At Techonomy Impact, we gathered three of the sharpest minds in climate innovation to answer a deceptively simple question: how do we direct talent, capital, and policy toward the solutions that matter most? The resulting conversation—between Ryan Panchadsaram, co-author of Speed & Scale; Sonia Aggarwal, CEO of Energy Innovation; and Mark Patel, Senior Partner at McKinsey & Company—offered a rare glimpse into both the hard realities and the exhilarating possibilities of the net-zero future.
The organizing principle for our discussion was the new Climate Tech Atlas, a collaborative tool designed to map the entire landscape of decarbonization technologies—from “innovation imperatives” we must scale today to “moonshots” that could redefine the future. And, as Panchadsaram put it, it’s designed to be more than a static report. “What it is is a map of all of the innovations that we need to radically decarbonize,” he explained. “It’s a head start for anybody in the room—investors, philanthropists, researchers—to identify not only where they want to spend their time and their capital, but also areas where they may want to avoid investment, because there’s already over-investment in that space.”
The Atlas divides the climate challenge into two broad categories. “The first are innovation imperatives,” Panchadsaram said. “These are the critical needs to get to net zero. The kind of exciting things on the map, too, are the moonshots. These are the high-risk, high-reward technologies that, if we unlock, really change the calculus of decarbonization.”
The distinction matters because each category demands a different kind of investment mindset. Geothermal energy and clean “peakers”—technologies that supply power during demand spikes—fall squarely in the imperative bucket. Fusion and next-generation solar cells, on the other hand, are moonshots: game-changing but uncertain. “If many of the entrepreneurs and founders that are starting fusion companies succeed, it changes the calculus of everything,” Panchadsaram said.
A Policy Roadmap—Not a Technology Bet
Governments, Aggarwal argued, are often overwhelmed by a flood of new ideas and lobbying efforts. A map like the Atlas can help them focus on what matters. “One thing that can be difficult if you’re a policymaker is how to sort through all of these different ideas and technologies,” she said. “It all comes down to the impact that we can have by making innovations that we can bring to scale in a reasonable amount of time and at a reasonable cost.”
And crucially, she added, governments shouldn’t try to pick winners. “They’re not in the business of choosing a technology,” Aggarwal said. “What they want to do is support innovation areas that have a material opportunity to make a big impact in the near term.”
Patel echoed that sentiment from the business perspective. “What’s been amazing about this exercise… is that it has caused us to go back and really challenge ourselves,” he said. “Not just what’s the absolute impact and the relative impact, but what do we think is the nature of the innovation that’s going to get us there?”
Problem-First, Not Technology-First
One of the most critical insights from building the Atlas was a shift in mindset. “We started with a really large list of technologies—about 2,000 strong—and that was the wrong way to approach it,” Panchadsaram admitted. “The surprising piece… is how do you frame these as problems that need to be solved?”
This problem-first framing unlocks creativity and collaboration. It’s not about saying, “I have a technology, what can it do?” but rather, “I have a problem—how many ways can we solve it?” That shift, Patel added, is critical for companies and investors deciding where to commit their resources. “If you’re going to choose to commit yourself to advancing a technology, then you want to choose based on knowing that technology has sufficient headroom to make a material difference,” he said.
Some of the biggest breakthroughs in the Atlas process came from unexpected corners. Panchadsaram was astonished to discover work on “alternative energy transmitters”—systems that use materials like steel or aluminum to transport energy. “This whole idea that you could ship an aluminum product across the sea and oxidize it to produce heat and hydrogen was just mind-blowing,” he said. “We don’t need transmission lines, possibly, but actually moving a commodity that we move already today.”
Aggarwal highlighted industrial manufacturing as a particularly urgent frontier. “We haven’t figured out the best pathway to zero-emissions versions of all of those materials,” she said. “The industrial sector is this persistent, difficult source of pollution and climate emissions that really needs some new thinking.”
Patel pointed to nature-based solutions as another underexplored opportunity. “We have barely begun to understand the mechanics that nature has given us, let alone apply them,” he said. “Especially because we’re embracing AI in everything—if we really have an ambition for AI, it should be that it will help us to start to really understand nature.”
Scaling What Works
The Atlas, now freely available online, is designed to be an iterative and collaborative tool. “If you see anything missing—an imperative or a moonshot—there’s a link for people to submit ideas,” Panchadsaram said. “This project would not have been possible without things like solar, wind, and batteries that were invested in and researched over two decades ago and have now reached scale. That’s what gives us confidence that we can follow the same playbook.”
The challenge—and the opportunity—is to turn that confidence into action. The climate crisis demands urgency, but it also requires imagination. As this conversation showed, solving the planetary puzzle isn’t about betting on a single technology or policy. It’s about building an ecosystem—one where bold moonshots, practical imperatives, and unlikely partnerships converge to make the future possible.
