The green movement in New Jersey will depend – more than most people appreciate, I dare say – on its ability to accelerate the participation of profit-motivated people. Only when fully allying with free enterprise will the green movement take on a life of its own – win legions of new interest groups such as large corporations (and their powerful lobbyists), labor unions, small business owners, and employee-citizens.

And since the basis of our free enterprise system is innovative, motivated entrepreneurs, the green movement must intensify its engagement with this group above all. Small, innovative companies grow quickly into larger companies, hire the most employees, and create buzz for ideas and momentum for action.

That’s why I urgently wanted to speak with Michel Bitritto, PhD, head of the NJ Meadowlands Business Accelerator. She and the Accelerator are doing work that is as vital to the green movement as any other group I can think of, and it’s in our power to participate in some way. I also wanted to ask her how the economic recession and plunging fossil fuel prices have changed the equation for NJ's green-prosperity movement.

The Meadowlands Business Accelerator formally opened just two months ago, yet already has tremendous resources to help entrepreneurs and young companies succeed in the renewable energy and technology fields. It has in-house experts, financial and plant resources, collaborations with NJ universities and companies, and the Meadowlands Environmental Research Institute (MERI) to draw upon to help entrepreneurs accelerate their path to profitability. For instance, what could be more useful for an entrepreneurial engineer than to to get the Accelerator’s help in locating other professionals with complementary skillsets, or to get help on patents from the Accelerator’s collaboration with the Rutgers Law Clinic?

It is a prime opportunity for New Jersey that the Accelerator is actively looking for additional qualified people and small businesses that it can help.


The timing couldn’t be better for at least three reasons:

• “While recessions make people less likely to take risks and start new enterprises, the entrepreneurs now want to cluster together more, use available resources, and move faster toward their revenue goals,” all of which the Accelerator helps accomplish, Bitritto told me.

• And regarding lower energy prices, she said, “They're still expensive, and people don’t think lower prices will last. There’s an understanding that we need to develop alternative energy technologies as much as ever.”

• And from a broader, societal perspective, she observed, “We don’t just need to develop alternative energy technology, we need to develop technology,” and that’s the Accelerator’s capability. The U.S. cannot be a service-only nation, and still expect to thrive. The financial services meltdown this year and our multi-trillion-dollar debt should quickly convince anyone of that.

I then asked Bitritto for a couple of examples of how the Accelerator works with clients it takes on.

• One of its clients is Gotham Analytics, which has developed sensors to gauge for toxins over dispersed areas. There happens to be a direct need for this precise technology within the Accelerator’s affiliated Meadowlands Environmental Research Institute, so the entrepreneur is afforded a perfect test-case. Such an opportunity will be a huge asset when the business pitches for additional clients. To my knowledge, there is an enormous, and growing, demand around the world for this kind of technology, equipment, related software, and expertise.

• Another of the Accelerator’s clients is Solaris Cybernetics, driven by people who have developed a machine to convert indigenous algae into fuel while it operates in the watery environment and maximizes the available solar power. The Meadowlands Estuary is an ideal testing area, something that again highlights the breadth of resources that the Accelerator provides for its clients.

I’m always on the lookout for friends and associates who can benefit from phenomenal – and available -- resources. What’s more, so many technologies become groundbreaking only after diffusing across various areas and disciplines, that the possibilities for referring people to new opportunities seem almost endless. Given this, my call to action is to identify people and companies that should be made aware of Michel Bitritto and the Meadowlands Business Accelerator.


Related Resources. The Meadowlands Business Accelerator is one of two NJ business incubators focused on green/sustainable enterprise. I wrote about the other, the Sustainable Business Incubator at Fairleigh Dickinson University, in a two-part report: here and here. Regarding the Meadowlands Business Accelerator, I liked this article, written for the Chicago market. There is also a good, early overview of the two NJ sustainable incubators here.

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