A Climate Change with Matt Matern
Climate Podcast

You’re listening to A Climate Change this is Matt Matern, your host and I’ve got Inna Braverman on the program. She is the CEO of Eco Wave Power. She started the company at the tender age of 24. It’s now listed on NASDAQ. And Inna has a really powerful story. She was born in the Ukraine. And she’s won all kinds of awards. Installed a wave farm in Gibraltar back in 2016. She was selected by Smithsonian Magazine as one that eight young innovators with ingenious ideas for the future of energy. She spoke to the Knesset, the Israeli parliament back in 2017.

She’s done three different TED talks in 2020. She was profiled by sustainable markets initiative curated by then Prince Charles now King Charles, so you have to tell us about maybe if you know the king, and then recently met with Hillary Clinton. So you’ve been busy and amazing stuff that you’re doing. Tell us a little bit about your story. We’re loving, the opportunity to talk to you, you know,

Thank you very much. So, tell you how I started with what do you mean by telling her?

Sure, yeah, that wasn’t a very well framed question on my part. Let me try that again. You know, just because I’m a lawyer, doesn’t mean I come up with good questions all the time. Or maybe because I’m a lawyer, I don’t come up with good questions.

So anyway, the question is, maybe take us back to the beginning, what, what brought you to this, this idea of creating wave power?

So that’s actually kind of interesting and personal story. I live in Israel, but I wasn’t born here. I was born in Israel in 1986. And the two weeks after I was born, the Chernobyl nuclear reactor exploded, which was the largest history, nuclear disaster in terms of cost and casualties. And I was one of the babies that was hurt from the negative effects of the explosion, I actually had a respiratory arrest, and the clinical death.

And luckily, my mother, she’s a nurse, and she approached my crib on time and gave me mouth to mouth resuscitation until the ambulance came and saved my life. So I got a second chance in life. And I don’t remember any of that, I was a baby. But you know, growing up in all the family meetings and gatherings, everybody in my family would say, Wow, that’s so cool, you got a second chance in life, you know, you should really do something good with it. And that’s kind of how I grew up with the feeling of purpose, like I really should do something good with a second chance that I got in life.

And when I was four years old, my family emigrated from Ukraine to Israel. And we settled in a small town in the north of Israel called Oppo, and it wasn’t exactly the city of opportunities. So they’re not was not so much like startups or like technology back then, like it was a very kind of small city in Israel, still a small city. So when I grew up, I decided to study political science and English literature in university to university in the north of Israel, in the hope of becoming kind of this great politician that will make peace in the Middle East, or, you know, kind of the nakedness of the innocence of somebody in their early 20s.

And when I finished my university, there was no lineup of politicians that were waiting to hire, you know, a young lady with a degree in political science and English language and literature. So actually, the first job that they found was an English/Hebrew translator for a renewable energy company. And then there, I kind of discovered the whole, let’s call it magical world of renewable energy, I learned about solar and wind and wave power. And where I solar and wind were already like, there was no too much to you in those fields.

And there was a lot of competition, the product color, and the technology was already fully developed. And everybody were kind of fighting for the same piece of the same file with Pollack and wave energy was something that all the engineers and scientists said that like, it’s an amazing source, and it can provide much more than other energy sources, because wave energy is the least intermittent source of renewable energy.

And even according to the world energy goals, it can produce twice the amount of electricity that the world produces now. And although like it’s such a huge source, no matter how much I researched it, I saw it, no company, no matter how big it is, or how much financial Human Resources collection, you can, like no company was able to make it a reality to commercialize wave energy.

So I didn’t have the money. I didn’t have the technical background. They didn’t have the contacts. So I said to myself, these huge companies cannot do it. I can do it again, the innocence of being in your early 20s. And I started really researching In a database, the books anything that I could find, where did other companies fail.

