Other Group

ZERO Lab

Location:

Princeton, NJ

Type:

Climate research center

Parent Institution:

Princeton University

Director:

Jesse Jenkins

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ZERO Lab (Zero-carbon Energy Systems Research and Optimization Laboratory) is a research center housed within Princeton University that creates energy consumption models with the goal of evaluating low-carbon energy technologies and carbon offsetting practices to “understand complex macro-scale energy systems and their transitions to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions.” The lab is directed by Jesse Jenkins, an assistant professor and macro-scale energy systems engineer at Princeton University with a joint appointment in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and the Andlinger Center for Energy and Environment. Jenkins selects two doctoral researchers annually to join the lab and guide its research, and the lab has partnered with companies and organizations including Google, General Electric, and ClearPath to fund research. 1 2 3

Background

ZERO Lab (which is an acronym for Zero-carbon Energy Systems Research and Optimization Laboratory) was formed to create technical research regarding energy usage to inform a transition away from conventional fuels towards a goal of “net-zero emissions.” The group is led by Jesse Jenkins, the principal investigator for the project and an assistant professor and macro-scale energy systems engineer at Princeton University with a joint appointment in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and the Andlinger Center for Energy and Environment. The Zero Lab also employs eight additional researchers and several additional Ph.D.-student researchers. 1

The ZERO Lab claims that its work “improves and applies optimization-based macro-energy systems models to evaluate low-carbon energy technologies, guide investment and research in innovative decarbonization solutions, and generate insights to improve energy and climate policy and planning.” 1

Activities

The Zero Lab first garnered attention in 2020 for its “Net-Zero America” report advocating net-zero emissions. Jesse Jenkins, the head of the project is a proponent of mass electrification and has written opinion pieces in the New York Times, Mother Jones, and the Wall Street Journal to argue for such an approach. 4

Jenkins worked with U.S. Senate staffers to help craft the Inflation Reduction Act, a large Biden administration-endorsed spending bill to push funding for additional transmission lines to facilitate mass electrification. A ZERO Lab report estimated that “the $400 billion Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) will double the pace of emissions cuts in America from 2% to 4% annually, bringing emissions to 37-41% below their peak by 2030” and that further progress towards mass electrification would depend on the U.S. “upgrading its power grid.” 4

The ZERO lab has garnered criticism for some of its research from others in the climate research space. The Emissions First Partnership, a coalition of companies in the weather-dependent energy and electricity sector including Akamai, Amazon, GM, HASI, Heineken, Intel, Meta, Rivian, Salesforce, and Workday, stated that the group disagreed with the conclusion of a ZERO lab report comparing electricity consumption methodologies stating that “we disagree with its core conclusion: that any procurement strategy other than hourly matching will have ‘zero or near-zero long-run impact on system-level CO2 emissions.’ ”5

The Emissions First Partnership further stated that “The paper comes to this counterintuitive finding because, in the world forecast by its capacity-expansion model, the incentives in the Inflation Reduction Act make clean energy so cheap that projects will get financed and built without the need for corporate purchase commitments. Because these projects get built either way, the paper’s logic continues, corporate purchases are unnecessary and therefore have no impact on reducing grid emissions. The conclusion runs counter to our experience.” 5

Funding

ZERO Lab receives funding from government agencies as well as left-of-center grantmaking foundations and companies. Funders include three entities within the U.S. Department of Energy: the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), the Geothermal Technologies Office, and the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. 1

Companies and foundation funders of the ZERO Lab include the Sloan Foundation, Hewlett Foundation, the Center for Equitable Growth, the Niskanen Center, the BlueGreen Alliance, ClearPath Foundation, Breakthrough Energy, the Eric and Wendy Schmidt Fund for Strategic Innovation, Linden Trust, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, PSEG, Google, BP, General Electric, and Frontier Climate. 1

References

  1. “Mission & People.” ZERO lab at Princeton University. Accessed January 6, 2025. https://zero.lab.princeton.edu/mission-people/
  2. “Google, GE, ClearPath have joined a new Princeton research consortium focusing on low-carbon technology.” Princeton University. June 6, 2022. Accessed January 6, 2025. https://www.princeton.edu/news/2022/06/06/google-ge-clearpath-have-joined-new-princeton-research-consortium-focusing-low
  3. “Home.” ZERO lab at Princeton University. Accessed January 6, 2025. https://zero.lab.princeton.edu/
  4. Ellis, Richard. “Electrifying Everything: Princeton ZERO Lab’s Jesse Jenkins on our progress a year into the IRA.” SOSV. September 5, 2023. Accessed January 6, 2025. https://sosv.com/electrifying-everything-princeton-zero-labs-jesse-jenkins-on-our-progress-a-year-into-the-ira/
  5. Oster, Jake and Threlkeld, Rob and Reed, Chad and Hunt, Hannah. “Princeton’s Zero Lab has it wrong on corporate renewable energy procurement and emissions.” Utility Drive. October 25, 2023. Accessed January 6, 2025. https://www.utilitydive.com/news/princetons-zero-lab-has-it-wrong-on-corporate-renewable-energy-procurement/696956/
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ZERO Lab


Princeton, NJ