Bio: Karma Sawyer is the Director of the Electricity Infrastructure and Buildings (EI&B) Division at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). She is responsible for vision and strategy to tackle the nation’s most important energy efficiency, clean energy, and electricity infrastructure challenges. The Division consists of 400+ staff members in eight technical groups in electrical, mechanical, and systems engineering, data and computer sciences, cybersecurity, policy and economics by building diverse, multi-disciplinary teams to provide innovative and actionable solutions to Department of Energy and Department of Defense clients. Prior to joining PNNL, Sawyer served as the Program Manager for Emerging Technologies in the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Building Technologies Office. Under her leadership, the Program’s activities are projected to avoid an estimated 315 metric tonnes of CO2 emissions and cut building energy costs by some $94 billion through 2035. From 2010-2013, she served as Assistant Program Director and Fellow at the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), focusing on carbon capture and thermal storage technologies. Sawyer earned a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley in 2008. She also holds a B.S. in Chemistry from Syracuse University. She is a member of the 2024-2026 cohort of the New Voices in Science, Engineering and Medicine at the National Academies and was a named a Distinguished Gilbreth Speaker by the National Academy of Engineering in 2023. She lives in Washington DC with her husband and two children and is a proud advocate for disability rights.

Abstract: The energy industry needs improved planning methods, tools, and data that can incorporate the wide array of uncertainties, backed by provable scientific methods, and manage and justify asset investment risks effectively under deep uncertainty. The compounding challenges of decarbonization and climate change have regional, national, and worldwide implications for interconnected economies and communities as well as energy system reliability and resilience, climate security, and natural resources. PNNL research is advancing the state of the art to develop comprehensive, multi-sectoral, flexible, and scientifically and stakeholder validated methods, tools, and data that advance climate science, energy system planning, community resilience, natural resource management, and economics and policy analysis to address these interdependencies and uncertainties in support of decision makers.