And I kind of found like common ground to all the failures of all the other companies. And I came up with my own kind of ideas of how to commercialize wave energy. But of course, again, I didn’t have even the money to register the patent, let alone to you know, build a power station, so I can put it aside and unrealistic. And then one day, I went to a social event, and the guy came and sat next to me. And he told me, what’s your passion, and they said, wave energy, because that was something that I was really into.

And it turned out that he’s a serial entrepreneur, and one of his investments is a sercotel, in Panama, and when he was there, another to complete the other side of the world, he was looking at people doing marine sports and saying to himself, wow, there must be something better that you can do other than marine sports with, you know, with the power and the energy, the waves, and also started kind of researching wave energy.

So when I told the wave power, that was my passion is my passion. It was kind of match made in business heaven, and he ended up investing the first $1 million into the company. And that was the beginning of Eco Wave Power. So when I was working for i co founded the company,

That’s an amazing story. You know, I guess it’s, it’s a testament to following your dreams and putting in the hard work to get there. Because obviously, you did a lot of work to kind of prepare yourself for the opportunity. And then the opportunity kind of arose. And you were ready for it. So kudos to you for doing doing the work.

So then, as those of us who’ve started companies know, the, you know, the start is, is great, but then you got to do the next level. So tell us about what took you to the next level? And how did you get your technology patented? And what was that next step like?

So after opening the company, like, we wanted to check if the ideas that we had it like feasible engineering wise, and so on. And we wanted to do it with the minimum possible cost. Because you know, until you know that you actually have a product, you don’t really want to invest a lot of money. So what I did, was going back to play into the same city that I was born, and doing a competition between 300 engineers, and hiring a team of five engineers, to actually take kind of our concepts and ideas into like really sketches and blueprints, and so on.

So when, when that happened, We registered our first patent, which was an international PCT that protects the technology and the patent in like 160 countries. And then we started doing testing and the first testing was the waveform testing in the Hydromechanical Institute in Kiev actually, again, we chose to do the testing in Ukraine, because the costs were much lower than they are in Israel. Also in the US, I guess. After we did the testing with the Hydromechanical Institute, we went to our first three conditions implementation, which was first in premium peninsula, and then moved it to the port of Jaffa in Israel. It operated in Jaffa port for six years.

And now we moved, kind of the demo power station, and installed it, so a bit larger scale, 100 kilowatt installation that we did with with co-funding from the Israeli Energy Ministry, which recognized our technologies by new technology, and EDF Renewables IN, which is a subsidiary of the French national electrical company.

And so I think the thing that we did kind of the best or kind of the best move that we did in our development journey was we were very, very fast to test the equipment and the technology in real conditions. Many of the companies, especially offshore wave energy developers, which is kind of like in the middle of the ocean, or in the middle of the sea, they spent 10 years, 20 years, sometimes even more like for R&D, like computerized R&D, and like wasteful testing and the knowledge to go and put it in real conditions.

And I really believe that like, some of that phenomenon, like behavior of the waves of the ocean is not really that easy to forecast, like you really need to go and put it out there in order to discover the real problem and challenges of the technology and the fact that we really went fast into the real conditions, I think, gave us the opportunity to learn much more.

Well, I definitely think that taking the chance to fail is a great chance to learn and those who are too afraid to fail, don’t learn as much. And that’s a great example of your kind of willingness to put yourself out there, test your technology and and then you have a faster learning curve because you failed or things didn’t work out as well. Then you make a change, and you’re constantly improving it.

So I’m looking forward to the next segment of asking you more about how you how you took that first generation technology and proved it to kind of get to your next gen and, and where you’re at and kind of where the where the cost curve goes going forward because I’ve read that, that the cost curve of wave energy is supposed to be going down pretty rapidly in the future. So you can tell us a little bit more about that. And when we come back from the break, you’re listening to A Climate Change. I’ve got Inna Braverman, CEO of Eco Wave power on the show and looking forward to talking with her about all these issues after we come back from the break.

You’re listening to A Climate Change, I’ve got Inna Braverman, CEO of Eco Wave power on the show. And you know, right before the break, we were talking about the cost of wave power and your iterations on the technology, maybe you could tell us a little bit more about how your technology evolved from your first prototypes to where it is today.

