Weston Roundtable Series: Mission Innovation, Not Mission Impossible: How Can Policy Accelerate Clean Energy Innovation?

Jacquelyn Pless, Assistant Professor, MIT Sloan School of Management.

Decarbonizing the energy sector will play a fundamental role in combatting climate change, but doing so at low cost will require substantial innovation. Hundreds of billions of public dollars are spent subsidizing R&D globally each year. Is this enough? Are these resources spent wisely? How can policy help drive clean energy innovation at speed and scale? This discussion will address what we know so far about what works, and perhaps more important, propose questions that research must still address.