Internationally, domestically and especially statewide, clean, renewable energy continues to gather significant momentum, and the college’s annual California Renewable Energy and Storage Technology (CREST) Conference aims to stay ahead of the curve. The 2016 CREST Conference, the fourth, took place November 12 and featured a full roster of speakers covering topics ranging from energy storage systems and energy harvesting from the ocean, to the State Lands Commission’s renewable energy program, and strategies for transitioning LA County to 100% renewable energy, among others. A poster session featured the research of several CSUN students.
The conference, which attracted some 90 attendees, opened with remarks by CECS dean S. K. Ramesh and Hamid Johari, chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering. Plenary speaker Dr. Sudarsan Rachuri, from the Department of Energy’s Federal Program Office, talked about smart and advanced manufacturing innovation in the department. Matt Petersen, the chief sustainability officer for the city of Los Angeles, was the keynote speaker and talked about solar and energy storage in context of the Aliso Canyon gas leak. Three panels of speakers, representing UCLA, USC, UC Irvine, Southern California Gas Company, SEATREC, and the California State Lands Commission, rounded out the event. Tom White, director of the Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator, ended the program with a discussion of the network for global innovation.
“This was probably the best group of speakers we’ve had so far,” says Abhijit Mukherjee, associate professor of mechanical engineering and director of CSUN’s Energy Research Center, who organized the conference. “I was very proud.”
Sponsors for the daylong conference included Endelos Energy and Tom Brown, a board member of the Energy Research Center.
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