The first prototype that we were doing the protest in the Hydromechanical Institute in Kenya, we were basically testing a number of different floaters shapes to see which flow to shape basically, the most optimally it kind of takes absorbs the power of the waves and you know, generates energy. For the energy generation process to commence. It was a small scale, kind of power station with a direct drive.

So they were basically uploaded directly drives a generator, then our let’s call it next generation of the reconditions was much larger scale photos already, the conversion system became a hydraulic conversion system, which enables basically continuous supply. So it does not fluctuate when in the time difference between one way but basically, we kept improving and improving the technology according according to data, we collected operational data that we collected from operating in real conditions.

So for example, we have a patented storm protection mechanism that when the waves are too high for the system to handle, the protons automatically go off above the water level, and they lock in the upper position until the storm passes. In our first test kind of storm protection mechanism, we will need the floater. But then we will see that the wind would blow very strong because when there’s a storm, also the wind blows strong.

So the floater would get kind of it would start hitting its own locks, it would be moving. So we understood that we have to change the locking mechanism into something that’s very robust, that does not enable any movement because if it has a movement, that floaters will hit its own loss and due to its heavy weight, relatively heavy weight will probably break it looks.

So basically, we kept improving also developing our own proprietary automation and control system that without a control system we can produce, let’s say x amount of electricity. And with the control system 5 x of electricity. So we keep innovating. We keep submitted patents, Eco Wave Power, this point has 18 patents and patents pending, 14 of them are already approved. And we keep submitting more as we develop more.

That’s great. So are you looking at some point in time licensing your technology to other companies or keeping it all kind of proprietary.

So right now, we’re not really looking into licensing except providing licenses to our joint ventures well established a joint venture to penetrate the new market and provide that joint venture kind of license for our technology. And our preferred revenue streams or working models, let’s call it, is the either turnkey when we sell the equipment or third party or to a JV that we establish. A second option is BOT when we build, operate and then transfer the assets.

Sometimes too, it’s possible to transfer to institutional investors that can pay a premium price for the power stations. And the most preferred one especially collocations. With great wave patterns and would feed in tariffs will price per kilowatt hour is BOO when we build on and operate the power stations for 25 years. And then we make our money from the sale of electricity to the grid for the duration of the project. And think of it kind of like building a building and instead of selling the apartments, renting apartments and making money for 25 years from the right.

So where do you see your next steps and I know you have a lot of contracts out there to build systems and provide power, kind of where are you at on that in that in that process?

So basically, right now we’re will finish the construction of our newest project in Israel, which will be the first project in Israel history, where wave energy kind of officially connects to the Israeli National Grid. So people that live next to Jaffa Port, it’s in Tel Aviv, I will be actually able to open the TV or operate the washing machine using energy from the power of the waves, which is very cool.

And was assigned the PPA power purchase agreement in the history of Israel between the Israeli electrical company and a wave energy developer equal wave power. We’re also penetrating the US market, which was his strategic market for us, we’re basically focused mostly on the European and the US market. The European one because it’s the most advanced in terms of regulation and legislation and grants and policies for wave energy, and the US market.

Because right now, we’ll feel like it’s really opening up to renewable energies with many ambitious goals and support mechanisms such as the Inflation Reduction Act. There’s also cool education initiatives for wave energy specifically being promoted one in New Jersey, and one in California, which is very excited, exciting, and something very, very new for the United States that we’re planning soon to open our first proof of concept or pilot in AltaSea’s premises at the Port of Los Angeles, where we actually met and the very good luck, we would love to invite you to come for a visit as soon as the power station opens.

And from what I know, you’ll be the first kind of onshore nearshore wave energy power station, which will be super cool also, because you know, as opposed to the offshore installations where nobody can actually go and visit it, because all the conversion mechanism is inside a floater in the middle of the ocean. Here like it will have full like people and media, students, investors, will have full access to the power station and we’ll be able to see how wave energy is being harnessed in real time.

