This workshop took place at the 2014 SunShot Grand Challenge Summit and Peer Review in Anaheim, CA.
Workshop Description
Solar installers, utilities, non-profit groups, and policymakers are charged with creating on-the-ground solar programs. A new set of tools, developed by social scientists and strengthened with the availability of data with astounding depth and breadth, can now be applied to make energy programs better: more effective, flexible, and affordable. Data-driven, low-cost, real-time embedded evaluation is solving some of the nation’s largest energy challenges, from changing consumer behavior to ramping up adoption of new technology. Solar decision makers, in partnership with top researchers, have an opportunity to advance and apply this new science. In this interactive workshop, some of the most stubborn soft cost challenges will be confronted, and creative methods for tackling them will be devised. First, solar practitioners will pose their most difficult open questions related to customer acquisition, permitting, incentives, and other soft costs. Next, scientists will introduce the progress they’re making at probing these questions via modeling and field experimentation. Working groups will then devise and pitch programs and policies that embed state-of-the- art rapid iteration. The workshop goals are for program implementers to gain a new set of tools, for researchers to discover the next big questions, and for both groups to form new partnerships.
Workshop Materials
Speaker Presentations
- Vikram Agarwal, Chief Executive Office, EnergySage
- Jack Clark, Director of Programs, Center for Sustainable Energy
- Adam B. Cohen, SunShot Science and Technology Policy Fellow, Department of Energy
- Jessie Denver, Director of Group Energy, The Vote Solar Initiative
- Easan Drury, Strategic Energy Analysis Center, National Renewable Energy Laboratory
- Bill Weihl, Manager of Energy Efficiency and Sustainability, Facebook
- Catherine Wolfram, Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley