The Research University A Catalyst for Equitable Climate Solutions and Education

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(Intro music) Good afternoon everyone. Thanks  for joining our session today   titled The Research University Catalyst for  Equitable Climate Solutions and Education.   It's a weighty topic and we hope that we do it  justice today. I'm Dave Hamilton, Chief Operating   Officer of The Advanced Energy Research and  Technology Center as well as Executive Director of   The Clean Energy Business Incubator program both  located here at Stony Brook University. I have   the honor of moderating today's discussion with  a distinguished panel of experts on this topic.   We have representatives from academia, research,  industry and economic development programs so   I'm going to let them all briefly introduce  themselves but you can find more detailed   bios for all the speakers on the event website, so  please go look for some of the information there.  

I'll call out the individuals and just say  hi and introduce yourself so we'll start with Paul.   Hi, I am Paul Shepson and I'm Dean of the School of Marine  and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University.  Great, thanks Paul. Jim. Good morning, thanks  David. Oh good afternoon. i'm Jim Misewich. 

I am the Associate Lab Director at Brookhaven  National Laboratory for Energy and Photon Science.   I'm also Professor of Physics at Stony Brook  University. Great. Jon. Good afternoon I'm Jon   Longtin I'm the Interim Dean for the College of  Engineering and Applied Sciences also a professor   here in Mechanical Engineering and a Joint  Appointment at Brookhaven National Laboratory.   Great. Adele. Hi my name is Adele Ferranti. I am the  Director of Workforce Development and Training at   the New York State Energy Research and Development  Authority or (NYSERDA) and thank you for inviting   me today. Got it, welcome. Thank you. Nse. Good  afternoon, I am Nse Esema and I'm the Vice President   of Smart and Sustainable Cities at the New York  City Economic Development Corporation. It's good to  

be with you all. Great, thank you. Pat. Good afternoon,  I'm Pat Malone the Associate Vice President   for Professional Education at Stony Brook and the  Director of the Advanced Energy Training Institute.   Wonderful. Marie-Lou. So hello everyone. First of all  I am very happy to be part of the panel. So I am   Marie-Lou Picherit. I am an R&D and Innovation Manager  um and I will also represent Ørsted on the   now RDC Board of Director. I have to say that I'm  new though. Um I only started working at Ørsted  a month ago and before that I was developing  innovative energy management solution for   an energy supplier always was objective to be  cleaner and always working closely with academics.  

Great. Well just because you're new there's no  excuse so we're going to ask you questions and   I know it's going to be. No problem, i'm there for  that. So all right, thank you everyone. I'm looking   forward to diving deeper into specific areas of  expertise over the next hour. So i was thrilled  

to be asked to be involved today. It's an honor to  be sitting at the same virtual table as our guests.   I have a very unique opportunity in my position  to see firsthand the interaction between academia,   researchers, startup companies and industry. Having  the chance to run a climate tech incubator as well   as the New York Center of Excellence in Advanced  Energy has allowed me to help ensure that the   incredible R&D efforts within Stony Brook which is  driven by our brilliant researchers and students   that it aligns with the wants and needs of the  commercial world in a joint effort to address   climate change. We have a unique ability at  Stony Brook to connect the dots to combat   climate change. We have a robust and influential  advisory boards associated with the Energy Center  

and the National Offshore Wind R&D Consortium. Um  consisting of industry and policy makers that   can help shape our future efforts against  climate change. We are continuing to grow   and enhance our regional workforce ecosystem  ranging from workshops and seminars offered to   our incubation companies, to the larger workforce  training of more established industry leaders,   to the very critical hands-on training being  developed to support the Offshore Wind industry.   On top of that every two years the Energy  Center hosts the Advanced Energy Conference   where thousands of energy experts attend from  around the world to talk about technology, policy,   workforce development and forward-looking  plans to help change the world. So expect   to see our next conference in the fall of next  year where we will continue to work together   to chart the course of energy to build a  stronger and more resilient energy world   to combat climate change. On top of everything we  do at Stony Brook we have strong relationships   with other research universities across the region  including NYU, Clarkson the SUNY and CUNY systems   and UMass Lowell just to name a few. And I  can go on for hours listing the national and  

international universities that our researchers  work hand-in-hand with on awarded federal grants.   So we are working with as many people as possible  to help drive technology and innovation forward.   And we can't forget the relationship that we  have with Brookhaven National Lab, which is one   of 17 national labs across the U.S. A number of  Stony Brook researchers have co-appointments at BNL as Jim mentioned he is one of them. Ensuring  that they have access to the best possible   resources and minds to help drive their research  forward the ability of these individuals to bounce   back and forth between both institutions allows  for an incredible exchange of information and   opportunities for success. You'll hear more  about BNL shortly from Jim. So today   

you will learn about the collaboration that  exists between academia research and industry.   You already see that at Stony Brook right now  where we have multiple centers, institutes and   consortiums all with their own missions and goals  supported by federal, state and industry funds all   driven to impact climate change one way or the  other. Just to name several that are located within   the Energy Center, which happens to be funded by  NYSTAR a New York State agency, we have our Clean   Energy Business Incubator Program, the Offshore  Wind R&D Consortium, which is a national consortium.   We have the Offshore Wind Training Consortium,  The Institute of Gas Innovation and Technologies,   we have The DOE Energy Frontier Center, we have The  Center for Integrated Electric Energy Systems   and we have a Center for Clean Water. I can go on  and on. We cover all the basics of climate change.   But research in an academic setting can't  be the end-all solution. We need industry and   here at Stony Brook we have access to the top  levels of utility leadership in the Northeast.  

