San Francisco backs its climate ambitions with real public infrastructure for startups.
Programs and agencies like California Energy Commission and EPIC Program offer grants, incentives, testing, and incubation to help climate companies get started and scale here.
California Energy Commission
The California Energy Commission is the state's energy agency, a government funder and regulator rather than a startup program, and its importance to founders is as the source of the clean-energy R&D funding that flows into founder-facing vehicles. The programs founders actually apply to are CalSEED for grants, CalTestBed for testing vouchers, BlueTechValley for incubation, and utility pilot programs.
EPIC Program
The Electric Program Investment Charge is California's ratepayer-funded clean-energy R&D program, administered by the state and the large utilities, and the funding engine behind CalSEED, CalTestBed, and utility pilots rather than a program founders apply to directly. Its value is that it capitalizes the non-dilutive and pilot vehicles founders actually use. Founders route to CalSEED, CalTestBed, BlueTechValley, and PG&E's pilots.
CalSEED
CalSEED is an early-stage clean-energy grant program funded by the state's clean-energy charge and administered by New Energy Nexus, the first rung of California's public innovation pipeline for concept-to-prototype ideas. It provides direct, non-dilutive, non-matching grants through concept and prototype awards won in an annual competition, plus professional development, mentorship, and community, and prioritizes diverse founders and ratepayer benefits.
CalTestBed
CalTestBed is a state-funded voucher program administered by New Energy Nexus with the University of California and Berkeley Lab, giving California clean-energy entrepreneurs vouchers for third-party testing across many facilities at UC campuses and the national lab. It takes no equity, no matched funding, and no IP, and adds a commercialization symposium, partner introductions, and an entrepreneur directory, requiring an existing hardware prototype and a California address.