SF Climate Week: Electrifying the Community
Wilhelm Scholz
Aug 28, 2025
"How do we help the one-third of Americans who live in multifamily housing electrify their homes, without the massive cost and disruption of deep retrofits?"
That was the central question guiding an event we co-hosted on April 24th with our friends at Gradient, as part of San Francisco Climate Week.
The room was packed. Energy was high. And the stakes were clear: if we’re serious about decarbonizing, we can’t leave multifamily housing behind.
The Conversation We Need
We brought together leaders from across housing, technology, utilities, and policy to talk about how we move beyond the ideas phase, and bring electrification to scale in apartment buildings across the country.
Panelists included:
Julio Garcia, Executive Director at Rise South City
Phillip Kobernick, Director of Transportation Programs at Peninsula Clean Energy
Paige Mueller, Managing Director at Eigen 10 Advisors
Cole Ashman, CEO at Pila Energy
Vince Romanin, CEO at Gradient
Moderated by Vanessa Warheit, Senior Advisor at the Northern California Assessment Center
Education, trust, and clarity are essential. Without them, even the most elegant technology won’t drive adoption.
“Nobody will trade out a gas stove if they don’t understand the health risks and what to do about it.”
— Julio Garcia, Rise South City
Behind the Scenes: Hosting the Event
As co-hosts, we were deeply involved in organizing the evening, from outreach and scheduling to designing the slides and guiding the conversation to be both informative and actionable.
It’s no small thing to gather six experts from different corners of the sector and ensure a cohesive, valuable conversation. But with support from the Gradient team and some thoughtful coordination, we pulled it off.