Well, it’s certainly an amazing project. They’re out at all to see Terry Tamminen, former EPA, California EPA, I guess, secretary, who was under Arnold Schwarzenegger started that or he I guess he didn’t start it. He’s now the current CEO of it. And so he’s brought together some amazing thinkers and doers like yourself and it’s, it’s an amazing kind of place. So, tell us in terms of where where does that all to see project go next, how, how long do you have to to launch it to the next level?

Already ship the conversion unit of energy conversion unit is already at sea along with one floaters. One floater at the demonstration unit is planned to be with up to eight floaters and an installed capacity of up to 100 kilowatts. Now right now we’re at the licensee point. So we’re waiting and submitting, submitting some documents at the Port of LA and then the Port of LA will issue the proper licenses in order for us to be able to actually take the conversion unit and the floaters and connected to the jetty that is located in front of the IBC.

And as soon as we finish the licensing, we will be able to produce several additional floaters and as you start to operational system. And so I wanted to add that basically we’re starting with a pilot project. But of course, our goal and our ambition, ambition is to go to commercial scale projects. So the Port of Los Angeles has a very, very big external breakwater where we can install anywhere between 20 to 60 megawatts of power, which is already substantial size of a wave energy power station. So of course, our goal of the building, the small proof of concept, and showcasing it kind of to the world and to the US is to go ahead and construct a lot larger scale installations which are much more cost efficient and which produce significant energy amounts.

That was what is 20 to 60 megawatts of power. What does that kind of translate to for for those of us who don’t measure power for a living?

So it’s about 20,000 to 60,000 households.

Okay, that’s a lot of power. So, then where does it go from here in terms of bringing the cost wave energy down to to the levels of solar and wind.

So, in commercial scale, the cost is already down, because when we reach a size of 20 megawatt and up our price goes as low as $1.5 million in construction costs per one megawatt, which is from what I know is comparable to the cost of onshore wind. Offshore wind is more expensive, of course, and is a bit higher than the price of solar energy, but we have to take into account that wave energy is much more stable source than solar energy. So whereas solar energy might might cost Less play style struck, but you have the night you have winter, you have cloud coverage when when solar doesn’t produce any electricity and wave energy for a bit of higher cost can produce in suitable locations around the clock, which is a big advantage.

Yeah, I’ve heard that word advantages of having wave energy is is complementary to wind and solar and that so that the grid kind of doesn’t need as many batteries because wave energy may be producing energy when solar or or wind energy is not. So they kind of work together in a good way.

Wave energy is not only complimentary, it actually can be used as a baseload source, meaning that look when energy is very fluctuating, it’s mostly prevailing early in the morning or late at night, when actually the population usage is at its lowest solar energy. You have a say in California, a lot of sun during the day, but then you have the night and solar energy stops producing wave energy, as we said in suitable locations can operate around the clock.

So basically, wave energy can be used as a stabilizing source for both wind and solar energy. So really, if we want to have a 100%, renewable energy friendly world or environmentally friendly world, then we definitely need to combine all renewable energy sources, because different sources are prepared prevailing during different times of the day, during different months in the year, seasons, and so on. But when they’re all combined, together, they stable as each other. And when they definitely can be the baseboard.

Well, tell us a little bit about how the inflation Reduction Act, which is a big funding source for environmental projects, is helping you and wave energy projects.

But from what I know, the Inflation Reduction Act, as determined on certain amounts of money to be contributed towards the development of wave energy or marine energy in general, for different programs that are now being promoted by the DOD, the Department of Energy of the United States and so on. It is different tax incentives and different kind of support policies for the promotion of renewable energies, which definitely helps, especially when you’re a new technology and you need this kind of support mechanisms.

Well certainly, you know, we’ve subsidized the fossil fuel industry, with trillions of dollars of subsidies all over the place. So it makes sense to give some subsidies to new technology that actually isn’t polluting, we would be well served to do that. While you’re listening to A Climate Change, I’ve got Inna Braverman, who is the CEO of Eco Wave power on the show, and we’ll be back in just one minute to talk to you further about wave technology and how it can power the planet.

