Boston Climate Tech: January 2023
MIT workshops, BioInnovation X Climate night, YPE Boston Happy Hour & more
Hi all, happy new year!
This is the Boston Climate Tech newsletter. This newsletter is a digest of upcoming community-submitted climate tech events in the Greater Boston area. Since there are relatively few events this month, this issue will contain all the events for the month of January. If more Jan events come up/are submitted, we’ll send more issues on a weekly basis.
As always, for the full calendar, check out https://airtable.cool/shrfu1ovRrNCh7SGy . To submit events, use this form
Cheers,
Leading the Energy Transition - MITEI IAP non-credit course - MIT Events - 1/10/23 tuesday
American Perceptions of Climate Change (IAP Workshop) - MIT Events - 1/12 thursday
BioInnovation x Climate Night - 1/18/23 Wed
At Home on an Unruly Planet: Finding Refuge on a Changed Earth, with Madeline Ostrander - MIT Events - 1/24 Tuesday
YPE Boston January Happy Hour - 1/25/23 Wed
SEA-CO2 Seminar: Sensing Exports of Anthropogenic Carbon through Ocean Observation, an upcoming ARPA-E program on mCDR MRV technology development - MIT Events
🕑 Start time
1/9/2023 Mon 2:00 PM
🕓 End time
1/9/2023 Mon 3:00 PM
📍Location
MIT Building 3, 370
📍Address
33 MASSACHUSETTS AVE, Cambridge, MA 02139
📝 Notes
Presenters: Simon Freeman (ARPA-E) & Daniel Rogers (ARPA-E)
This seminar is an outreach effort seeking to inform the ocean sciences and sensor development community about ARPA-E and the upcoming SEA-CO2 program. This program seeks to accelerate the development of the marine Carbon Dioxide Removal (mCDR) industry through the development of Measurement, Reporting and Validation (MRV) technologies.
MRV must be of sufficient quality to quantify carbon drawdown magnitudes, the degree of permanence, and bound the uncertainties associated with these parameters so that carbon markets can ascertain credit quality and financial institutions can make informed decisions regarding investment risk. mCDR will be an essential component of a future negative emissions industry, that alongside emissions reduction is necessary in restricting climate warming to less than 2°C in order to avoid global, irreversible, and catastrophic changes caused by this temperature rise. To achieve these goals, a paradigm shift is required in chemical oceanographic data collection from today’s sensors capable of accurate measurements at individual point locations, towards a goal of persistent sensing at equivalent accuracies across large areas and/or volumes.
Technical progress is required in two areas: 1) The development of persistent, radiated energy-based (i.e., optical, acoustic, electromagnetic) chemical oceanographic sensor technologies that enable large-scale volumetric or swath quantification of mCDR-relevant ocean chemical parameters, beyond depths sensed by satellite systems, to transform our fundamental understanding of the ocean carbon cycle, quantify mCDR efficacy, and to reduce or eliminate under-sampling concerns that limit carbon credit quality. 2) The development of regional-scale, ocean carbon flux models that integrate and estimate the combined major carbon cycles (i.e., physical, inorganic chemical, micro and macro-biological) likely to be impacted by one or more mCDR approaches in the region. Models will be developed under this program to first achieve state-of-the-art performance levels for bias and variance before application to estimate the impact of new sensing technologies on carbon flux quantification accuracy, and thus credit quality. Models will also be developed as a basis for a data-driven carbon accounting framework.
Sample Technological Approaches/Questions:
1. Acoustics: High-frequency active underwater acoustic sensor developers. Can a high-frequency ADCP or another high-frequency array be modified to capture variations in the acoustic impedance of seawater, possibly revealing water properties in 3D after correlation and validation
2. Optics: Underwater spectroscopy through either backscatter or absorption that could work on spatial scales of ~1-100m. Approaches could include Raman, i.e., not just elemental but molecular characterization. Particular interest in time-gated backscatter techniques, as those would give range resolution.
3. Electromagnetic sensing. Technology being demonstrated by some (e.g. Twinleaf) is so sensitive. Could it be used to characterize the minute variations in local EMF created by (i) seawater composition (ii) seafloor sediment composition (iii) the many millions of living things per m^3 of seawater, including microbial as well as macro-organisms?
🔗 Registration link
Leading the Energy Transition - MITEI IAP non-credit course - MIT Events
🕑 Start time
1/10/2023 Tue 2:00 PM
🕓 End time
1/10/2023 Tue 4:00 PM
📍Location
Virtual
📍Address
📝 Notes
Leading change is never easy but the goal of global decarbonization requires a different approach than the traditional approaches. Although technical innovations are necessary, they are not sufficient to bring about the global energy transition.
