity and clear vitality tasks at 528 websites throughout each faculty district within the county and delivering vitality financial savings of 48 million kilowatt-hours per yr leading to price financial savings of greater than $11 million yearly – all whereas decreasing greenhouse fuel emissions and making a more healthy studying surroundings. 

From 2009-2012, Turock chaired a Regional Road Lighting Working Group to create a greatest apply sharing discussion board for the 18 cities and different public businesses within the SDG&E service territory to share key learnings that might speed up the retrofit of the area’s high- and low-pressure sodium streetlights to induction and LED fixtures as an environmentally pleasant solution to cut back the excessive price of streetlighting for municipalities. On the conclusion of the challenge, 15 cities and San Diego County had made commitments to retrofit greater than 75,000 streetlights for a financial savings of $4 million in annual taxpayer financial savings along with vitality financial savings of 30 million kilowatt-hours per yr and a discount of regional greenhouse fuel emissions by 18,720,000 kilos.

For the IRS Clear Renewable Vitality Bonds (CREBs) Program began in 2009, Turock recruited Metropolis of Chula Vista, Metropolis of Lemon Grove, Metropolis of Santee, Santee Faculty District, San Dieguito Union Excessive Faculty District, San Diego State College, and Fallbrook Public Utility District to construct the important mass to make pursuing CREBs bond incentives Cleantech San Diego’s first true regional authorities/public company clear vitality strategic initiative. As a part of this system, Marty leveraged relationships with native contractors to offer professional bono engineering signoffs required for every of the CREBs purposes. The endeavor resulted in 192 photo voltaic PV tasks accredited for $155 million in CREBs bonds for the San Diego area, representing 19 p.c of the nationwide allocation and jump-starting photo voltaic PV deployment for 9 San Diego authorities businesses.

“Marty has led, impressed, and mentored the Metropolis of Santee for the previous 15 years and has been instrumental in supporting the whole area by way of many successes,” stated Kathy Valverde, Assistant to the Metropolis Supervisor, Metropolis of Santee. “Marty raised our metropolis’s consciousness and curiosity within the important significance of sustainability tasks for financial, environmental, and social advantages. We are going to proceed to be impressed by and profit from Marty’s work and our partnership with him.”

In 2007, Turock launched Cleantech San Diego’s first strategic subject program focusing on the preliminary deployment of vitality effectivity and renewable vitality tasks with the Metropolis of Santee and the Metropolis of Lemon Grove to validate the financial, social, and environmental advantages of these tasks and set an instance for different public businesses throughout the San Diego area. The ensuing vitality effectivity retrofits and photo voltaic photovoltaic (PV) tasks had been the primary deployments in San Diego County’s authorities company sector, and people early successes validated the triple backside line advantages of fresh vitality tasks, which motivated lots of the different public businesses throughout the county to develop local weather motion plans and launch vitality financial savings and decarbonization initiatives.

“Wanting again, it was most likely unrealistic on our half to anticipate anybody particular person to have the option set up and lead an ever-changing group of people and firms by way of a collection of very totally different, and largely untested, tasks, pilots, and implementations,” stated Cleantech San Diego Co-Founder Jim Waring. “But Marty efficiently pulled it off, again and again, yr after yr. It’s really wonderful from the vantage level of 2023 to replicate upon every little thing he has completed.”

“Cleantech San Diego needs Marty the perfect in his retirement and extends our deepest thanks for his years of top-notch collegiality and unwavering ardour in help of our group, our members, and the whole cleantech business,” stated Anderson. “There’s little question our group will proceed to really feel the monumental impacts of his life’s work for a really very long time to return.”

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About Cleantech San Diego

Cleantech San Diego is a member-based enterprise affiliation that positions the larger San Diego area as a world chief within the cleantech financial system and good cities motion. As a nonprofit group, Cleantech San Diego is uniquely suited to help the business by fostering collaborations throughout the private-public-academic panorama, main advocacy efforts to advertise cleantech priorities, and inspiring extra equitable funding throughout the San Diego area. Stakeholders embrace greater than 130 companies, universities, governments, and nonprofits dedicated to advancing sustainable options for the advantage of the financial system, the surroundings, and all members of the group. Be taught extra at cleantechsandiego.org.

Concerning the Southern California Vitality Innovation Community

The Southern California Vitality Innovation Community (SCEIN) is a free incubator program for clear vitality startups based mostly in San Diego, Riverside, San Bernardino, and Imperial counties which are growing applied sciences to assist California meet its local weather targets. This system gives entry to the sources and amenities of regional accomplice organizations and connections with business as a way to speed up the commercialization of rising vitality applied sciences. Managed by Cleantech San Diego, this system is the results of a number of grants from the California Vitality Fee to assist advance California’s vitality innovation business. SCEIN purposes are accepted on a rolling foundation. Anybody focused on making use of as an entrepreneur, turning into a mentor, becoming a member of the Technical Advisory Committee, or internet hosting a pilot demonstration challenge, can be taught extra at cleantechsandiego.org/scein.

Media Contact:
Shannon Bresnahan, Cleantech San Diego, 858-568-7777, shannonb@cleantechsandiego.org

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