You’re listening to A Climate Change, this is Matt Matern, your host, and I’ve got Inna Braverman of Eco Wave Power on the program.

Inna tell us a little bit about what makes Eco Wave Power special what differentiates itself from other wave power technologies.

So 99% of the wave energy developers decided to install the equipment offshore which is four or five kilometers into the sea. So basically, most developers took like kind of bulky huge floaters and they put inside the floaters all the expensive hydraulic mechanical and conversion mechanism. And this kind of approach created I call it the “five fear factors from wave energy or from offshore wind energy.”

So the first thing was prices. The prices of offshore wind energy were sky high, because they needed and still need ships, divers, underwater mooring, and cables. So a company called Balaam is from Scotland has installed the test site in Portugal for a few 100 households for a development cost of around $150 million. Obviously no 100 households will return a 100 over $100 million investment.

And the second problem was even though large scale investors had gate belongings and other companies that amounts of money because they thought to themselves “okay, the price is super high right now, but it will decrease with the time,” unfortunately such decrease never happened because in the offshore there’s waves of 20 meters and even higher and unfortunately no man made stationary equipment can survive the loads over 20 meters wave height.

So Balaam, is a company called Ocean Lease, another one called Wello Oy basically, after a few months or a few days in some cases or Operation found themselves total loss to the system. So big wave comes break the whole system and all the expensive equipment is inside the closure. So it’s a total loss. So technologies were too expensive breaking down all the time insurance companies so that it’s so expensive and breaking down that they were reluctant to ensure offshore wave energy.

And that’s, you know, a blow to the industry because like if you can get insurance, how can you fund the projects, especially new project new technologies, environmentalists, which was supposed to be the greatest proponents and supporters of wave energy, we’re actually objecting wave energy because it’s connected to the ocean floor and disturbed the marine environment, he started a project called Balance. And his companies, this offshore companies got so preoccupied with trying to lower the price and up the reliability that most of them never got the chance to actually connect to the electrical grid.

So on top of all their problems, that became a big question mark on whether wave energy can even safely connect to the electrical grid. And that kind of was the issues or the problems that bother let’s call it all the investors in the industry, how do you solve this type. So when David and I we established the Eco Wave Power, we understood that like no solution would work other than a solution that solves these five specific problems.

So basically, instead of going to the offshore, we did kind of something different than the whole industry, we decided to install on existing man made structures, such as piers breakwaters, jetties, and other types of marine structures.

The only thing that is in the water, the floaters which belong in the water, and all the expensive conversion mechanism is online, just like regular power station. So that enabled us to significantly lower the prices, we built our first 100 kilowatt installation in Gibraltar, for a price of $450,000. In comparison to the Philippines, $150 million.

That’s like a big breakthrough in terms of the cost, we showed that we’re reliable, and that we can survive storms, because when the waves are too high for the system to handle, as I said before, the float is automatically rise above the water level and stay in the upward position until the storm passes. Because we’re reliable, and we’re cost efficient.

We’re also able to secure insurance from global reputable insurance companies, which makes it much more easy to invest in our assets, environmentally supporting us because we don’t create any new presence on the ocean floor. When you connect to existing manmade structures. These manmade structures documented stones are it’s a man, it’s a prime real estate, it’s not used for anything other than breaking the waves.

So we’re using kind of real estate that nobody needs and the kind of damage the environment because cement in the water is not very friendly. But you had to build it breakwaters to protect like ports and coastal municipalities from you know, storms. So we take something that is bad for the environment, but necessary, and it’s not prime real estate, and we turn it into a source of revenues and a source of clean electricity, which is kind of repurposed in the US.

And we have been connected to the grid in geographic for six years, proving that wave energy can kind of safely connect to a national electrical grid or the micro grid, and can also solve that problem. So I think that’s kind of what the core part is different than that. What really put us forward.

