MARK Z. JACOBSON

Green New Deals for transitioning 143 countries to 100% clean, renewable energy and storage for everything

Abstract

Global warming, air pollution, and energy insecurity are three of the most significant problems facing the world today. This talk discusses the development of technical and economic Green New Deal roadmaps to convert the energy infrastructures of 143 countries to those powered by 100% wind, water, and sunlight (WWS) for all purposes after energy efficiency measures have been accounted for. All purposes includes electricity, transportation, building heating/cooling, and industry. The talk further discusses the electricity and heat generation technologies and the electricity, heat, cold, and hydrogen storage technologies needed and their current status. It also discusses methods of keeping the electric power grid stable in 20 world regions comprising the 143 countries. Results indicate the grid can remain stable at low cost in each region. Aside from mitigating global warming, these roadmaps have potential to eliminate 4-7 million air pollution deaths worldwide annually, stabilize energy prices, reduce catastrophic risk, and reduce international conflict over energy. Please see http://web.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/Articles/I/WWS-50-USState-plans.html for more information.

Biography

Mark Z. Jacobson is Director of the Atmosphere/Energy Program and Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Stanford University. He is also a Senior Fellow of the Woods Institute for the Environment and of the Precourt Institute for Energy.  He received a B.S. in Civil Engineering, an A.B. in Economics, and an M.S. in Environmental Engineering from Stanford in 1988.  He received an M.S. and PhD in Atmospheric Sciences in 1991 and 1994, respectively, from UCLA and joined the faculty at Stanford in 1994. His career focuses on better understanding air pollution and global warming problems and developing large-scale clean, renewable energy solutions to them. He has published three textbooks and 165 peer-reviewed journal articles.  He received the 2005 American Meteorological Society Henry G. Houghton Award and the 2013 American Geophysical Union Ascent Award for his work on black carbon climate impacts and the 2013 Global Green Policy Design Award for developing state and country energy plans. In 2015, he received a Cozzarelli Prize from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences for his work on the grid integration of 100% wind, water and solar energy systems. In 2018, he received the Judi Friedman Lifetime Achievement Award “For a distinguished career dedicated to finding solutions to large-scale air pollution and climate problems.” In 2019, he was selected as “one of the world’s 100 most influential people in climate policy” by Apolitical. He has served on an advisory committee to the U.S. Secretary of Energy, appeared in a TED talk, appeared on the David Letterman Show to discuss converting the world to clean energy, and cofounded The Solutions Project (www.thesolutionsproject.org). His work is the scientific basis of the energy portion of the U.S. Green New Deal and laws to go to 100% renewable energy in cities, states, and countries worldwide.