Utilities such as National Grid, LIPA, PSEG,  Con Ed, NextEra, Eversource and NYPA are all   affiliated with the Energy Center and the Offshore  Wind Consortium working closely with us to ensure   that the research we are pursuing will also solve  real world problems. We also have direct access to   the Offshore Wind developers including Ørsted  and Ecuador just to name it too. These developers   will be instrumental to the maturation of the very  nascent offshore wind industry here in New York   and working closely with them will ensure  that Stony Brook and our partners continue   to support them as needed. Research for the sake  of research will not help us achieve our goals   we need research and industry to work together  to frame the problems and possible solutions   allowing the best minds to solve those  problems that is what we do at Stony Brook.  

So, enough from me. Let's get back to our experts  and hear their thoughts. So everyone we have a   lot to cover today so let's try to hit the high  points and get to as much as we can. So and we're   hoping to get some audience Q&A at the end so our  attendees when the Q&A opens up later the chat   please put your questions in there for our  speakers. So let's start with an easy question  

for everyone. We'll start with Paul and then we'll  go through the same order of introductions. So   easy question. What do you see is the  key challenges for a sustainable future?   Paul. Well you know I'm going to just refer to first of all the opportunity for universities  

to be a key asset for society in managing  the path to to a sustainable world.   Universities, research universities are are a key  component of our future success given that they   contain all the complementary disciplines within  them needed to tackle grand challenge problems   and here we have one in climate change. As long  as we can connect the disciplines to each other   and to stakeholder partners in industry and  in government. Research universities have a   couple of important assets. One is that we have the  ability to focus on problems over the long term   and to provide deep understanding in areas that  where we would like to have predictive power like   what does the future look like under a variety  of scenarios with respect to climate change? We also play a unique role in our ability to for  example use universities as a living laboratory   for change to do experiments. In the university  community in that setting where we develop and   test new technologies like battery storage technologies that are so essential   to the challenge before us and when we engage  students in the process of learning by doing we   are simultaneously producing leaders of the future.  Anyway to answer your question directly you know  

the challenge is about leveraging complementary  assets, bringing together government university and the private sector to meet the enormous  challenge we have. Succinctly, what is that   challenge? Changing the way that we do  everything on the planet. Fortunately we've   laid the groundwork in New York State with the  Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act   for us all to lead if we can do it together. Piece  of cake, easy lift. Thank you, Paul. Jim. Well first  

of all I completely agree with Paul. I think he  made a really good point that these are complex   problems that are going to require partnerships  we've got to bring a wide variety of folks and   disciplines together to solve some of these. And  so, I'll take Paul as the starting   point and drill down maybe one step further and  I'll talk about one of the challenges that he   already mentioned and talk a little bit about how  we're working together to address it and that is   storage. So you know we all are excited about the  renewables the massive offshore wind that's coming  

the increase in solar but one of the challenges of  course with renewables is intermittency. So we know   we're going to need storage but uh and and there's  a big challenge in you know generating all that   offshore electricity and getting it on shore I  want to focus on the challenge of plugging it in.   This is where energy storage is going to be  extremely important and the the three challenges   or three questions that i think are really  important along the lines of of integration   of renewable electricity are number one, What  is the technology? What, you know, what kind of   battery do you need for doing this? Or maybe  not even a battery you might do something   like making hydrogen through electrolyzers  and then using fuel cells to convert that back   to electricity when you need it. It could be  electrochemical, energy storage batteries.   So you know you have to look at the what is the technology that's going to get there.  

Second question is well how much do we really need?  I don't think anybody completely understands that   we don't know what the intermittency is going  to be and uh we really have to have a better   model of what we expect that the you know the  the renewable resources to look like   what kind of noise is going to exist on the power that's coming out of it and   you know how are we gonna distribute  that you know through the existing grid.   And then the final question or final challenge  is where do you put it? Where do you put it on the   system that makes the most  sense? And these are all really critical    questions that are tough that require bringing  people together and and this particular one   we're gonna have to bring together the energy  storage folks along with the folks that do the   grid modeling and this is a good example of how  Brookhaven and Stony Brook are working together.   David already mentioned we have an Energy Frontier  Research Center on energy storage. We're looking   at the technology that would be appropriate for  scalable storage that is what you'd need on a grid   scale level. We also have at Brookhaven a  tremendous resource in grid modeling we have folks   that are able to model the transmission  and distribution system which is essential   for putting in renewables and understanding the  impact and helping us identify where it would be.   All of these folks have to work together and  then to get it deployed we have to bring in folks   like New York Best and NYSERDA and you know  develop the workforce develop the supply chain   make sure that folks are out there to deliver  those technologies and the policy has to be   in place for somebody to make money on  it so that they put up the investment.  

