This week, Green connected with Julie Kring, CEO and Founder of Khepra, a company focused on enabling businesses to improve sustainability for their customers. How do they do it? By developing a technology that uses renewable electricity to break down consumer and agricultural waste into fuel. The fuel produced from this regenerative process replaces dirty fossil fuels for electricity production and petrochemicals in combustion engines, (e.g. cars and machinery).

Let’s get to learn more about Julie Kring!

Tell us a little bit about you, your background, and your current role:

I am founder and CEO of Khepra, a mountaineer and conservationist, and artist. I started my company in college after I fell in love with biomaterials while interning at NASA Ames Research Facility. I studied biochemistry at UC San Diego, and when I graduated I was accepted into Indiebio, the world’s leading life science accelerator. As a start-up founder, I do everything from running experiments, to paying bills, to pitching investors, to writing goofy update emails to my team.

What is a fun fact about you?

I became an accidental dog mom. I was on a road trip a year ago, and I found two husky puppies in a parking lot. I thought I wasn’t in the right place in my life to have a dog, much less two, but Lana and Luna have been valuable members of the Khepra team. They keep morale high!

Why do you think climate change and sustainability is such an important topic today? 

Because the grass is no longer green! Terrifying. What have we come to. In all seriousness though, where else is Jeff Bezos going to park his rocket?

What do you envision your industry looking like 10 years from now?

The chemicals industry has a chance to be a net positive to the environment. Rather than creating waste and pollution, it can support sources of raw materials that actively clean up the planet. Chemicals manufacturing, once electrified, can help to solve the energy imbalances that come from wind and solar generation.

Green Success Stories is a television show, podcast, social media, and news platform, hosted by Dylan Welch, that highlights climate change scientists, renewable energy experts, and clean tech entrepreneurs by giving them a voice in the mainstream media. The Green Podcast highlights leading experts in cleantech, sustainability, media, finance, and real estate. Tune in and subscribe to the podcast on Apple or Spotify to listen to interviews with leading cleantech and sustainable experts. If you are interested in being featured on Green, click HERE.