MIT Power Initiative convention spotlights analysis priorities amidst a altering vitality panorama | MIT Information
“We’re right here to speak about actually substantive modifications, and we wish you to be a participant in that,” stated Desirée Plata, the College of Engineering Distinguished Professor of Local weather and Power in MIT’s Division of Civil and Environmental Engineering, at Energizing@MIT: the MIT Power Initiative’s (MITEI) Annual Analysis Convention that was held on Sept. 9-10.
Plata’s phrases resonated with the 150-plus contributors from academia, business, and authorities assembly in Cambridge for the convention, whose theme was “tackling rising vitality challenges.” Assembly such challenges and in the end altering the trajectory of world local weather outcomes requires partnerships, audio system agreed.
“We’ve got to be humble and open,” stated Giacomo Silvestri, chair of Eniverse Ventures at Eni, in a shared keynote tackle. “We can not develop innovation simply specializing in ourselves and our competencies … so we have to associate with startups, enterprise funds, universities like MIT and different private and non-private establishments.”
Added his Eni colleague, Annalisa Muccioli, head of analysis and expertise, “The vitality transition is a race we are able to win solely by combining mature options able to deploy, along with rising applied sciences that also require acceleration and threat administration.”
Analysis targets
In a convention that showcased a collection of analysis priorities MITEI has recognized as central to making sure a low-carbon vitality future, contributors shared each promising discoveries and methods for advancing confirmed applied sciences within the face of shifting political winds and coverage uncertainties.
One panel targeted on grid resiliency — a subject that has moved from the periphery to the middle of vitality discourse as climate-driven disruptions, cyber threats, and the combination of renewables problem legacy techniques. A dramatic living proof: the April 2025 outage in Spain and Portugal that left thousands and thousands with out energy for eight to fifteen hours.
“I wish to emphasize that this failure was about greater than the ability system,” stated MITEI analysis scientist Pablo Duenas-Martinez. Whereas he pinpointed technical issues with reactive energy and voltage management behind the system collapse, Duenas-Martinez additionally known as out an absence of transmission capability with Central Europe and out-of-date working procedures, and beneficial higher preparation and communication amongst transmission techniques and utility operators.
“You’ll be able to’t plan for each single eventuality, which suggests we have to broaden the portfolio of utmost occasions we put together for,” famous Jennifer Pearce, vp at vitality firm Avangrid. “We’re making the system smarter, stronger, and extra resilient to higher defend from a variety of threats reminiscent of storms, flooding, and excessive warmth occasions.” Pearce famous that Avangrid’s dedication to ship protected, dependable energy to its clients necessitates “meticulous emergency planning procedures.”
The resiliency of the electrical grid below significantly elevated demand is a crucial motivation behind MITEI’s September 2025 launch of the Information Middle Energy Discussion board, which was additionally introduced in the course of the annual analysis convention. The discussion board will embody analysis initiatives, webinars, and different content material targeted on vitality provide and storage, grid design and administration, infrastructure, and public and financial coverage associated to knowledge facilities. The discussion board’s members embody MITEI corporations that additionally take part in MIT’s Middle for Environmental and Power Coverage Analysis (CEEPR).
Storage and transportation: Staggering challenges
Assembly local weather targets to decarbonize the world by 2050 requires constructing round 300 terawatt-hours of storage, in accordance with Asegun Henry, a professor within the MIT Division of Mechanical Engineering. “It’s an unbelievably monumental downside folks must wrap their minds round,” he stated. Henry has been growing a high-temperature thermal vitality storage system he has nicknamed “solar in a field.” His system makes use of liquid steel and graphite to carry electrical energy as warmth after which convert it again to electrical energy, enabling storage wherever from 5 to 500 hours.
“On the finish of the day, storage gives a service, and the kind of expertise that you simply want is a perform of the service that you simply worth probably the most,” stated Nestor Sepulveda, business lead for superior vitality investments and partnerships at Google. “I do not assume there may be one winner-takes-all kind of market right here.”
One other panel explored sustainable fuels that would assist decarbonize hard-to-electrify sectors like aviation, transport, and long-haul trucking. Randall Area, MITEI’s director of analysis, famous that sustainably produced drop-in fuels — fuels which are largely suitable with present engines — “might remove doubtlessly trillions of {dollars} of value for fleet alternative and for infrastructure build-out, whereas additionally serving to us to speed up the speed of decarbonization of the transportation sectors.”
Erik G. Birkerts is the chief development officer of LanzaJet, which produces a drop-in, high-energy-density aviation gasoline derived from agricultural residue and different waste carbon sources. “The important thing to driving broad sustainable aviation gasoline adoption is fixing each the supply-side problem by extra manufacturing and the demand-side hurdle by lowering prices,” he stated.