So you know just looking at one aspect  of that challenge the integration of the   renewables is already a pretty you know  interesting and tough, tough challenge   but we have the resources within New York State  to address that and I'm really excited about   our potential to do that. Great, thanks Jim. I think  we're going to touch on some of those points   in the coming questions and conversation as  well on how to use our resources together.   Jon what are your thoughts? To comment  and build upon what Paul and Jim said    maybe three thoughts. The first is the complexity.  Arguably solving or addressing this problem   is the most complex challenge that we as  a society and really a global community   face and that's unprecedented. The good news it  comes at a time when we're at our very best in   terms of technological advances and our knowledge  base and so on. The second is the comprehensive  

nature of this solution it will not be a silver  bullet be it science or policy or economics this   really is going to require a large number of  entities to work together in unison and that in   itself is a challenge because this is something  that historically we haven't done a lot of. So   again the enormity of this challenge will itself  present challenges in terms of how we solve it but   that in turn will provide growth and further  opportunity. And then last is the uncertainty   as Paul alluded to we don't know where we're  going to be in 5 or 10 or 15 or 20 years   but we will be asked to provide solutions now  that endure that period if not longer and so   that represents a challenge as well to make  sure that we get it as right as we possibly can   with the time so we definitely have our work cut  out for us. Thanks, Jon and I think the key thing   there is we need to understand that what we don't  know yet and we need to be flexible as we make our   plans for the next coming decades to solve this  that we may need to pivot and shift accordingly   based on technology based on demands or whatever  it may be so very great points thank you. Adele.  Yeah thank you I agree with everything  that's been said so far I think we're   as we think about the challenges and opportunities  for sustainable future I'm happy we here in   New York we have set the goal post through the  Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act   with very aggressive and exciting targets  related to greenhouse gas emission reductions   zero emission electricity renewables such  as large-scale wind as we've heard already   energy storage and I think as we think about  those challenges and those targets and those   opportunities as we all have know and it has  been mentioned this can be an all hands on deck   activity or activities. Starting with community-based  organizations and not-for-profit organizations  

that are in the community looking at opportunities  for jobs clean energy jobs for people in those   communities thinking about the manufacturers  and we're going to hear from Ørsted today.   Developers, the trades, the educational  institutions not just the universities and   colleges but the K through 12 schools and  opportunities to really address this from   kindergarten on up with opportunities, challenges,  job opportunities, career opportunities so   I think it's all about engaging  stakeholders, coordinating stakeholders   empowering stakeholders and making sure we bring  all those stakeholders to the table as we address   some of the challenges that the rest of the  panel have already brought up, so thank you.   Thank you and NYSERDA has done a great job of  trying to bring those stakeholders together   across the board from tech to market, which is what  my incubator's part of, all the way through to   what the governor's office is trying to accomplish  so thank you for that. Nse. Yeah, thank you. So   first of course I have to acknowledge everything  that everyone has said and just say that   all of that is absolutely critical. I'd like  to bring in an additional perspective that hasn't  

yet been raised. So just for context I think most  people know EDC is the City of New York's   economic development arm and our commitment is to  creating shared prosperity across New York City by   strengthening neighborhoods and growing good jobs  and so we are committed to working with and for   communities to provide them with the resources  that they need to thrive and invest in projects   that increase sustainability, support good job  growth, develop talent and spark innovation   to strengthen the city's competitive advantage.  So with that as context when we talk about you   know the challenges that the climate crisis  presents itself we talk about you know   the transition that needs to happen right  and so you know as we try to transition   our economy from one that is carbon based and  extractive to a regenerative one   fueled by renewables and then we're going to talk  a lot about offshore wind in this conversation   you know that's focused on energy efficiency  and diverting waste from landfills all of that   we have to also remember, and this is one of the  central challenges we think a lot about, that   it's also not in inevitable that this transition  will happen in a way that is equitable or just.   So one of the challenges we really  like to think about in center when we think about   the challenges that we face for  a sustainable future is ensuring that this   transition to sustainability this just transition happens in a way that's   equitable and is just, right. And that   centers communities that have been most directly   impacted by the climate crisis and so that's part  of what we're trying to do with our offshore wind   efforts which I hope I get a chance to tell you a  little bit more about as we try to develop the   industry in New York City. Thank you. Yeah that's  all very important and making sure that   that all the right resources and renewables  get to all the people and not leave some   some communities out is a critical thing that  we're all looking at, so thank you. Marie-Lou.  

Now I have to say that I agree with all what has  been said so far. What we all want I think is   to be at the forefront of the technological  innovation to support growth and for   that we will do that through many different  ways actually. Innovation and R&D work program,   sharing data, sharing knowledge, maybe also sharing  testing facilities is an option. We'll try also  

to leverage knowledge and expertise and key  topics for ourselves related to offshore   such as data and digitalization robotics also  naval architecture and yeah something quite   important also, at least for us, collaborating  with academics will also allow us to increase   our R&D activities and scope because we'll share  they're in the effort and we'll be able to access   to funding opportunities that we will be able  to do new things other things too and something   important for us as an industrial maybe is that  as industrial we could offer to give advice on   what the sector needs in terms of R&D so  that academics could focus on developing the   right knowledge that will benefit the whole sector  and I think it's at least for the industry   it's really our role there. Great, thank you.   I think that actually leads to the next question   I have for the group which some of you touched  on but to give everyone a chance to maybe   expand on it a little bit is you know from your  perspective what exciting opportunities do you see   at the intersection of this research universities  and government and industry as we work together on   the mitigation and adaption of climate change?  So let's do the same order that we did before   we'll start with Paul. What is exciting I think  it is the prospect of this change that we're   talking about in New York State leading it  through the Climate Leadership and Community   Protection Act that we're going to be 100 percent carbon  neutral by 2050. That's just 29 years from now

and again because we burn fossil fuels  to drive most of all the work that humans do on   the planet that means that we will and we must  completely change the way that we do everything   on the planet including you know the flow  of dollars, the generation of wealth and   where jobs are. So that can be a scary thing.  Change. People are generally change averse.   I would like to say that I'm  really big on positive feedbacks and I see   a role for universities in managing  constructive positive feedbacks. So first of all   we have the ability to predict the future one  of the things that scientists like to do is create   crystal balls, so we can use our ability to do  simulations of the entire earth system including   human all human activities and run scenarios  that show us that yes in fact if we go   down the road in the way that we're proposing to  do with the CLCPA we can do this. This problem is  

solvable. It is good for people to know  and to hear that there is a hopeful future.   The second thing that is going to  happen that will be a positive feedback   is the job market. That people are afraid of  change because of the fear about the impact it   will have on their ability to feed their family. As  companies like Ørsted are successful in developing   offshore wind and there will also be onshore  wind and solar. Lots of new jobs. When universities   partner with those companies in doing workforce  development so not only do the jobs exist but we   are training young people to meet that need people  will see hey maybe this is not so scary   we have a bright future. Lastly I will  say that one of the things that will also  

be a positive feedback is if universities and our  government partners can create sort of a dashboard   of how are we doing with mitigating  greenhouse gas emissions. We should have   a website like we have for weather forecasting  that shows for all communities around the world   what has been happening with greenhouse gas  emissions. When people see that hey look the   changes that that we are implementing are  actually having a positive effect. So we can do   it according to models. If we do it jobs will  exist and hey look it's actually happening  

there's a bright future and I think if we all  work together we can utilize a variety of    positive feedbacks to get everyone excited about  this enormous challenge. Great, thank you. Jim.   Okay well I'll try to be quick,  David. What I see as important opportunities are   one the evolution of policy. You and I have  been working on clean energy for a while now  

we've known each other for a while because of  clean energy, but policies are really changing as   as Paul mentioned the Climate Leadership Community  Protection Act has put really remarkable goals on   the table. The federal government the administration, the current administration is   really enthusiastic so I see a momentum developing  that I hadn't quite seen before because the   you know the scale of this challenge is is  essentially in our faces right now. I see    one of the opportunities  the development of supply chain and that's   one of the challenges, but it's also one of the  opportunities. I'm seeing wonderful things for   example in energy storage developing right here in  New York State for a supply chain. We're going   to need a domestic supply chain to support  the offshore wind industry and then finally I   want to say the other thing that I think is a  wonderful opportunity and it's very encouraging   the enthusiasm of the next generation. You know  I teach a course in the physics department on  

energy and I am just you know delighted  at how enthusiastic the next generation is   about working on these problems and over at  Brookhaven I'm able to attract really good folks   to come to the lab because they want to work on  sustainable energy, they want to contribute to that.   It's something that people are getting excited  about that I think that's a wonderful opportunity.   Agreed. Thank you. Jon. To me I think to  distill it to a single word it's the challenge.   The enormity of the challenge and I  would ask, imagine if we can do this? So think   forward 20 or 30 years with an electrified economy  based on renewables, electric vehicles, storage   and that fossil fuels are behind us. Think  about how transformational that would be   it's almost unthinkable. If we could  solve that problem then I think there are   then there are few other problems that we  couldn't solve and that to me is what's exciting.  

Great, thank you Jon agreed. Adele. Yeah thank  you. I want to give one quick real-life example   to talk about. We're funding SUNY Ulster  and they're partnering with a number of   community stakeholders in Ulster County in the  City of Kingston to expand pre-apprenticeship   programs for the clean energy technology fields in  the region. Under the project we're funding they're  

working with YouthBuild, Ulster County sheriff's  office and they're recruiting high-risk youth   and incarcerated individuals to participate  in green jobs training and this is an exciting   opportunity as we talk about equity  as we talk about just transition.   They're going to be developing courses that will  lay the foundation for stackable micro credentials   that the students can put towards a degree  leverage towards other more advanced training   they'll be provided wrap around services by the  Ulster County Office of Employment and Training   and trainees will be able to get hands-on  experience in green building techniques and   repairs through the Kingston Land Bank. So  this is just an example of doing things a   little different new partnerships bringing in a  SUNY school with community based organizations.   And the exciting thing is graduates can get  continuing education credits as well as BPI or   building performance institute and passive house  certifications that will help with job placement   with local contractors. So just one example of  an exciting partnership that we're hoping to   leverage this model and expand it through  other technologies and other regions in the state.   Great, thank you. Nse. Great I'll take a cue  from Adele's book and sort of share some concrete  

