Dawn Lippert is the Founder & CEO of Elemental Impact, a nonprofit investor focused on scaling climate technologies with deep community impact. Elemental was founded and maintains its HQ in Hawai’i. The organization has invested in more than 150 startups in the energy, mobility, water, industry, and agriculture sectors, and those companies have gone on to raise over $8 billion in follow-on funding.

Elemental has pioneered a new model for climate solutions that centers social equity in companies’ cultures, products and technology deployments. Over half of Elemental’s portfolio companies are serving customers in disadvantaged communities, and the technologies are deployed in 50 states and more than 100 countries.

In addition to leading Elemental Impact, Dawn serves as Founding Partner of Earthshot Ventures, a venture capital fund spun out of Elemental in 2021 and backed by corporates, individuals, and institutional investors from Hawai’i, Asia Pacific, and the U.S. mainland.

Dawn is also Senior Climate Advisor at Emerson Collective, the investment and philanthropic platform led by Laurene Powell Jobs. Dawn has shared insight on climate investing and the energy transition in the Economist, Politico, Bloomberg TV, Axios Pro, TED, Yahoo! Finance, and Canary Media.

Dawn graduated from Yale University and the Yale School of the Environment.