Sounds like a genius plan.

Thank you. Well, yeah, trying to start smaller, I think is a better plan than you know. And of course, waves out there in the middle of the ocean are incredibly powerful. A friend of mine, who was a naval architect would talk about how some of those huge waves could just, you know, mangle even like an aircraft carrier or something, because they’re just so powerful. They can just smash things incredibly. So tell us, what’s the next step for for Eco Wave power in terms of getting some of these projects done and getting the financing? And what do you need to kind of take it to the next level?

So the next step for us, I think, is like, as I said, we prove that we can solve the fight prevent prevailing problems. And right now, our next natural step is to build larger scale installations and show that wave energy not only that, it can be cost efficient and reliable and insurable and environmentally friendly and safely connect to the grid.

But that wave energy can actually be built large scale to provide large amounts of electricity and to make money to become profitable. Because in the end of the day, what is not profitable even if it’s an input industry does not survive. So our next kind of natural goal and aspiration is to build the first commercial wind energy project in the world.

So how far off is that? And I definitely want to comment on the profitability aspect. I believe that a friend of mine and I were talking and he was saying we’ve got Combine profitability along with the green part of the equation that if we can marry kind of those two things together, then then you have something that’s super powerful. Because otherwise, it’s really hard to draw in the money. And it does take lots of money to build these things. So tell us, where are you at on this journey to profitability.

So basically, as mentioned before, wave energy exactly like wind and solar becomes profitable at the point that it reaches commercial scale. So our kind of focus and focus the lowest construction costs is when we reach a scale of 20 megawatts and up and given the fact that our preferred revenue stream is VO O is built on an operating power stations.

And we should have multiple kind of yielding assets on our balance sheet in order to be able to really show significant profitability, which is exactly what is done by other large scale renewable energy companies, such as NL green and such as other and green developers. So first step is building the first commercial scale power station, and then kind of, you know, copying, pasting and copying and pasting to different locations with different sites in the world, and then basically selling electricity to the grid and profiting from that.

So currently, you have a number of contracts, is that correct? To build out stations or to start stations? Yes. Tell tell us a little bit more about where your current your current contracts are and what where they’re at in the process of going from vision to reality.

So most events projects is the one in Israel that is about to open very soon, it’s already fully built, and we’ll just pending the last approval to start selling the electricity to the grid. The next one that we’re planning to launch is the port overlay one will be our first project in the United States. Our first commercial installation is planned to be in Portugal, in a location called bar to door breakwater in the city of Porto. And then we signed the 20 megawatt concession agreement with apdl, the local port authority for three different breakwaters that they own.

So that will be our first commercial one. On top of that we have different agreements, one that we signed recently with Taiwan, for developing the first pilot, they’re usually benefit new locations with pilots. And then when they see that the pilot works, well, then we get a commission and kind of orders for larger scale installation. We have I’m actually flying next week to Greece to heracleum port, we’re not doing a detailed project planning for a project in heracleum, called a two megawatt project, together with Drogen Associates, which is a large scale grid engineering company. So we’re kind of a little bit all over the place. But as I said, mostly Europe in the US.

Well, it sounds exciting. So in terms of finance, or where were you guys getting the financing to, to build these projects out? Or is that part of the contract that your partners come up with money to, you know, help get these things off the ground?

Well, right now we’re funding kind of mixed methods of funding. Some project we found with equity sample project with fun with grants, those different grants available for web development. Some projects are being funded with strategic partners such as the Israel project that is being co funded by the Israeli energy ministry and by EDF renewables i L. Right now, one of the showstopper, I would say for wave energy is the fact that because it’s such a new technology, we still cannot get that financing.

And really, in order to make a commercial rollout and build multiple, as we said, yielding power station or yielding assets, and that financing is key for solar and wind, sometimes they provide 80 and even 90% of the cost of the installations and power stations. So as soon as wave energy, we’ll be able to get that financing as an additional source of funding the project and that will be amazing and will really kind of Hurry up with the execution of the projects.