examples too of where I think we're seeing these  key opportunities kind of intersect at industry,   academia, government and community partners.  So as I shared really briefly you know   we're super excited about the offshore  wind opportunity in New York City. Today   our mayor announced that we are committing  to a 15-year vision plan for the offshore wind   industry and almost 200 million dollars to  support that vision. There's   three quick prongs of the vision and two of them I  think are really, really critical opportunities for   this intersection that we're talking about. The  first is developing best-in-class infrastructure  

we could talk for days about that but I'll table  that for now. But then the next two where I think   that the partnerships between academia, industry,  community, government are going to be so critical   are in preparing local businesses and workforce  for the opportunity and also in promoting   innovation and in the offshore wind industry.   So you know as we talk about prioritizing   equity ensuring that New Yorkers, especially women,  BIPOC communities, folks from environmental   justice communities are ready for offshore wind  jobs we have to make targeted workforce training   investments right. And one of our strategies in  New York City is to invest in programs at CUNY   that can leverage the system's wide geographic  reach in its existing range of assets and its   academic programs and expertise to train New  Yorkers for these jobs right. So that's 

kind of to that second strategy around preparing  local businesses and workforce and then when we   talk about promoting innovation in the offshore  wind industry our plan there is to partner with   organizations, institutions, academic institutions,  research institutions to support the development   of offshore wind technologies and build facilities  to bring research to market. You know we're   eager to ensure that new technologies and  approaches that advance our vision are created in   New York City and we understand that part of how  we do that has to be leveraging you know federal   government funding and city capital but connecting  with non-New York City research institutions   like many of you on on this call, so including  federal labs with the New York City ecosystem   to advance the development of new products and  services and so I think those are two really big   buckets. You know workforce development advancing  innovation specific to the offshore wind industry   that are opportunities that i'm particularly  excited about we're particularly excited about   in New York City for really bringing  together this confluence of partners.  

Great and we'll talk, we'll touch base on that more in a little bit. Marie-Lou. Yeah of course I   agree with all that have been said. I have to  say that I quite like the the idea of Paul of the   world dashboard with all the things that  has been done for that and maybe to provide   an example, and this is a reason  that why i'm very happy to have joined Ørsted,  their vision is that a world that's run  entirely on green energy and I think that we have   a very singular experience in transitioning from  black to green energy and just to provide a number   reduce our emission by 83 percent since 2006 so in  less than 20 years. That means this is    doable and we have to take action to mitigate  global warming and we have to be ambitious.   For example and to finish, Ørsted   have the ambition to become carbon neutral by   2025. I'm talking here about generation assets  and they also we set the target of achieving  

carbon neutral footprint by 2040. So I think all  those experiences I'm sure there are plenty in the   in the industry in their academic world and yeah  having a kind of dashboard that will demonstrate   showcase all those experience and maybe share the  experience. Sharing is a big part of it I think   right now and it could be quite, quite important.  Agreed, thank you. Pat I think you have some   thoughts on this. Yes, thank you. Well it's really  wonderful that we're having these conversations.   I think the important thing to mention here is  that we are building bridges amongst our different   environments in our communities to make sure  that we respond more holistically to these things   and to the point of the challenge and the way Jon  put it so well in terms of wouldn't it be great   and how exciting it is. I think that taps into the  excitement of potential jobs and opportunities   and the transition of jobs. So at Stony Brook  we had a great opportunity this summer with  

funding from the governor's office to work with  NYSERDA and other partners in the fundamentals of   offshore wind and what we saw in that are the  seeds for additional training and development   that we need to keep doing in partnership with  our community colleges and our community based   organizations because these jobs will be very  diverse, they will come at different times in   the economy, the labor market intelligence that  we gather around the timing of real jobs and the   planning of seeds for knowledge and literacy and  experiences is a big lift and I think we're   up to it I think we've had some incredible  strategies that we've worked on in the past   and going forward I'm very excited that we're  working on this offshore wind as a centerpiece   but all the other pieces around climate and  renewables that were articulated in our program   are resonating. We had over 20 individuals from  utilities to your point Adele, about talking about   the changes of jobs and the power grid, Jim we had  multiple people and they are looking to transition   the skill sets and the abilities of people working  with fossil fuels to be incompetent in leading the   charge as we move towards renewable energy so  the role of the university and translating the   research and making the application of academic  expertise and real-time labor market work is a   big lift, but we we're really very privileged to be  working with so many people that are part of this.   Great, thanks Pat. And I want to dive into  R&D for one second but then we'll get to the   some of the workforce so we can talk more about  some of those things that you were talking about.   So focusing on R&D for a second, Jon  what role do you see engineering playing   as climate change and climate solutions become  more prevalent in the future? It's a great question   I think engineering will be part of the  fabric of the canvas that represents the solution   there's no question. So kind of four aspects I  think of engineering. First it'll be extensive  

