Panel: AI and Climate Change: Where is the funding and is it sufficient to meet the 2030 and 2050 goals? https://www.climatechange.ai/events/aaaifss2022#scheduleThursday, November 17, 2016, 5:10 pm – 6:00 pm

1. Panel
AI and Climate Change: Where is the funding and is it sufficient to meet the 2030 and 2050 goals?
Jim
Spohrer
(ISSIP.org)
11/18/2022 1
Fahmida N Chowdhury
NSF
David Tew
ARPA-E
Andres Alonso
Bank of Spain
Jon Greene
ITA International
Moderator
Jim Spohrer

2. Learning to invest in
changing the local
planetary energy
infrastructure:
Decarbonization costs
• Smil V (2022) Taming the
Climate Is Far Harder Than
Getting People to the Moon.
IEEE Spectrum
11/18/2022 Jim Spohrer (ISSIP.org) 2

3. Funding Opportunities
Related to Climate Change
and AI
National Science Foundation
Fahmida N. Chowdhury
Office of International Science
and Engineering (OISE)
AAAI Fall Symposia, Nov. 17,
2022

4. Multiple Opportunities Across
NSF
NSF has invested over $100 million to establish five NSF AI
Institutes.
NSF AI Institute for Research on Trustworthy AI in Weather,
Climate, and Coastal Oceanography (AI2ES)
https://www.ai2es.org/
Create trustworthy Artificial Intelligence (AI) methods for diverse
environmental science (ES) users. Academia, Industry, National
Labs involved.

5. NSF has several programs in clean energy and climate ---
evolving and new program announcements coming
every year. AI tools can be incorporated in many of these
proposals.
In FY 22, $19m awarded in projects involving international
collaboration (PIRE); https://beta.nsf.gov/news/nsf-invests-
use-inspired-climate-change-clean
The Convergence Accelerator program in the new TIP
Directorate:
https://beta.nsf.gov/funding/initiatives/convergence-
accelerator
Even if the program does not mention AI explicitly. See
https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2040613&Hist

6. How to build proposals with industry and other non-academic entities
What are convincing strategies for future AI workforce development
Whether to propose basic, foundational AI research or applications to climate and
energy-related themes
Points to Ponder

7. ARPA-E & AI
David E. Tew
Program Director, ARPA-E
November 18, 2022

8. History of ARPA-E
8
In 2007, The National Academies recommended Congress establish an Advanced Research Projects Agency within the
U.S. Department of Energy to fund advanced energy R&D.
2007 2009 2021
Rising Above the Gathering Storm
Published - warning policymakers that U.S.
advantages in science and technology had
begun to erode
America COMPETES Act Signed –
authorizing the creation of ARPA-E
American Recovery & Reinvestment Act
Signed – Providing ARPA-E its first
appropriations of $400 million, which funded
ARPA-E's first projects
1,270 Awards
60+Programs
FY22 Funding: $450M
(President’s FY23 Request: $700M)

9. ARPA-E Mission
9
ARPA-E is part of the Dept. of Energy & supports high-risk & (hopefully) high-reward energy-related R&D

10. ARPA-E Impact Indicators 2021
10

11. ARPA-E Program Portfolio
11
Active
Alumni
RANGE
REMOTE
TERRA
NEXTCAR
REFUEL
TRANSPORTATION
MARINER
AMPED
ELECTROFUELS
MOVE
PETRO
TRANSNET
REEACH
ASCEND SMARTFARM
ULTIMATE
EFFICIENCY
METALS
ARID
ADEPT
REACT
SWITCHES
CIRCUITS
SENSOR
SHIELD
ROOTS
MONITOR DELTA
BEETIT
PNDIODES
BREAKERS HITEMMP
DIFFERENTIATE
FLECCS REPAIR
ENLITENED
ELECTRICITY
GENERATION & DELIVERY
GRID DATA
INTEGRATE IONICS
MOSAIC ALPHA
GENSETS
NODES
GENI GRIDS
HEATS
REBELS
IMPACCT
FOCUS
CHARGES
MEITNER
ATLANTIS
BETHE
DAYS
PERFORM GEMINA
GAMOW
SOLAR ADEPT
+ OPEN 2009, 2012, 2015, 2018, & 2021 Solicitations
+ Seedlings, Competitions, Complementary Exploratory Topics
+ SCALEUP
SHARKS
BEEST
ECOSYNBIO

12. ARPA-E DIFFERENTIATE (AI Focused Program)
12
ML-Enhanced
Design Tools
More Creative &
Productive
Engineers
Better Energy
Products
Accelerated
ARPA-E Mission
ARPA-E Mission
Mission: To overcome long-term and high-risk technological barriers in the development of energy
technologies
3
REDUCE
IMPORTS
IMPROVE
EFFICIENCY
REDUCE
EMISSIONS
Ensure U.S.
Technological Lead &
U.S. Economic and
Energy Security
Leverage the transformative potential of machine learning (ML) to address today's energy challenges by
seeking to automate the process of invention
Current ARPA-E Program
$35M

