First Green will invest in early-stage companies that focus on developing methods to convert renewable carbon—such as non-food biomass and carbon dioxide—to fuels and chemicals, and applications of clean or green technologies in the conventional energy process, sometimes known as green-black technologies.

First Green will make initial investments of $500,000 to $10 million in each emerging technology and up to $100 million in a single business as it commercializes.

First Green is led by co-presidents Doug Cameron and Tom Erickson. Cameron was formerly chief science officer at Khosla Ventures, a Silicon Valley-based cleantech venture capital firm, and served as director of the biotechnology group and chief scientist at Cargill, the international producer and marketer of food and agricultural products. Erickson is a co-founder and general partner of BlueStream Ventures, a venture capital partnership focused on technology companies, and a former research director and technology analyst at Dain Rauscher Wessels, a Minneapolis-based brokerage and investment banking firm.

There is a mismatch in the marketplace between the advanced technologies and innovations related to the carbon value chain that can change the energy landscape and the lack of capital to help commercialize them. We believe now is the perfect time to provide First Green’s capital and expertise to make these emerging technologies a commercial reality.

—Doug Cameron

In addition to his experience at Khosla Ventures and Cargill, co-president Doug Cameron is currently a consulting professor of chemical engineering at Stanford University and was formerly a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Wisconsin, Madison from 1986 to 2000. He was the recipient of the Raphael Katzen Award in 2009 and formerly served as chief science advisor and managing director in the cleantech investment banking group at Piper Jaffray, a global Minneapolis-based investment bank.

He was also acting CEO for Gevo, LS9, and Segetis, and served on the boards of select carbon value chain companies, including Kior and Mascoma.