engineering will touch all aspects of this  everything from the sensors used for measurements,   to the data processing collection, to new materials,  to renewables, to storage etc. It will be everywhere.   But with that thinking there will be some  new challenges that we historically   have not had to deal with. I mentioned one and  that's the forward thinking nature of things.   Again, we will have to put solutions in play  that may need to last for 20 or 30 or 40 years.   In a situation that itself is changing in other  words the climate expectations 20 years may be   very different than what we expect that's  a challenge. The team that works   on this will have to be agile and versatile, so  again, each disaster, each site, each application   will probably require a very unique solution  that's different than making cell phones   a million or a billion at a time. Interestingly  by the way I think COVID helps us in that regard   because we've been forced to be resilient. Lastly,  we are going to have to be more cooperative so  

the idea of siloed groups doing their own thing is  going to be a thing of the past for this solution.   We have to have technical people engineers  speaking with the climate scientists speaking   with economists and financial people social  scientists addressing the impact on society   and public planners and policy  people that oversee all of this.   So it's going to be a fascinating journey to be  sure and we're going to learn a lot in the process.   Great, thanks Jon. I want to shift towards jobs. Pat  brought it up a little bit. Adele what roles  

do you see that colleges and universities can  play in developing career pathway training for   individuals with barriers let's say so they can  have employment in the clean energy jobs?   Yeah we've recently had quite a few meetings  with community-based organizations and   not-for-profits as we try to figure out how best  to address just transition and equity issues   and we're hearing a lot from those stakeholders  and training organizations that they're really   good at recruiting, screening, providing soft  skills training, technical skills training   I'm sorry. Soft skills training professional  skills training but they really need partners   for the technical skills training. A lot of  those organizations have great models to really   prepare people for a variety of clean technology  jobs but they're learning that they need to really   develop new relationships with colleges and  universities as well as the trades to really   develop that technical training piece so I think as I mentioned with the SUNY Ulster   example there are a lot of opportunities for  technical institutions training institutions   such as Stony Brook and others to partner with  these organizations to develop the career pathway   training and again all of those are driven by  business needs. So there will be business partners   and the universities have great relationships  with local businesses so we think that's   a great marriage with the community-based  organizations and local colleges and universities.   Great, thank you. On a similar vein, Nse how is New York City echo dev advanced   workforce development and innovation related  to green jobs and industries and what role are   universities playing in these efforts? Yeah so this  is something that you know we we take seriously   so I'll give one innovation example and kind  of one more workforce example. In 2014, and of  

course there's all that we look to do but i'll  share some of what we're currently doing or what   we've done in the past. In 2014 EDC partnered  with NYU School of Engineering on the opening   of what is now called the Urban Future Lab it's a  business incubator that supports startup companies   showcases innovation and provides education and  some workforce training focused on clean tech   startups. That's you know one example  where it's just an example of how strong   amongst the city academia and the private  sector can really promote entrepreneurship and   facilitate both cutting-edge research and  education and also jobs right. They provide   some workforce development programs and they've  created over, since the establishment, have   created over 600 jobs, supported 63 companies  nearly a billion dollars in capitalization so   we're pretty excited about that example. Another  sort of more squarely in the workforce development  

space but still on the theme of incubators  another kind of innovation space that we partner   with as the New York City Economic Development  Corporation is Company Ventures. They partner   specifically with the workforce team within CUNY  the tech talent pipeline program to recruit train   and support students through a 10-week internship  program right and we know that this is critical   for CUNY students, many of which do not have like  this kind of typical internship experience and   find it to be pretty transformative in terms  of setting them up for a career in clean tech   or Korean tech more generally, so CUNY supports  with the provision and vetting of candidates and   oftentimes payroll for the students while company  ventures as startups provide interns with a robust   internship experience and the really critical  wrap-around support, right, so the mentorship, the coaching, the professional development that  really ensures that these opportunities can be long-term transformative. So those are just  a couple of examples of kind of investments   we've made partnerships we've built with these  different types of partners to really advance   the green economy. (David Hamilton) Great thank you very  much so now i'm trying to be cognizant of the time.  

I have a million other questions but i want to  shift for one more question uh and then um then   we'll go see what the audience is is looking  for so this is for. So this is for Paul, Nse and Adele... Focusing on just New York City, are there  unique ways that you can see that the greater   New York City area can lead in the global response  to climate change? Let's start with Adele from   the state's perspective then we'll shift to Nse from the city's perspective then we'll wrap up   Paul from the academic university perspective. Yeah,  thank you, when we think about energy savings   potential and greenhouse gas emissions reductions  we think about buildings, right? And where do we   see a lot of buildings – a lot of opportunity for  retrofit work – making impacts and new construction   in New York City. We see a great opportunity to  leverage with organizations in New York City   that are doing some great work. One good example  is block power. As you may know they're working in   the multi-family building sector to install heat  pumps and a lot of multi-family buildings they are   partnering with organizations across the state and  in New York City to train those individuals that   they need to hire -- I think they're going to hire  a thousand people. These are great opportunities  

to do things at scale and in a way that could be  replicable at even an even greater scale as we   think about opportunities across New York State. So  I think New York City is a great ecosystem for   us to all figure this out, working with the various  organizations, leveraging the different resources   and, as we've mentioned before, to really address  equity issues as we move this economy forward.   Great, thank you. Nse? Yeah, I absolutely 100% agree  with everything Adele just said. You know we  

