UT Energy Symposium
A weekly guest lecture series that is both free and open to the public and available for course credit.
In an effort to provide a multidisciplinary platform for UT faculty and students to interact on the most pressing energy issues facing our world, the Energy Institute sponsors the UT Energy Symposium (UTES), which entered its 27th semester in fall 2024.
The UTES serves as a “convener” for the campus community, uniting students interested in energy issues with faculty and others working on sustainable energy security. Students who register for the symposium receive one credit hour for the 15-week seminar course, which is open to both undergraduate and graduate students. The course is taught in both the fall and spring semesters.
Ongoing themes for UTES include climate change policy, innovation and diffusion of energy technologies, low-carbon technology options and status, and behavioral aspects of energy consumption.
Each UTES talk is recorded and posted on this page and on the Energy Institute YouTube channel.
Instructor: Carey King
Unique Number (Spring 2024): 60540 (graduate students) / 60245 (undergraduates)
Day & Time: Tuesday, 12:30 – 1:45 p.m.
If you need an accommodation to participate in this event, please contact Christa Hopkins, who can be reached at 512-475-8447 or christa@energy.utexas.edu, no later than five (5) business days prior to the event.
Upcoming UT Energy Symposium Talks
Date | Speaker | Talk Title |
---|---|---|
2/4/2025 | Melinda Taylor Senior Lecturer, School of Law, University of Texas at Austin | Reducing Methane Emissions from Oil and Gas Operations in the Permian Basin: A Common Sense Approach |
2/11/2025 | Hector Pollitt Senior Economist, World Bank | The Real-World Economics of the Energy Transition: Finding Policy That Works |
2/18/2025 | Chris Lamb Cybersecurity Researcher, Energy Security, Sandia National Laboratory | TBD |
2/25/2025 | Daniel Roesler Founder & CIO, UtilityAPI | Utility Data and Connectivity - How Climate Changes Everything |
3/4/2025 | Matthew Heun and Paul Brockway Professor, Department of Engineering, Calvin University; Associate Professor, Sustainability Research Institute (SRI), School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds | A Country-level Primary, Final, Useful Energy and Exergy Database to Improve Understanding of Energy and the Economy |
3/11/2025 | Kent Zheng Assistant Professor, McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Texas at Austin | Reimagining Battery Chemistries for Sustainable Energy Storage |
3/25/2025 | Adam Birchfield Assistant Professor, Electrical & Computer Engineering, Texas A&M University | Electric Grid Dynamic Simulation: Open Synthetic Datasets and Stability Assessment Frameworks |
4/1/2025 | TBD | TBD |
4/8/2025 | Yonghong Chen Chief Scientist, Grid Planning and Analysis Center, National Renewable Energy Laboratory | Interregional Transmission Operational Coordination |
4/15/2025 | Lee Lynd Paul E. and Joan H. Queneau Distinguished Professor of Engineering & Adjunct Professor of Biology, Dartmouth University; Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer, Terragia Corporation | TBD |
4/22/2025 | Sam Porter Co-Founder & CEO, NeuVentus | Texas Reliability Underground: How Salt Cavern Storage Enables the Energy Expansion & Transition |
UT Energy Symposium Talks
February 21, 2019
Getting to zero: what will it take to decarbonize electricity and will the Green New Deal help?
Jesse Jenkins, Postdoctoral Environmental Fellow, Harvard Kennedy School | Harvard University Center for the Environment
February 14, 2019
How and why people disagree on future energy issues, and broader social/economic outcomes related to energy systems: a discussion
David Spence, Carey King and Fred Beach, UT Austin
February 7, 2019
California Energy Policy in Crisis
Michael Wara, Director, Climate and Energy Policy Program, Senior Research Scholar, Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University
January 31, 2019
Non-Renewable Resources, Extraction Technology, and Economic Growth
Martin Stuermer, Sr. Research Economist, Research Dept., Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas
November 29, 2018
Geopolitical and energy trade affected by China’s rise
David Firestein, Executive Director, China Public Policy Center; Clinical Professor of Public Affairs, LBJ School, UT Austin
November 15, 2018
Book talk: Great American Outpost: Dreamers, Mavericks and the Making of an Oil Frontier
Maya Rao, Washington correspondent for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune writer and author of Great American Outpost: Dreamers, Mavericks and the Making of an Oil Frontier
November 8, 2018
Innovating for a Clean Energy Future
Kate Zerrenner, Senior Manager, Energy-Water Initiatives, Environmental Defense Fund
October 25, 2018
Addressing Energy Poverty in Texas
Dana Harmon, Director, Texas Energy Poverty Research Institute
October 18, 2018
Shale: The Revolution That Wasn’t
Richard Chuchla, Director, Energy and Earth Resources program, Jackson School of Geosciences
October 11, 2018
Renewables and electricity market design
Peter Cramton, Professor of Economics, University of Cologne and University of Maryland
October 4, 2018
Transitioning to electricity as a fuel: challenges and opportunities for remaking our refueling infrastructure
Mike Nicholas, Senior Researcher, The International Council on Clean Transportation
September 27, 2018
What We Measure Matters – US Electricity in the Future
Robert Hebner, Director, Center for Electromechanics, The University of Texas at Austin
September 20, 2018
Creative Destruction and the Electric Utility of the Future
David Hurlbut, Senior Analyst at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory
September 13, 2018
Fuel Taxation, Emissions Policy, and Competitive Advantage in the Diffusion of European Diesel Automobiles
Eugenio J. Miravete, Professor, Department of Economics, The University of Texas at Austin
September 6, 2018
How Energy Fits into the History of the World in Seven Cheap Things
Raj Patel, Research Professor, LBJ School of Public Affairs
April 26, 2018
Planet Texas 2050: A UT Austin Grand Challenge
Jay Banner, ESI | Richard Corsi, CAEE | Michael Young, BEG | Heather Houser, English
April 19, 2018
Adapting from grid to cloud
Bill Cannon, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Environment & Infrastructure Group Sumitomo Corporation of Americas
April 12, 2018
Will the internet of things change the electric business?
Robert J. King, President, Good Company Associates
April 5, 2018
Global Energy Impact of a Developing China; and India?
Fred Beach, Assistant Director for Policy Studies, Energy Institute, The University of Texas at Austin
March 29, 2018
To Uber or Not to Uber: Economic and Energetic Tradeoffs
Todd Davidson, Research Associate, Energy Institute and Webber Energy Group, The University of Texas at Austin
March 22, 2018
A Proposed Framework for Rebooting the Study of Economics
Garvin Boyle, principal designer and programmer, Orrery Software
March 8, 2018
Personal Reflections on California’s Leadership in Environmental Policy
Alan Lloyd, Research Fellow, Energy Institute, UT Austin; Former Secretary, California EPA; Former Chair, California Air Resources Board
March 1, 2018
Global gas demand and US LNG exports
Gürcan Gülen, Research Scientist, Bureau of Economic Geology, Jackson School of Geosciences
February 22, 2018
Coal in India: History and Persistence
Rohit Chandra, PhD Student, Kennedy School at Harvard