Leaders from industry, academia and government from around the country will gather to discuss the latest advances and opportunities in energy efficiency at the third annual Santa Barbara Summit on Energy Efficiency April 26-27 at the Four Seasons Resort The Biltmore, 1260 Channel Drive in Santa Barbara
The summit, convened by UCSB’s Institute for Energy Efficiency, will feature updates on groundbreaking science and technology and its applications in solar energy systems, smart grid technology, lighting and computing. There will also be discussions on how to expedite innovations from the lab to the marketplace.
“With global demand for energy increasing, resources being depleted and concerns over the safety and environmental impacts of fossil fuels and nuclear energy mounting, we need to focus on energy efficiency and renewable sources in order to secure a sustainable energy future,” said John Bowers, director of the Institute for Energy Efficiency.
A highlight of the summit will be a discussion on the Department of Energy’s new SunShot Initiative to reduce the total cost of solar energy systems by 75 percent by the end of the decade — to about $1 a watt — at which point solar electricity would be cost competitive with other forms of energy, without subsidies. The session will include an overview of the initiative and of related research, as well as perspectives from the solar energy industry and a public utility company.
Other sessions will focus on:
» Research Highlights from the Institute for Energy Efficiency: The latest developments in solar energy technology, batteries for energy storage, solid state lighting and photonics.
» Energy-Efficient Supercomputing and Data Centers: A preview of next-generation supercomputers and the challenge of reducing energy consumption in data centers.
» The Smart Grid: Integrating renewables in the energy grid, opportunities to increase energy efficiency and grid standards and security.
» California Perspectives on Energy Innovation: Clean tech case studies and perspectives on the outlook for the industry.
» Commercialization of Energy-Efficient Technologies: Driving innovations from the lab to the market in today’s economy.
The keynote speakers at the summit will be Bill Brinkman, director of the Department of Energy’s Office of Science, who will discuss federal initiatives in renewable energy and energy efficiency, and Matt Rogers, former senior adviser to U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu, now a director at McKinsey & Company, who will talk about the state of the energy sector and the outlook for the future.
Other speakers include industry leaders from Google, Intel and Cisco and world-renowned researchers from UCSB and national laboratories.
Click here for more information about the summit.
— Anna Davison for the Santa Barbara Summit on Energy Efficiency.