think New York City is super well positioned to  respond to this crisis and opportunity moment   because of so many reasons... you know, a large  market size and consumer base, the expansive   building stock, as Adele was referencing, our  leading academic institutions and our capacity to   partner with academic institutions outside of New York City, our reputation as a global innovation   hub and then the strong policy drivers and our  infrastructure - our high infrastructure demands   and needs...right and so I think the opportunities  really around coordinating between evolving policy   priorities around climate change and then  new market opportunities around resiliency,   sparking innovation by investing in the green  tech ecosystem, steering the real estate industry   towards greenhouse gas emission reductions,  developing workforce strategies, right, it's   like how do we bring those those pieces together  that's really where we we kind of make the opportunity   that New York City kind of uniquely presents.  Great, thank you. And, Paul, your thoughts?   Yeah I just think there's a fantastic  opportunity for New York City to lead by example.   It is positioned perfectly to do so with  demonstration projects. So just one example   we could engage the local communities with  startup companies that are involved in creation   of microgrids and distributed energy production  companies could invest in front-line communities   that produce their own power at the  community level and demonstrate that   you can have reliable heating and cooling produced  from power generated locally. So I think it's  

there's an opportunity to engage disadvantaged  communities with projects that that demonstrate   the feasibility of new technologies. So we  achieve multiple goals at the same time.   Great, that's what makes New York City so  exciting. We have so many opportunities   for so many different technologies and so  many different interactions with everybody.    It's... it's wonderful. So like I said I can ask  questions forever with this audience, but I want   to give the audience a chance. So I'm going  to introduce Derek O'Connor, part of our team.  

Derek has been looking at the the questions  and I think he has one or two that ... for   the audience.. for the panel. So Derek?  Thanks, David. This one was asked. It was how   can non-utility commercial operations, for example  manufacturing, best help? In other words, how should   their operations evolve to best support addressing  the overall climate challenges? And I think Pat   had indicated that she had wanted to start with  that one. That's a... that's a really great   question we have a supply chain network here of  a whole number of manufacturers that are working   very closely with us in the offshore wind effort  and we also have a manufacturing consortium group   that consists of all the funders, providers,  public-private institutions where we look at   emerging opportunities. I think the important  thing is to have the manufacturing community   at the table when we involve our stakeholder  meetings which is going to come up pretty soon.  

I see Nse is shaking her head... we are going to be  convening groups around short, long term   and very near-term jobs, in terms of emerging  jobs and transitional jobs and opportunities.   And I think the conversation to make the point  that we've had today in this discussion is   all the different stakeholders involved in the  process need to be at the table when we take a   look at how people will become involved and what  the strategies are to get them more involved,   but on the manufacturing end I think there's  going to be tremendous opportunities and in our   work with Orsted and Eversource and some of the  other developers and the research centers, we're   going to start to see clearer how they can pivot  a bit and change some of their technologies and   work in implementing ways to weed themselves in. We  did this many years ago in moving from the defense  

industry to biotech and medical in the Long Island  region and beyond. I know it was very similar in   San Diego and we can do it again with clean energy  technologies. And as Jon mentioned, I think the   backbone will be engineering and the ability  to integrate multiple engineering technologies   and that's a hot spot for manufacturers in many  ways. Great, thanks Pat. Actually I'm curious uh  

Marie-Lou, do you have uh some thoughts on this  question before we go to the next question?   Only I can agree with what has been said something  very, very important and uh yeah having everyone   at the table is something that is absolutely  necessary if we want to ...make progress. That's all I have to say. All right,  great, thank you. Derek, do we   I think we have time probably for one more  before we start the wrap up. Sure, this one   was asked, "Are there any focused trainings  available on battery storage technologies?"   It looks like Pat may be the leader of the  the question and answer period here, but Pat I'm   assuming you can answer that and and maybe Jim as  well. I would defer to Jim to start and then I can   piggyback on what we're thinking of doing.  Jim? Well, let me just briefly state a great   place to look for that is the New York Best  website. This is the New York battery and  

energy storage technology consortium... it's  uh newyorkbest.gov or org or   com... I can't quite remember the url but just  google New York Best and you'll you'll find it.   And New York Best offers a number of different  resources. They also offer a series of webinars and   meetings where you could learn a lot more about it. But then you could look it depends you know this  

this question has many levels... for students  that are looking to work in energy storage, there   are some fantastic leaders in that technology in  New York State. At Stony Brook, I think we have   a really outstanding national leader uh in the  programs that are in both material science and   chemistry, at uh in at the Stony Book University,  where we have battery leaders that are doing   fascinating work on energy storage technology.  SUNY Binghamton has great programs, there are great   efforts at Columbia University as well, so at a  higher level, if you're a student that are looking   ...who's looking to get into these programs  at either a graduate or undergraduate level   there are great resources and great groups in  New York State. For more generally... for the more   general audience that is looking, start with  New York Best.They have fantastic resources.   Grea,t thanks. Pat, anything real quick on your end  from a training perspective before we... I think this  

