Ezra’s Round Table / Systems Seminar: Yixing Xu (Breakthrough Energy)

The United States power grid will have to undergo a radical transformation for the deep decarbonization necessary to avoid the worst effects of climate change. To help guide the consideration of the plethora of options for how to conduct this transformation, the Breakthrough Energy Grid Modeling team is working to develop, validate, and publish high-resolution models of the U.S. grid, capable of investigating a variety of future grid configurations. To demonstrate the utility of these models, we investigate how to meet the current 2030 clean electricity goals, as well as a more ambitious set of goals consistent with deep decarbonization. With electric grid as an enabler, transportation, building, manufacturing sectors will be integrated as one energy system. The modeling of these coupled sectors and the openness of these models are critical for decision makers in policy, industry, academia, and investment community. Breakthrough Energy is actively working with all stakeholders to solve these challenging problems.

Bio:
Yixing Xu is the research director at Breakthrough Energy. Yixing works with a talented and diverse team of research scientists, data scientists and software engineers to explore potential pathways to carbon neutrality and build open-source energy systems software. His research focuses on clean energy technology and energy policy. The goal of his open-source software effort is to support industry experts, policy makers, and academic researchers in studying the future energy systems. Yixing also collaborates with researchers at universities, and experts in the industry to solve the most challenging problems in the clean energy transition. Yixing finished his Ph.D. and postdoc at Texas A&M University and his bachelor’s degree at Tsinghua University—all focusing on clean energy.