In the 2023 version of this mini course, we have invited some international energy transition leaders from academia/education, industry, government and utilities to inspire us and share their latest strategies in accelerating the energy transition.
Mette Hoe, Senior Chief Consultant, Smart Mobility, Denmark – Jan 10
Dr. Tiziano Distefano, Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, University of Florence, Italy – Jan 10
Judy Chang, Undersecretary of Energy and Climate Solutions, Massachusetts – Jan 17
Galen Nelson, Chief Program Officer at Massachusetts Clean Energy Center – Jan 17
Bess Gorman, Assistant General Counsel and Director at National Grid (Clean Energy, Sustainable Heating Solutions) – Jan 24
Amelia Letvin, Senior Geoscientist at Baseload Capital – Jan 24
Margo Oge, Former Director Office of Transportation and Air Quality US EPA - Jan 24
Francisco Boshell, Renewable Energy Markets and Standards Analyst, International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) – Jan 31
Dr. Sunita Satyapal, Director, Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technologies Office, U.S. Department of Energy; and DOE Hydrogen Program Coordinator – Jan 31
The class will meet Tuesdays, 11am - 1pm on January 10, 17, 24 and 31, 2023.
To register for this class, please fill out the survey:
https://mit.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_d9XOlAA1niz0w6i
🔗 Registration link
https://calendar.mit.edu/event/leading_the_energy_transition_iap_non-credit_course
American Perceptions of Climate Change (IAP Workshop) - MIT Events
🕑 Start time
1/12/2023 Thu 10:00 AM
🕓 End time
1/12/2023 Thu 11:30 AM
📍Location
Virtual
📝 Notes
Over 50% of Americans are worried about climate change – but why is the rest of the country not? Are they duped by misinformation and corporate propaganda... and/or is there something else going on? And how do we get more Americans to support action on climate change?
In this workshop, we will review academic literature and real-world projects on understanding and engaging with Americans across the ideological spectrum on the topic of climate change.
Weaving presentation and discussion, we will draw upon learnings from the fields of political science, psychology, sociology, and communications to unpack how – and why – Americans think the way they do about climate change and how to effectively engage them on science and solutions.
🔗 Registration link
https://calendar.mit.edu/event/american_perceptions_of_climate_change_iap_workshop_23
BioInnovation x Climate Night
🕑 Start time
1/18/2023 Wed 4:00 PM
🕓 End time
1/18/2023 Wed 8:00 PM
📍Location
The Engine
📍Address
750 Main Street, Cambridge, MA
📝 Notes
You are invited to Vectors Capital's inaugural Boston event! The BioInnovation X Climate Night is a chance to hear from industry insiders, connect with founders committed to reversing climate change through biological innovations, and meet the Vectors Angel network and members of the MIT-derived fund, The Engine. This an excellent opportunity to expand your network, learn about advances at the intersection of biotechnology and climate, and find your next deal.
Thank you to our sponsors at First Republic Bank for your support!
If you are a founder and would like to pitch at the BioInnovation X Climate Night, please sign up here
🔗 Registration link
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/bioinnovation-x-climate-night-tickets-483434384257
At Home on an Unruly Planet: Finding Refuge on a Changed Earth, with Madeline Ostrander - MIT Events
🕑 Start time
1/24/2023 Tue 7:00 PM
🕓 End time
1/24/2023 Tue 7:00 PM
📍Location
Virtual
📝 Notes
As part of the Boston Public Library's Central Author Talk Series, science journalist and author Madeline Ostrander will discuss her recently published book At Home on an Unruly Planet: Finding Refuge on a Changed Earth as part of the Boston Public Library's theme of climate justice activism. Acting as interlocutor for this conversation is Greg M. Epstein, Humanist chaplain at Harvard and MIT, Convener for Ethical Life at MIT's Office of Religious, Spiritual, and Ethical Life, and New York Times bestselling author. Following their discussion, there will be time for audience Q&A.
Porter Square Books will be supplying books for this event, and all books ordered through them will come with a bookplate signed by the author. Order here, and put in BPLEVENT23 as a coupon code in your order.
🔗 Registration link
https://calendar.mit.edu/event/unrulyplanet
YPE Boston January Happy Hour
🕑 Start time
1/25/2023 Wed 6:30 PM
🕓 End time
1/25/2023 Wed 9:30 PM
📍Location
Granary Tavern 170 Milk Street Boston, MA 02109
📝 Notes
Is your New Year's resolution to get more involved in your community? Start the year off strong by joining Young Professionals in Energy Boston and other energy enthusiasts to celebrate 2023!
🔗 Registration link
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ype-boston-january-happy-hour-tickets-503377534757