raises a really important question. There is going  to be an opportunity for us collectively to work   on creating new transitional micro credentials  and certificate programs that are a little bit   out of the realm of, you know, traditional academic  programs, and we will see more and more of a deeper   dive in the dimensions around climate change,  offshore wind, renewable energy, battery storage   and numerous other areas where people in my role,  along with others...community college partners -- I  have several, I think on the call today -- will be  looking at the different levels of education that   are within the area of communities we serve, and  coming up with ways that there's an articulated   pathway and new certificates and credentials that  people can cap off knowledge when they need to   and do a deeper dive in academic programs when  they need to. So I see it's a very rich environment  

for us moving forward in that space. Great, thanks,  Pat. And you're instrumental in a lot of this   training uh that we're doing throughout the state, so thank you. All right so we are running low on   time... it's amazing how quickly 60 minutes goes.  So to wrap things up, I wanted to toss it back to   all the panelists for some brief closing thoughts --   30 seconds or so, just so we don't run over.  

I am gonna switch things up to make our  brains fire differently, let's start with Marie-Lou and then we'll work our way backwards  to Paul. So um, Marie-Lou, final thoughts?  Yeah, the only thing is... for what i really  think, is that it's really important that we   work all together to to achieve this and uh as others  said we already did a lot on this we're very happy   to to be able to share our experience on this,  explaining how we transition ...with our transition   from the black energy to the green ones and   also on the recruitment part, I have to say that   yeah working with with academics is very,  very important for us because they also allow   us to be known by the students and to identify  and attract talent and highly skilled candidates for   employment. And maybe to conclude because it's also  an important message, i don't know if there is a   student in attendance, but Orsted is growing its  platform in the U.S and is currently a recruiting   for many positions, and, yeah, we will need to have  many, many different people with very different   skills to achieve all this. Right, thank you.  We look forward to working with you to help  

you fill out your roster there. Nse? I mean  there's so much to be said, I feel like we've had a   really incredible, wide-ranging conversation.I'm so  delighted to have been a part of it. I'm going   to conclude my remarks in a way that also tries to  address one of the questions I think Ross Meyers   proposed... I think one of the big themes we've  talked so much about on this... in this conversation   is just the importance of partnerships, you know -- across academia, across government, across industry --   and I think that those types of partnerships  can also be really critical for helping us to   implement transparency from public accountability  and scrutiny around our diversity and inclusion   practices, right, so you know as we commit to  making, you know, this transition -- this   clean energy transition, this green economy  opportunity really open to communities that have   been left out, I think we got to hold ourselves  accountable and we hold ourselves accountable   through these partnerships as well, so really  excited about what it can look   like to do that in New York City, we're standing  up in offshore with advisory council for example   that we hope will be an example of what it looks  like to get those various stakeholders to hold us   accountable to those commitments. So, thank you  again for such a wide-ranging, great conversation.   Thank you, absolutely. Adele? Yes, thank you very much  for the invitation to participate. This has been a  

great panel. I just want to say that I've been so  proud of what New York State NYSERDA has done for   clean energy workforce development and training,  but we've barely scratched the surface. A lot more   work to do and much bigger scale and with a much  wider reach. So I look forward to new partnerships, and new training models, and looking forward  to working with everyone in the future. Thank you.  

Thank you, Adele. John? I wanted to point  out ... the start of Ross's question that   we didn't get a chance to answer but he  said awareness is a critical first step.   And I think one encouraging bit of news is the  awareness that we're now seeing about this problem.   And if you think 10 years ago these  kinds of conversations weren't being held   and now we have an entire week of this, this is a conversation that's happening on a daily   basis and that to me is encouraging -- the rate at  which this is gaining attention. And I think that's  

important and urgent for solving the problem so  I enthusiastically look forward as we continue to   embrace this at breakneck speed which we need to  do.Thank you for the chance to speak to you today .  Got it. Thank you, John. Jim? I'll just   pile on with the partnership message. I think partnership is absolutely critical  and I'm excited about the momentum.  

As John mentioned, things are changing and there's  a lot of momentum, there's a lot of enthusiasm   for clean energy, and I think we can get there.  Thanks. Yeah, you got it. I'll just say this   you're absolutely right... the end, Jon. the  changes in the way I've even seen the Stony Brook   ecosystem working and communicating and trying  to move forward on these technologies... I've been  

here since 2011... it's completely different  now and it's very exciting. So, Paul, the last   the last words. Succinctly! So...what an exciting  opportunity we have here in New York State to lead   the world in ushering in the new green economy and  we can accelerate this process by developing good   action-oriented partnerships between universities,  private industry and governments that can give   us access to demonstration projects in places  like New York City. What a time we're going to have!  Yes, it's going to be fun! So with that,  um, wow, a great panel. As you all said a lot of   thought-provoking ideas--a lot more that we can  touch on. So all the panelists, again, from you   know made my life easy, you made it..this is a  simple, simple effort here, so thank you very  

much for all your time. I appreciate that for our  virtual attendees, one day we'll get together again   and we'll do this in person and we'll really  really really dive into this, so thank you all   everybody. Be safe and have a great rest of the  week. Thank you very much.Thank you. Thank you. (Outro music)

2021-10-07

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