Climate Innovation Collaboratory awards $1M to tackle key sustainability challenges
Four novel research projects are being funded by the Climate Innovation Collaboratory (CIC), an ongoing alliance between Deloitte Consulting LLP and CU Boulder.
The latest round of CU Boulder research being funded by the CIC includes four 18-month-long projects focused on sustainable computing and building materials, and electric vehicle (EV) infrastructure.
“Deloitte is proud to support CU Boulder’s innovative research and to help transfer data into meaningful solutions for businesses, organizations, government agencies and the communities they serve,” said Steve Goldbach, principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP and U.S. sustainability practice leader.
With this second round of awards, the CIC continues to enable valuable research, technology and market development. The collaboration with Deloitte, a leader in sustainability, began in 2022 with a focus on a wide range of climate priorities with potential for tangible impact.
The Climate Innovation Collaboratory is helping organizations and communities design and implement data-driven approaches so they can be even more prepared for climate-related challenges."
—Katie Sherwin, managing director, Deloitte Consulting LLP
“The Climate Innovation Collaboratory is helping organizations and communities design and implement data-driven approaches so they can be even more prepared for climate-related challenges,” said Katie Sherwin, managing director, Deloitte Consulting LLP and a sustainability leader in the government and public services practice.
CIC project teams work at the nexus of industry and academia, which “ties into the larger framework of sustainability at CU Boulder,” said Senior Vice Chancellor for Research and Innovation and Dean of the Institutes Massimo Ruzzene. “Together, we are working on sustainability challenges that have real world impacts and need solutions.”
Previous CIC awards have funded research on digital tools to advance water management and commercializing analytics to redefine the nation’s wildfire risk.
Mija Hubler (Civil, Environmental & Architectural Engineering)
“Over the past two years, Deloitte’s understanding of our clients’ needs, combined with the university’s cutting-edge research capabilities, has led to innovative solutions to help the public sector address wildfires and droughts,” said Goldbach. “We understand the importance of building on this success to address evolving climate challenges.”
Current seed grant awardees also are focused on mitigating climate-related risks and developing tools that support planning for major infrastructure investment while meeting multiple sustainability goals.
“Just as our clients are changing their processes to address the impact of these challenges, the CIC’s focus is evolving to support them,” said Sherwin. “This year’s research projects concentrate on some of the most complex climate-related issues, examining electric vehicle infrastructure, low-carbon computing and sustainable building materials.”
That includes principal investigator (PI) Mija Hubler and her work to streamline the industrial use of low-embedded carbon cements to target global emission reduction goals.
“I am very excited about this award,” said Hubler. “This is a fast-paced effort, including new collaborations between CU faculty conducting experimental efforts, modeling, theory and framework development. The industry will greatly benefit from this framework and this motivates us.”
The award-winning CIC projects are:
Sustainable Computing:Viability of long- and short-duration energy storage for AI Data Centers: Carbon, Cost and Reliability
This team, led by PI Kyri Baker, will develop an optimization framework for data center energy storage that leverages price and renewable energy forecasts to optimize cost, carbon impact and resiliency goals. The tool may help data center clients lower energy consumption and carbon emissions.
Sustainable Computing:Interconnection Planning for Large Data Centers
The team, led by PI Bri-Mathias Hodge, will develop a system planning tool to help utilities identify areas where energy generation expansion is optimal, taking into consideration network reinforcement and asset upgrades needed to meet the demands of new data centers. This tactical work aims to enable utilities, grid operators and data center operators to plan for expansion in data centers and their energy usage.
Sustainable Building Materials: Framework for Mix Design Relations of Low-Embedded Carbon using Local Materials
This project, led by PI Mija Hubler, will develop a framework to facilitate the use of local, low-embedded carbon materials. Understanding how to mix cement with local materials is a major barrier to utilizing local resources and bringing down its cost and carbon impact. The team will develop a web-based tool to provide criteria for assessing the impacts of local aggregates and additives on material strength and functionality.
EV Infrastructure: Planning for multiple community benefits
This team, led by PI Stephanie Weber, aims to understand how the construction of public electric vehicle charging infrastructure affects the economic development of adjacent areas to support the development of public EV charging infrastructure to meet multiple goals. This research may help national and state governments interested in deploying EV charging infrastructure to plan for multiple benefits.