VP for Energy and Climate Evelyn Wang ’00 discusses goals and plans for the MIT Climate Project
Wang: “Climate change is a systems problem, and you need to take advantage of all these different facets”
Photo courtesy of Adam Glanzman
On May 20, The Tech interviewed Prof. Evelyn Wang ’00, the inaugural VP for Energy and Climate. Previously, Wang was the Director at the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), an agency in the Department of Energy (DOE) from 2023 to 2025. Wang currently is a professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and served as the department head from 2018 to 2022. Her research focuses on heat transfer, with notable projects including her work on solar thermophotovoltaic energy conversion and water harvesting.
In the interview, Wang talked about her past experiences in climate change and energy research, her goals and plans as the VP for Energy and Climate, as well as updates on the MIT Climate Project.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
The Tech: What made you interested in becoming the inaugural VP for Energy and Climate? How will your past leadership experience in the DOE help you in your current role?
Wang: My lab does heat transfer, but this research actually translates to a lot of the energy problems that we face. As a researcher, I’ll say that while it’s been really exciting, I started realizing that you can only focus on one piece of the problem. As I got more exposed to climate change when I became [the Mechanical Engineering] department head, while there’s so much exciting work, it is important to be able to help inspire people to work together more holistically to solve these challenging problems.
I’ve learned a lot in the government. [ARPA-E’s] whole mission statement is to bolster the U.S.’s energy independence. The premise of the agency is focused on, how do you actually support the early-stage research and development to translate into impact in the real world, to actually commercializing technologies? We’re supporting a lot of early-stage researchers, which include academics, but also entrepreneurs and industries in general who are able to be immersed in that culture. I’ve been able to help support this innovation ecosystem and bring that into where the potential of MIT is.
TT: What are your goals as VP for Energy and Climate, and how will you make sure they address the six missions of the Climate Project?
Wang: We’re trying to really engage beyond the technologists. We’re trying to bring in the policy experts or social scientists — the economists. It’s really the combination of these fields of expertise that will find a pathway to actual impact. From looking at how you actually get new technologies deployed, policy matters so much because these costs are so high when you start with innovative technologies, and someone has to take a chance on [them]. We know that we have to remove gigatons of CO2. How do we do that in economical ways without policy levers?
But at the same time, we also need to develop better technologies. Part of the reason they’re so expensive is because the materials we’re using are just way too expensive for great performance. And I think this is where we don’t have all the technologies, and we have to keep on innovating. We have to understand the science in detail and how technological solutions ultimately have effects on the atmosphere, the land, and the oceans. It’s a collective problem.
When you think about these problems, they’re never in these kinds of stove pipes; [the missions] are just a helpful way for us to organize. Ultimately, a lot of these things are cross-cutting. That’s why it’s so hard, right? The targets are always moving. So, [regarding climate change,] you always have to think about how things are dynamic. It makes it really exciting but challenging.
TT: Given recent federal funding cuts that have been targeting climate and energy initiatives, would this significantly impact the MIT Climate Project? How does MIT plan to address this issue?
Wang: It’s an important question at this time, and I would say that this is beyond the Climate Project itself. The role of academic institutions is to support our country and the world. There’s important national security that we have to also continue, as MIT has a long history of supporting national security. Think about economic competitiveness. These are things that I think we will continue to support as an academic institution.
We rely a lot on federal funding. That’s how academic institutions work. We have to partner with the government when we see there are opportunities that are aligned with our goals and also help support our country. But we also have to think about the resources and the diversity of support that we need as we move forward. That includes philanthropy, engagement with industry, and foundations. There are also state funds. There are a lot of different governments, so there’s also the international support that we’ve gotten through the years to collaborate with others as well.
Traditionally, we’ve had a lot of great collaborations with international entities. I think one that’s very well known around MIT is the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART). That’s just an example of a framework that we have set up. And there’s always a lot of these kinds [of collaborations] emerging in the ecosystem at various levels that I think have been hugely valuable for both sides to work towards common kinds of opportunities and goals.
TT: Do you think an earlier goal of achieving zero direct emissions is feasible for MIT, like the year 2035? Is MIT considering divesting from fossil fuels in its endowment or as research sponsors?
Wang: It’s great to set ambitious goals, but I think we also have to be cognizant of what is really practical and possible. It gives us credibility as we’re thinking about what we can really do, and what we set an example for.
These numbers mean one thing, but what do we really practice, and how do we also engage the community to actually work towards these goals? I’d like to first understand where we are and figure out what the Climate Project can really help potentially accelerate, but with a realistic perspective, rather than just being like, “We need to do this [thing] by this time.”
There is an ad hoc committee to look at fossil fuel industry engagement for the MIT Climate Project that’s currently led by Professor Anne White, who is also the Vice Provost for Research, and they are doing their work right now. The goal is to have recommendations by the end of the summer. This is still a question of deliberation for the Institute, and once we have that, we can have a better understanding of the different perspectives and what the committee recommends, and then we can potentially figure out a path forward.
TT: What about the Climate Project excites you the most?
Wang: The only [open call topics] that we’ve launched are focused around these two bigger, kind of holistic problems that we’re pursuing: heat stress and cooling solutions, and sensing, sharing, and understanding the state of the climate and planet. Those are going to be the open calls that are emerging within the missions, and we haven’t launched any [frontier projects].
It’s a little bit premature to speak of what’s so exciting, at least within the Climate Project. Holistically, I will say it’s hard to pick. Right now, the excitement is, how do we create these partnerships within MIT and with the outside world, so that we can actually make this kind of more holistic impact? Can we facilitate and inspire the connections and actually have people work on problems that they have never worked on before; can they leverage their expertise into solving new problems related to this?
Come back in six months and I’ll say, “Look, we have some great, exciting projects that we think are really kind of uniquely different and impactful.” So stay tuned.
Aneesh Sharma ’28 contributed to this interview.