Padture says the initiative complements the University’s growing array of efforts to confront global climate and capitalizes on Brown’s reputation for high-impact climate research. Specifically, it will establish at Brown the third leg of a proverbial three-legged stool needed to avert catastrophic consequences of climate change.

“Brown helps address the latter two — public climate policy and climate science — through the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society and other units,” Padture said. “The unique synergy provided by new partnerships among these units and the initiative will make Brown a powerhouse for addressing the global crisis of our time — climate change.”

In recent years, Brown faculty have led innovations in each of the initiative’s three focus areas: renewable energy, energy efficiency, and sustainable fuels and materials.

Researchers studying an emerging clean energy technology based on high-efficiency perovskite solar cells, for example, found a way to strengthen a key weak point in the cells, dramatically increasing their functional life. The relative ease of the manufacturing process and the use of much less material means that perovskite solar cells can be potentially made at a fraction of the cost of current silicon cells, offering the potential for major steps forward in renewable energy. Recently, Padture’s research group won a $1.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy to expand on their research.

Separately, a team of engineers, including Brown professor Yue Qi, working to replace the liquids commonly used in today’s lithium-ion batteries with solid materials developed a new material made from wood. The material marks a step toward bringing solid state battery technology to the mass market and could one day help produce batteries that deliver more power and operate more safely than today’s lithium-ion batteries. These solid-state batteries present a way to get around number of limitations and risk factors from lithium-ion batteries, such as being able to be made flame retardant.

And Brown biophysics professor Derek Stein was part of an award-winning collaboration to design a house that uses 90% less energy than a typical house. The environmentally friendly “Techstyle Haus” was a joint project between researchers at Brown, Rhode Island School of Design and Erfurt University of Technology in Germany. The self-sustaining house made of innovative materials produces 50% more energy than it consumes and has architectural curvature designed for optimal solar energy usage. The house was constructed in Providence and eventually made its way to Domaine de Boisbuchet in France where it served as a living laboratory and teaching tool for students.

“These research thrusts are key to achieving future ‘net-zero carbon’ where significantly less carbon dioxide — a potent greenhouse gas that lingers in the atmosphere for a millennia — is emitted and the existing CO₂ in the atmosphere is removed,” Padture said. “Brown has critical mass in these areas that are primed for growth to the next level. We’re launching the initiative to expand this research which can be translated into practice, and to create an ecosystem for researchers from across different fields to collaborate for an even bigger impact.”

Over the next few years, key educational components of the new initiative will be stimulating new ways of thinking about energy across different fields of study at Brown through campus-wide sustainable energy seminars, workshops and events. Later this spring, for instance, a Sustainable Energy symposium will take place, and the initiative has already released a call for proposals as part of a new seed funding program to launch new faculty-led projects in sustainable energy.

Another key goal is establishing new Brown courses that complement existing curricular offerings focused on sustainable energy topics. Courses currently being evaluated include ones centering on sustainable energy systems and another on the physics of climate and energy.

Padture not only envisions increased collaborations among scientists and educators at Brown, but that the initiative will also host distinguished visitors that complement expertise on campus. He also sees opportunities for partnership with national laboratories and with other institutions in the U.S. and abroad.

“There is a sense of urgency for providing these technological solutions to achieve net-zero carbon over the next few decades, thereby averting disastrous global consequences of climate change,” Padture said.