Well, certainly the bankers are holding the keys to I think the environmental movement in a lot of different ways and we can talk about that after we come back from the break but you underlying one of the most important things is getting people to loan your money and banks having some degree of confidence in you know, a technology.

Though I think it probably makes sense to have the government give some guarantees to this type of funding to get an industry like this off the ground. So we’ll be right back in one minute. My guest Inna Braverman, CEO of Eco Wave Power, you’re listening to A Climate Change and stay tuned.

You’re listening to A Climate Change, this is Matt Matern, your host, and I’ve got Inna Braverman, CEO of Eco Wave Power on the program. And you know, we’re just talking before the break about financing and and I think one of the main things that could help everybody is degree of government financing or to get projects like what you’re doing, which are kind of on the cutting edge but have tremendous promise, as you said earlier, that wave energy could have enough energy to, to power the world two times over.

So it seems worthy of putting some money into to see if we can build it out and make it. And as you said, potential is cheap or cheaper than wind and solar, which are already cheaper than coal and natural gas. So now, now what what is California doing to encourage us in terms of grants or tax breaks or things of that nature?

So right now, there’s actually a new legislation initiative called SB 605. If I’m not wrong by Senator Padilla, which is kind of requesting or wanting to grant a certain amount of funding for both research feasibility studies and actual implementation of a wave energy project in California. So that’s one initiative that, you know, I think it’s very impressive.

I even submitted a written testimony for the different utilities committee and maritime committees in order to kind of explain the advantages of wave energy. If we look at the United States In the United States alone, according to the Energy Information Administration, wave energy can supply 66% of all United States energy needs.

If we’re looking at California, California, according to an Arielle can get wave energy there can supply 69% of all California’s energy needs, if we’re looking at the energy needs of 2018. And California on exemptions apply 3% Of all the United States energy needs. So California definitely has one of the larger resources in terms of wave energy in the US. So definitely hope that this bill initiative will pass. It already passed the I think the appropriation committee and the senate committees, and is heading for further approval. So I hope this will pass and other similar initiatives will pass as well.

Well, certainly, that’s something that all of us citizens can talk to our, our representatives and senators, assembly people to encourage them to move this bill forward, because certainly more research and financing for this very promising area to produce such a large amount of energy, and in a clean way, is is a great idea. And, and essentially, I mean, all utilities are public goods. Now we’ve granted them monopoly status. And I’m surprised that utilities haven’t gotten more into the game regarding producing wave energy. What do you think is going on there? And maybe they have and I just don’t know it.

So some utilities are going into the way that it gains. So for example, our partners I said in the Israel project is EDF. EDF is a large scale utility. It’s a French national electrical company. I’m sure that other utilities are going as well. Maybe the United States is not as popular right now. Because again, wave energy was kind of slower in commercializing the solar and wind and we’re only seeing now this year and last year, maybe the first kind of initiatives for the promotion of adaptation of wave energy. But I do think that the more you know, more legislation, regulation, licensing procedures, phenotypes are sent by the government are always energy, the more the utilities will participate as well.

Okay, well, before I before you go, do tell us a little bit more about how this technology actually works. And because it is a fascinating technology, all of us have been out to the ocean we see wave so we’re familiar with what it looks like in terms of your raw materials. The question is, how do you convert it into electricity?

So basically we’re tax unit floater shape will exist in man made structures such as piers breakwaters, jetties. The floaters are going up and down with the movement of the waves and the pushing hydro cylinders, which transmit biodegradable fluid into land located accumulators, a pressure is being built in the simulators, the higher the waves, the higher the pressure, which is used to turn the hydro motor, turning the generator and the generator for an improper sense clean electricity into the grid.

And the whole system is controlled by smart automation system that enables optimal supply of the clean energy from the waist to the grid, and also activates our patented strong protection mechanism that puts kind of the floaters in some protection mode in the upper position every time there’s a storm and when the storm passes flowing back into the water and commences operation.

