This podcast is supported by Sungrow. Sungrow itself supports some of the biggest and most innovative PV and battery systems in the world with its inverters.

Sungrow is the leading solar inverter supplier by volume in the world and all that volume it creates

complexity. To manage that complexity it needs the best people to deliver the best products

on time and working perfectly. That means people like Jill Dunn, who you're going to hear from later in the show.

Find out more about Sungrow Solar and Storage Inverters at Sungrow Power.com. This week on what it takes, how an aspiring astronaut went from working on a laser system for the Mars rover to sleeping in her car for months

and then co-founded a startup that turned CO2 into chemicals and fuels.

For some reason I had this thought in my mind that like, oh, when I grad school you would just get a high salary that just would happen like when it was clear that I was not then I had to really make some like tough choices and so it was like okay well let me see how I can like help my rent and all that kind of stuff.

So what did that what did that look like?

Well, I was like living in my car for a few months.

When I was yeah, yeah.

Little few months um which actually is kind of nice.

Berkeley has some very nice areas.

They're pretty, they're relatively safe.

You know, it was like camping every night.

You definitely have that founder-optimist lens.

Welcome to What It Takes, an interview series produced by Powerhouse and Green Tech Media.

I'm Stephen Lacy.

In this series we hear from founders and executives at the most influential

clean energy companies, their backgrounds, their passions,

their struggles, their deals, their management philosophies, their near-death experiences. their

near-death struggles, their deals, their management philosophies, their near-death experiences.

In this episode, Powerhouse CEO Emily Kirsch sits down with Dr. Itosha Cave,

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