HACK 2023
Theme: AI and Climate
WINNERS
FIRST PLACE
Fenergy (Mitra Chem)
Unbiased Cathode
The lack of efficient tools to evaluate materials' usability in production early-on in the development process is one of the core problems slowing down innovation in the battery industry.
Our solution, Unbiased Cathode, enables researchers to assess the supply chain implications of battery materials before development begins, hence reducing the lab-to-production timeline. The platform deploys a pipeline that encompasses trust-worthy LLMs, along with ML models for Text Sentiment Analysis and Web scraping combined with state of the art paradigms that focus on LLMs for supply chain optimisation.
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Alessandro Fumi
MBA Candidate, MIT Sloan School of Business
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Amal Nammouchi
PhD in Energy & AI, Karlstad University
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Amaury De Bock
MBA Candidate, MIT Sloan School of Business
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Cyrine Chaabani
PhD Candidate in AI, Technical University of Munich
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Robbie Lee V
MBA Candidate, MIT Sloan School of Business
SECOND PLACE
Carbon Fighters (Watt Carbon)
Team: Arunim Agarwal, Malo Lahogue, Owen Frausto, Rob Santos
THIRD PLACE
Wendy’s 4 for 4 (Crusoe)
Team: Brian Zhou, Maya Avida, Mihir Rao, Devan Shah
FINALISTS
SunCycle (First Solar)
Team: Luis Velasquez, Connie Cheng, Yi Jin Toh, Rowell Castro, Gozel Dovranova
Latent (Avangrid)
Team: Rourke Pattullo, Tom Walkinshaw, Vivek Singh, Kathy Yang
Iron Eye (Ironwood Forestry)
Team: Mart Duitemeijer, Rosie Keller, Charles Dawson, Nina Shamsi
Climate Ledgerlings (Climate Ledger)
Team: Cheng-Yung Kuo, Juan Viera, Janik Sauerbier, Anna Neumann, Frederik Brosch
Garden.Alrs (Foothill Ventures, Koidra)
Team: David Merkel, Eugenia Carrara, Eddie Zhang, Andrew Kerber
Terrier Threat (Schneider Electric)
Team: Carmen Pelayo Fernández, Sarah Hendri, Anush Veeranala, Afra Seleme Göncüoğlu, Olimpia Estela Cáceres-Brown
GAG PRIZE WINNERS
EARLIEST SUBMISSION
NRG
Team: Grace Smith, Noburu Myers, Arthur Wang, Arsh Shaikh
BEST TEAM NAME
Emission: Impossible
IRONWOOD FORESTRY MINI CHALLENGE!
Lucas Chu
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
Jeremy Gregory
Executive Director of MIT Climate and Sustainability Consortium
Jeremy Gregory has extensive experience in working with industry partners and diverse stakeholders across MIT. Through his research, Dr. Gregory studies the economic and environmental implications of engineering and system design decisions, particularly in the area of materials production and recovery systems. His research topics include product and firm environmental footprinting, manufacturing and life-cycle cost analysis, and characterization of sustainable material systems. He has applied these methods, often with industry partners, to a range of different products and industries including pavements, buildings, automobiles, electronics, consumer goods, and waste treatment and recovery.
In addition, Dr. Gregory has served as a Faculty Fellow within MIT’s Office of Sustainability since 2018. In this role, he has collaborated with administration, faculty, staff, and students across campus to conduct analyses related to strategies for lowering MIT’s environmental footprint, with a focus on scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions.
Prior to joining the MCSC, Dr. Gregory served as Executive Director of the MIT Concrete Sustainability Hub, where he worked directly with industry leaders; drew links between academia, industry, and government; helped define strategy; and coordinated research activities with external collaborators.
Previously, Dr. Gregory was the Education Coordinator for the MIT Portugal Program’s Engineering Design and Advanced Manufacturing Focus Area, where he built education and research activities between MIT, three Portuguese universities, and numerous Portuguese companies.
He holds a bachelor of science in mechanical engineering from Montana State University-Bozeman, and a master of science and PhD in mechanical engineering from MIT.
Rafael Gomez-Bombarelli
Paul M. Cook Career Development Professor, MIT Associate Professor of Materials Science and Engineering
Professor Gómez-Bombarelli received his BS, MS, and PhD in chemistry from the University of Salamanca in Spain, followed by postdoctoral work at Heriot-Watt University in Scotland and at Harvard University. By fusing physics-based atomistic simulation with machine learning models, he aims to accelerate the discovery cycle of novel practical materials
David Babson
Executive Director of MIT’s Climate Grand Challenges Initiative
Dr. David Babson is the Executive Director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Climate Grand Challenges Initiative, which develops and manages advanced research programs and challenges aimed at delivering impactful solutions for climate change mitigation and adaptation. Prior to leading MIT’s CGC, David served as a Program Director at ARPA-E, Senior Advisor in the Office of the Chief Scientist at USDA, Technology Manager at the Department of Energy, Senior Fuels Engineer at the Union of Concerned Scientists, and AAAS Fellow at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. David has a PhD in Chemical and Biochemical Engineering from Rutgers University and a BS in Chemical Engineering from the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Neil Gaikwad
MIT Researcher, Professor in Data Science and Computer Science at UNC Chapel Hill
Neil Gaikwad’s research focuses on the intersection of Responsible AI and Policy, aiming to reduce poverty and enhance the well-being of marginalized people in both developed and developing regions. Neil theorizes, designs, and engineers human-AI systems that offer scientific insights for understanding and improving high-stakes societal decisions.
Priya Donti
MIT Assistant Professor in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Priya Donti is an Assistant Professor in MIT EECS and LIDS, and a co-founder and Chair of Climate Change AI, a global nonprofit initiative to catalyze impactful work at the intersection of climate change and machine learning. Her research focuses on ML for forecasting, optimization, and control in high-renewable power grids, and her framework for Climate Change AI was the inspiration behind the 2023 MIT Energy and Climate Hackathon.