13. Design Process Framework
13
November 18, 2022
Problem Hypothesis Evaluation Solution
Tool Capability Description
Hypothesis Generation Optimizers with domain knowledge
Hypothesis Evaluation Surrogate models with high fidelity @ low cost
Inverse Design Design representations as functions of requirements 𝑥𝑑𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑔𝑛 = 𝑓−1
𝑦𝑡𝑎𝑟𝑔𝑒𝑡
1 2
3
1
2
3
Goal: Help to resolve our climate challenge by using ML to automate the process of energy-related invention
𝑦𝑡𝑎𝑟𝑔𝑒𝑡 =
𝑦1
…
𝑦𝑁
E.g., Low-cost carbon-
neutral long-distance
transportation
𝑦ℎ𝑦𝑝 = 𝑓 𝑥ℎ𝑦𝑝
𝑥ℎ𝑦𝑝
𝑥𝑑𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑔𝑛 =
𝑥1
…
𝑥𝑁

14. Outside DIFFERENTIATE
‣ AI/ML is increasingly a tool of choice throughout our programs
– Materials discovery
– Digital twins
– Sensor data analysis
– Etc.
‣ Future opportunities @ ARPA-E
– Designed to be quick to respond to challenges &/or opportunities
– No roadmaps
– Future programs (e.g., ML focused ones) determined by future PDs
– If you don't like what we are doing, please come fix the problem!
14
November 18, 2022
• Primary focus is end application
• AI/ML is one of many tools employed

15. Join the Team that is Transforming the Energy
of Tomorrow
15
 Independent energy technology
development
 Program Director support
 Organizational support
PROGRAM DIRECTOR
 Program development
 Active project management
 Thought leadership
 Explore new technical areas
FELLOW
TECHNOLOGY-TO-MARKET
ADVISOR
 Business development
 Technical marketing
 Techno-economic analyses
 Stakeholder outreach
Learn more and apply: www.arpa-e.energy.gov/jobs or arpa-e-jobs@hq.doe.gov.

16. ANDRÉS ALONSO <ANDRES.ALONSO@BDE.ES>
Central Banks are working to unblock operational problems
that prevent Green Finance to scale up.
• Looking for a way to reduce the barriers that green fintechs
might find to raise capital for AI-driven solutions.
• The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) is running
an Innovation Hub (BISIH) and an Innovation Network
(BISIN) dedicating resources to experiment with and
monitor innovative technologies applied to Green
Finance:
 Project Genesis 1.0
 Project Genesis 2.0
 Project Viridis  ML & advanced analytics
 Project Gaia  NLP for climate-related disclosures
Blockchain, smart contracts & IoT.

17. ANDRÉS ALONSO <ANDRES.ALONSO@BDE.ES>
• BIS- G20 Techsprint 2021: race horse competition on (i) data
collection, (ii) climate risks, and (iii) connecting investors with
projects.
• Winners of these competitions usually benefit strongly from
this recognition when going into the private market later on.
• In our experience, AI-driven technologies have a huge
potential in this field!
 Further resources: ESA gateaway; UK FCA Green
Fintech Challenge, HKMA Green Hackaton.

18. AI & Climate
Where is the funding? Is it enough?
And are we asking the right questions?

19. 19
Just Cause and Mission Statement
Mission Statement
ITA International is a
different kind of company
that moves at the speed
of business to ensure
mission success for
customers, “In The
Arena.” We leverage
subject matter expertise,
data analytics and
technology to make what
may seem impossible,
possible.

20. 20
Conditions of the Human Ecosystem

21. 21
The Standoff
“We are on a highway to
climate hell with our foot still
on the accelerator.”
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres
“Climate-Change
‘Solutions’…Are Worse
Than the Problem”
Jason De Sena Trennert, WSJ
Is it… Or…
Climate change will have vast and unanticipated
impacts, intervention on the scale required to address it
will as well.
Can we change the conversation?

22. 22
A Complex System of Systems Approach
…powered by AI

23. Jon Greene, jgreene@ita-intl.com, 540-553-5846

24. https://www.climatechange.ai/events/aaaifss2022#schedule
Emails:
Fahmida Chowdhury <fchowdhu@nsf.gov>
David Tew <david.tew@hq.doe.gov>
Andres Alonso <andres.alonso@bde.es>
Jon Greene <JGreene@ita-intl.com>
Jim Spohrer <Spohrer@gmail.com>
Priya Donti <pdonti@andrew.cmu.edu>
Frank Stein <fstein@ieee.org>