Date: Tuesday, March 5
Time: Noon to 1:00 p.m.
Location: Hyatt Regency Orlando
The clean energy transition calls for unprecedented demand for critical materials. These materials—like lithium for electric vehicle (EV) batteries and neodymium for magnets in offshore wind turbine generators—face supply chain vulnerabilities and are often difficult to substitute. Yet, many of the technologies used to manufacture critical materials are not necessarily viable from a safety, economic, environmental, or social standpoint in the U.S. This calls for a departure from decade-old methods to meet the needs of the clean energy transition. Innovation can lead to sustainable approaches to developing critical material supply chains. This panel will discuss how innovation in all forms—from advancing our understanding of materials at the atomic level to disruptive technologies—can be accelerated through intentional partnerships to meet the needs of the clean energy industrial base while preserving the future. The panelists will bring perspectives from industry, government, and the Critical Materials Innovation Hub (CMI), a public-private partnership led by Ames National Laboratory. This session will feature an interactive Q&A session with audience members.
Panelists
Helena Khazdozian
Co-Chair of the Critical Materials Collaborative (CMC), Advanced Materials & Manufacturing Technologies Office, Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy
About the Presenter
Helena Khazdozian is a senior technology manager for Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Technologies Office (AMMTO) at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), managing a critical materials research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) portfolio. She joined AMMTO after completing an AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellowship in which she supported critical materials work funded by the former Advanced Manufacturing Office. Khazdozian is also the DOE co-chair to the Critical Materials Subcommittee of the National Science & Technology Council, coordinates research activities in the Office of the Undersecretary for Science and Innovation, and serves as a co-chair to the newly formed Critical Materials Collaborative (CMC). Before joining the U.S. Department of Energy, Khazdozian spent two years as a researcher at the Ames National Laboratory, evaluating critical magnetic materials in electric machines using finite element analysis. She has eight years’ experience in renewable energy research. She earned her Ph.D. from Iowa State University in Wind Energy Science, Engineering, and Policy with a co-major in Electrical Engineering and her M.S. in Electrical Engineering from University of Virginia.
Thomas Lograsso
Director, Critical Materials Innovation Hub, Ames National Laboratory
About the Presenter
Thomas Lograsso is the director of the Critical Materials Innovation Hub (CMI). He has been a member of its leadership team since the inception of CMI, leading the Developing Substituting Focus area. He has been a materials scientist at the Ames National Laboratory since 1988. He received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in Metallurgical Engineering from Michigan Technological University. Lograsso’s background is in solidification physics, and he has applied his background to the synthesis and design of new novel materials in single crystalline forms. His efforts have made significant contributions to the understanding of the underlying physics and functionalities in a broad range of materials systems, including structural intermetallic alloys; quasicrystalline compounds; ferromagnetic shape memory alloys; giant magnetocaloric compounds; and rare earth-transition metals intermetallics. Lograsso is a co-inventor of a rare-earth free substitute for the magnetostrictive alloy, Terfenol-D (contains the critical elements Tb and Dy), used in high-precision machining operations for small engine components and as an ultrasonic driver in petroleum exploration.
Robert Miles
Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder, Momentum Technologies, Inc.
About the Presenter
Robert Miles is Chief Technology Officer, Momentum Technologies, Inc., a company whose technology spun out of the Critical Materials Innovation hub and that he co-founded to focus on sustainable recycling of lithium-ion batteries, industrial materials, and rare earth metals. Prior to this, he was part of the Oil and Gas Group at McKinsey and Company, an Entrepreneur-in-Resident and venture partner at a major venture capital firm whose mission is to commercialize intellectual property from academia and national labs. He was president and founder of Milestone Funds, an innovative mineral rights fund, and founder of Liquid Green Technologies, a geological and geophysical services company that has pioneered and refined numerous statistical and analytical methods to reduce location risk. He received his Bachelor’s degree with distinction from the U.S. Naval Academy, and his Master’s and PhD degrees in Physics from the California Institute of Technology.