The energy transition requires new technology and public-private partnership to accelerate research, development, demonstration and deployment of clean energy systems. This talk will begin with an overview of research in Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s Energy Technologies Area. This in- cludes R&D related to demand side systems such as buildings, industry and EVs, plus energy markets and policy analysis, as well work on energy storage, supply chains, direct air capture systems, and clean hydrogen.

AI's capabilities to create visual art, music, stories, and videos are improving exponentially. AI can teach innovative new strategies, unknown to humans, in games such as chess or Go and promises to revolutionize human problem-solving. These advances motivate important questions relating to AI and Human Creativity.

There is tremendous interest in making the next super battery, however Li ion technology continues to improve and has inertia in several commercial markets.  Recent material breakthroughs in solid-electrolytes (SE) could enable a new class of non-combustible solid-state batteries delivering twice the

Climate change is the defining challenge of our time, with global consequences affecting the natural environment, basic livelihoods and nearly every sector of human activity. The presentation will briefly review the current scientific understandings that define climate change as a critical threat, and summarize where we stand in the enormous task of limiting global greenhouse gas emissions. This will be followed by an examination of the principal economic and policy tools that can be brought to bear to address the problem, with an emphasis on putting a price on carbon as a key option.

As Germany completes the closure of its last nuclear power plants, Sweden is looking to build new nuclear in light of climate change and energy security concerns. In this talk, Jessica will discuss the unique role that nuclear energy can play in balancing a low-carbon electric grid and decarbonizing the global energy system. This talk will focus on both the opportunities and challenges of new nuclear technologies, and explore how policy can bring down the costs and expand access to the benefits.

Writer, historian, and activist Rebecca Solnit joins Dr. Leah Stokes and Nikayla Jefferson for a conversation about Not Too Late, a new anthology edited by Solnit that changes the climate story from despair to possibility. Solnit is the author of twenty books on a variety of topics, including feminism, the environment, western and Indigenous history, politics, and art. After the conversation, there will be a book signing with Rebecca Solnit.

Research, particularly on the "discovery" end of the R&O spectrum, is complex and easily misunderstood. Scientific advance doesn't always precede, it often follows, engineering advance. Answering questions isn't always the goal, finding questions often is. We don't always seek to strengthen conventional wisdom, sometimes we seek to surprise it. What if we could rethink research so that its nurturing, through policy and management, harmonizes with its nature?

Feeding humanity puts enormous environmental pressure on our planet. Most studies focused on this critical issue have addressed it piecemeal, one group of foods or one environmental pressure at a time. I will share results from our recently published work compiling vast data on greenhouse gas emissions, freshwater use, habitat disturbance and nutrient pollution generated by 99% of total reported production of freshwater, marine and terrestrial foods (crops, livestock, fisheries, and aquaculture). We map these pressures to produce the first ever global ‘footprint’ of food production.

The science-to-product gap for hard technology is real. Our current innovation centers —within academia, corporate R&D, and startups—are not consistently translating promising science into commercially viable products with the potential for scalable impact. Academic research institutions are optimized for scientific discovery, but materials and manufacturing technologies can require years of system engineering and process development to mature.