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

Until about decade ago, the central focus of climate mitigation efforts was how to make progress—how we might drastically reduce fossil energy emissions. By 2018, though, it was increasingly clear that electricity from renewables would beat fossil fuels on cost, and the focus shifted from just making progress to how we reach the ultimate goal of net-zero emissions. That shift entailed grappling with the most difficult-to-abate sources of emissions--what makes them particularly difficult and what are potential solutions? Steve will present the latest work by his group assessing net-zero pathways for the power sector, aviation and marine shipping, heating, and industry processes, and discuss the salience of this work as technologies, costs, geopolitics, and climate ambitions evolve.

Speaker Bio 

Steve Davis is a highly-cited researcher and expert in earth system science, emissions and energy scenarios, climate impacts and solutions, and corporate climate strategy. He is currently Professor of Earth System Science in the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability and the Chair of the Science Advisory Board at Watershed. 
 
At Stanford, Steve leads the Sustainable Solutions Lab, a research group dedicated to quantifying how different human activities are affecting climate and air quality, how those environmental changes in turn jeopardize human wellbeing, and the relative priority of solutions. He and his group have published seminal papers assessing carbon emissions and air pollution impacts embodied in international trade, committed emissions related to existing energy infrastructure, the economic and biophysical limits of various carbon removal approaches, interactions among food-energy-water systems, drivers of agriculture and land-use change emissions, and the key challenges and opportunities for net-zero emissions energy systems.
 
Prior to his science career, Steve worked as a lawyer to venture-backed companies in Silicon Valley, and holds degrees from Stanford University, the University of Virginia School of Law and the University of Florida, where he double-majored in Political Science and Philosophy.

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)

If you'd like to join the Stanford Energy Seminar mailing list to hear about upcoming talks, sign up here.