So how high can your floaters go up in the air to kind of avoid the strongest waves?

So the float is basically it’s according to the mechanical design, how high they go. And according to the height of the wall in the specific location of implementation, basically, we just go like that, from kind of almost a 90 degree position, they go up and low. So it’s not the point of like only lifting them above the water level, which helps of course, during the big storm, but also the locking itself kind of the protests become a part of the world.

And we start getting like instead of getting dynamic forces, the clothes are moving the way it is moving. So dynamic forces against the enemy forces is a lot of force than when you lift it up. It’s like dynamic forces of the waves hitting kind of a static wall like the flow tree becomes kind of a wall, which assists the survivability of the floaters in storms.

Well, that’s a brilliant design. It’s just very simple but elegant in execution to kind of keep it safe. So tell us tell us a little bit about kind of some of the most exciting things that you’ve done in, in growing the company and, and how you’ve grown kind of as a leader in in that process.

I think one of the most exciting moments was opening up the Gibraltar power station. It was our first grid connected power station where we showed that wave energy can safely connect to the electrical grid, and I really feel that made an impact. also improving the wave energy is cost efficient, reliable, insurable. 100% environmentally friendly.

Another very kind of proud moment for me is the signing of the PPA with the Israeli electrical company, because wave energy developer never signed a PPA with the Israeli electrical company for the first time in the history of Israel, that wave energy will officially connect to the electrical grid. So that’s super exciting. Ico with powers IPO on NASDAQ us, we IPO the company in July 2021. That was a huge step for the company. And we traded under the stock symbol wave.

And so I think there were many, many proud moments, you know, as the CEO and the founder of the company. For me personally, I received the Global Climate Action Award from the United Nations in the category of women for climate. And that was a very exciting moment because I always say that being an entrepreneur is hard.

But you know, being a female entrepreneur definitely adds an additional layer of difficulty to kind of the entrapreneurial journey, especially in the energy industry, according to you UI, like only 5% of the executive in the whole energy industry, not only renewal, but are women, 95% are men. So with this kind of distribution, it’s not always the easiest to succeeded still. So definitely, you know, that was a proud moment.

That’s, that’s incredible set of accomplishments for anybody and you’re still going the best is yet to come. So, you know, looking forward to seeing great things as you move forward. You’ve met a lot of great leaders in the environmental movement, can you name four off the top of your head that would kind of be as they say in the US the Mount Rushmore where we have four great presidents up on the you know, carved into a mountainside who would be your four top environmental leaders so definitely say almost five figure wars okay with some people visit our power station at AltaSea in the Port of Los Angeles, like he’s kind of known as the former governor that did most towards you know, the acceleration of renewable energy sources.

The location in California is responsible for the roofs initi ative, the solar roof initiative in California so he pushed a lot of positive legislation for other patient of renewable energy. I met recently, Hilary clean ICANN, which I know also is very, very passionate about the environment and has their own kind of ideas on how to improve and accelerate the development of renewable energy sources in the United States.

To more, I don’t know, to the two last ones that I met, to be honest, so I don’t have right now to more of the top of my head, my head, but like, definitely, there’s many or maybe I would like to say over Tobin chart, which is an assemblyman from New Jersey, who kind of pushed forward and wrote the first legislation initiative for promotion of wave energy in New Jersey, and probably also Senator Padilla from California that is pushing the SB 605 legislation.

Well, that’s, that’s a great list.

They never forget, there is definitely a big pioneer in renewable energy and what he’s doing with AltaSea, and the blue hub there is really, really amazing and inspiring. And really, there will be more hubs like this in the night in other states and also in Europe and in other countries around the world, then it will really accelerate adaptation of renewable energy sources.

Well, that’s a that’s a great idea what an idea, I can definitely stand behind. Inna Braverman thanks for joining us on the program, CEO of Eco Wave power, you should follow ina on all her social channels and check her company out she’s listed on NASDAQ. It’s a bright, has a bright future. It was so great to having you on the show.

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