The Stanford Energy Seminar has been a mainstay of energy engagement at Stanford for nearly 20 years and is one of the flagship programs of the Precourt Institute for Energy. We aim to bring a wide variety of perspectives to the Stanford community – academics, entrepreneurs, utilities, non-profits, and more. 

Talk Abstract

AI is already accelerating the clean energy transition: it’s helping to identify richer deposits of critical minerals; it’s improving recycling systems; it’s enabling the discovery and optimization of materials for energy technologies; and it’s contributing to the design of next-generation energy devices, from advanced turbine components to magnetic systems in fusion reactors. Yet the energy demands of AI itself are growing at an unprecedented rate, sparking a parallel race to introduce and scale technologies to curb its energy intensity. From the perspective of an investor in clean energy and clean technologies across the economy, this talk will explore both sides of this equation: How AI can accelerate the transition to a clean economy, and how energy and computational innovations and innovators can come together to achieve greater performance and reduce the energy consumption of AI. The talk will cover applications of AI across sectors of clean technology, and applications of new technology in compute including energy transmission and conversion, advanced cooling, and novel compute architectures.

Speaker Bio 

Libby Wayman is a Partner at Breakthrough Energy Ventures, a fund that invests in transformative innovations to accelerate the transition to clean energy and a decarbonized economy. Prior to BEV, Libby led clean technology development at GE where she served as the Global Director of Innovation for GE’s Ecomagination strategy, where GE invested over $10B in clean technology and generated over $200B in revenue. Libby also served as the Director of the US Department of Energy’s Clean Energy Manufacturing Initiative, where she formulated clean energy manufacturing tax credits (48C), and established new research programs and institutes for advanced manufacturing for clean energy technologies. Libby began her career in entrepreneurship and technology development, including research and development in solar at SunPower and Alion Energy. Libby holds a Bachelor of Science in Civil and Environmental Engineering from MIT, and a Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering at MIT, where she co-founded the MIT Energy & Climate Club. Libby also serves as a Lecturer at MIT where she co-teaches the MIT & Harvard Climate & Energy Ventures course.

Anyone with an interest in energy is welcome to join! You can enjoy seminars in the following ways:

• Attend live. The auditorium may change quarter by quarter, so check each seminar event to confirm the location. Explore the current quarter's schedule.
• Watch live in a browser livestream if available. Check each seminar event for its unique livestream URL.
• Watch recordings of past seminars 
  • Available on the Past Energy Seminars page and the Energy Seminars playlist of the Stanford Energy YouTube channel
• (For students) Take the seminar as a 1-unit class (CEE 301/ENERGY 301/MS&E 494)

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