When Arun Majumdar took on the unenviable task of trying to shift the conversation away from the "this is how it's done" mindset surrounding energy to a focus on nascent technology with high-reward potential, his first task was to set up meetings with some of the brightest business minds in the world.
They spoke and Majumdar listened. The "they" were the likes of Bill Gates, and Fred Smith of FedEx. "I was surprised so many of the top executives agreed to talk with me," Majumdar commented recently at an energy symposium sponsored by the innovation network PopTech in New York City. The talks with the execs inspired Majumdar to follow his instincts: Support breakthrough innovations from creative thinkers who don't mind disrupting the status quo to transform the system.
Since 2009 when Majumdar became the first director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, he's been inundated with technologists seeking funding. ARPA-E is an outgrowth of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA, www.darpa.mil), the highly funded government program where projects such as the GPS system and the Internet were born. While DARPA is a great big brother that helps pave the way, ARPA-E just doesn't have the same funding pockets as DARPA to support every seedling of an idea that comes its way, no matter how good it may sound to Majumdar and his team.
Arun Majumdar
Photo courtesy of ARPA-E
DARPA has a budget of $3.1 billion while ARPA-E's is, by comparison, a paltry $400 million, and that's only because stimulus money was allocated to it. ARPA-E doesn't quite yet have the cachet of DARPA either, but the little brother is growing up fast thanks to the impact Majumdar's group is having at identifying potentially transformative technologies, then providing start-up funding, and then standing back and watching the technologists push the boundaries of the staus quo.
ARPA-E's projects have ranged in scope and funding. For example, Lehigh University was granted $500,000 to work on a plan promising to capture carbon dioxide through an electric field swing adsorption technology. Foro Energy was given $9.15 million for a plan to use thermal-mechanical technology to drill through basement rocks in a search for geothermal energy.
Silicon Valley venture capitalists can be convinced to bankroll projects that improve existing technologies near commercialization, but those that find a funding home at ARPA-E, Majumdar said, are usually "too risky for VCs." He called ARPA-E's role "preventure funders." Risks are worth it if the payoff proposition is high, he said. In fact, Majumdar readily admits that many of the projects his agency funds will probably not succeed. But if one truly transformative success can occur for every 10 that don't, then ARPA-E has succeeded.
Certainly there are many who don't support this perspective, especially policymakers who are reluctant to approve expenditures that might come back to bite them during election time. The recent bankruptcy of start-up solar company Solyndra, which washed away hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars, also soured the taste for investing on renewables among many politicos and the general public.
Despite some of the naysayers, Majumdar—who reports to Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, and was the founding chair of ASME's Nanotechnology Institute—is, proudly, one of today's most recognizable energy disruptors trying to change the conversation on energy. But there are many others, working quietly but feverishly in labs, biding their time to get some of ARPA-E's funding and see if they can help transform the energy infrastructure.
By thinking differently on how to solve today's grand energy challenge, "We can change the future," Majumdar said. "This is real." Successful entrepreneurs are innovators who push the envelope and do things differently. Technical innovators are the same.
John Falcioni is Editorial Director, Mechanical Engineering.
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