Oil, one of my college buddies who majored in chemical engineering once told me, is in everything. He was talking about not just the fuel that goes in your car, but also the petrochemicals in the laptop you type on, the chair you sit on, the clothes you wear, and the pharmaceuticals you take.
Kelly Ogilvie, the CEO of Seattle-based Blue Marble Energy, has made clear that he sees the world in the same way, and wants to do his part to see if we can come up with those essential chemicals in a more renewable way. Ogilvie, a veteran of former Seattle mayor Greg Nickels’ administration and Paul Allen’s Vulcan holding company, clearly knows how to put that kind of big picture story to work in helping build his alternative fuel/specialty chemical company.
So I’m pumped that Ogilvie has accepted our invitation to join the next big Xconomy Seattle event, titled “Separating Hype from Reality in Alternative Fuels.” This event, on the evening of May 19 at the Institute for Systems Biology’s new headquarters in South Lake Union, is truly shaping up into a star-studded affair for Northwest leaders in the renewable fuel industry. Ogilvie will be on hand to deliver one of our patented 4-minute “burst” overview presentations. If this (somewhat dated) company video is any indicator, he’ll do just fine when he gets handed the mike.
Blue Marble is the latest company to join the list of standout presenters at this event. The group includes Michael Ramage of Redmond, WA-based Asemblon; Jan Allen of Harvest Power in Seattle; Jeff Surma of S4 Energy Solutions in Houston, TX and Bend, OR; and Hoby Douglass of Seattle-based General Biodiesel. Before they step up to the mike, I’ll moderate a conversation about the big picture with Kristina Burow, a co-founder of Sapphire Energy; Margaret McCormick, a co-founder of Matrix Genetics; and Ned David, the co-founder of Kilimanjaro Energy. We’ll also hear a brief presentation on an ambitious aviation biofuels initiative from John Gardner, the incoming dean academic affairs at Bainbridge Graduate Institute.
The early bird discount period for tickets has passed, but there are still seats available for students (undergrads, graduate students, and postdocs) for the bargain rate of $20. We also have made special discounts available to startups with less than 20 employees, as well as members of Climate Solutions, and the Washington Clean Technology Alliance. If you’d like to take advantage of one of those deals and join the conversation, go ahead and sign up here at the registration page. See you there on May 19 for another evening of big ideas and top-notch networking.