“We expect a very good coverage framework [for sustainable fuels] could be one thing that’s technology-neutral, doesn’t exclude any pathways to supply, relies on life cycle accounting practices, and on market mechanisms,” stated Veronica L. Robertson, vitality merchandise expertise portfolio supervisor at ExxonMobil.
MITEI plans a serious growth of its analysis on sustainable fuels, asserting a two-year research, “The way forward for fuels: Pathways to sustainable transportation,” beginning in early 2026. In response to Area, the research will analyze and assess biofuels and e-fuels.
Options from labs huge and small
International vitality leaders supplied glimpses of their analysis initiatives. A panel on carbon seize in energy era featured three takes on the subject: Devin Shaw, business director of decarbonization applied sciences at Shell, described post-combustion carbon seize in energy vegetation utilizing steam for warmth restoration; Jan Marsh, a world program lead at Siemens Power, mentioned deploying novel supplies to seize carbon dioxide straight from the air; and Jeffrey Goldmeer, senior director of expertise technique at GE Vernova, defined integrating carbon seize into gas-powered turbine techniques.
Throughout a panel on car electrification, Brian Storey, vp of vitality and supplies on the Toyota Analysis Institute, supplied an summary of Toyota’s portfolio of initiatives for decarbonization, together with solid-state batteries, versatile manufacturing strains, and grid-forming inverters to assist EV charging infrastructure.
A session on MITEI seed fund initiatives revealed promising early-stage analysis inside MIT’s personal labs. A brand new course of for decarbonizing the manufacturing of ethylene was offered by Yogesh Surendranath, Donner Professor of Science within the MIT Division of Chemistry. Supplies Science and Engineering assistant professor Aristide Gumyusenge additionally mentioned the event of polymers important for a brand new sort of sodium-ion battery.
Shepherding daring, new applied sciences like these from educational labs into the true world can not succeed with out ample assist and deft administration. A panel on paths to commercialization featured the work of Iwnetim Abate, Chipman Profession Improvement Professor and assistant professor within the MIT Division of Supplies Science and Engineering, who has spun out an organization, Addis Power, primarily based on a novel geothermal course of for harvesting clear hydrogen and ammonia from subsurface, iron-rich rocks. Amongst his funders: ARPA-E and MIT’s personal The Engine Ventures.
The panel additionally highlighted the MIT Proto Ventures Program, an initiative to grab early-stage MIT concepts and unleash them as world-changing startups. “A mere 4.2 p.c of all of the patents which are really prosecuted on the earth are ever commercialized, which looks as if a stunning quantity,” stated Andrew Inglis, an entrepreneur working with Proto Ventures to translate geothermal discoveries into companies. “Can’t we do that higher? Let’s do that higher!”
Geopolitical hazards
All through the convention, contributors typically voiced concern in regards to the impacts of competitors between the US and China. Kelly Sims Gallagher, dean of the Fletcher College at Tufts College and an knowledgeable on China’s vitality panorama, delivered the sobering information in her keynote tackle: “U.S. competitiveness in low-carbon applied sciences has eroded in practically each class,” she stated. “The Chinese language are successful the clear tech race.”
China enjoys a 51 p.c share in world wind turbine manufacture and 75 p.c in photo voltaic modules. It additionally controls low-carbon provide chains that a lot of the world is determined by. “China is getting so dominant that no person can carve out a comparative benefit in something,” stated Gallagher. “China is simply so huge, and the size is so enormous that the Chinese language can actually conquer markets and make it very arduous for potential rivals to discover a method in.”
And for the US, the issue is “the seesaw of vitality coverage,” she says. “It’s extremely troublesome for the personal sector to plan and to function, given the dearth of predictability and coverage right here.”
However, Gallagher believes the US nonetheless has an opportunity of not less than regaining competitiveness, by establishing a secure, bipartisan vitality coverage, rebuilding home manufacturing and provide chains; offering constant fiscal incentives; attracting and retaining world expertise; and fostering worldwide collaboration.
The convention shone a lightweight on one such collaboration: a China-U.S. three way partnership to fabricate lithium iron phosphate batteries for business autos in the US. The enterprise brings collectively Eve Power, a Chinese language battery expertise and manufacturing firm; Daimler, a world business car producer; PACCAR Inc., a U.S.-based truck producer; and Accelera, the zero-emissions enterprise of Cummins Inc. “Manufacturing batteries within the U.S. makes the availability chain extra sturdy and reduces geopolitical dangers,” stated Mike Gerty, of PACCAR.
Whereas she acknowledged the obstacles confronting her colleagues within the room, Plata however concluded her remarks as a panel moderator with some optimism: “I hope you all depart this convention and look again on it sooner or later, saying I used to be within the room once they really solved among the challenges standing between now and the long run that all of us want to manifest.”
