Also called: Cleantech Entrepreneur, Startup Founder (Climate)
Starts a company building technology to cut emissions, like better batteries, carbon capture, or low-carbon cement.
You pitch investors in the morning, test a prototype with your engineers in the afternoon, and answer 100 emails at night. Every week brings a new crisis and a new breakthrough. Most startups fail, but the ones that work can change an industry.
Extremely variable: early founders often pay themselves little; success can mean big equity payouts.
Approximate: anchored on Bureau of Labor Statistics data for a broader job group.
Bachelor's degree (4-year), about 4 years after high school. No required path; many founders have engineering or science degrees, some a PhD or MBA.
Ways in: 4-year college, Graduate school, Self-taught. Training cost: $15k – $60k.
Majors to look at: Engineering, Chemistry, Materials Science, Business.
Growing faster than average. Climate tech investment is large but cyclical.
Low risk for 10 years. AI speeds coding, research and pitch decks; inventing, building and selling new technology stay human.
Classes: AP Physics, AP Chemistry, Business.
Official data: O*NET occupation 11-1011.
Career Universe is an early version. Pay, training and AI-risk figures are estimates to start your own research, not verified facts. The research was written with AI research assistants, checked by validation scripts and spot-checked by hand. Check anything important with schools, employers and official sources. How the numbers work.