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Manoela Romano de Orte's ocean research Queensland, Australia, Photo by Ken Caldeira
Caldeira Lab
Home Research Labs Caldeira Lab

Caldeira Lab

Caldeira Lab

Environmental science of climate, carbon, and energy

Ken Caldeira
Department of Global Ecology
Carnegie Institution for Science
260 Panama St.
Stanford, CA 94305, USA
1 + (650) 704-7212
kcaldeira@carnegiescience.edu

C.V.         Biography         Blog

Carnegie Energy Innovation         Research Brief

Caldeira Lab Legacy Site

      Lab Tabs

      News
      Mar
      17
      2021

      Algae growing on dead coral could paint a falsely rosy portrait of reef health

      By Carnegie HQ
      Washington, DC— Algae colonizing dead coral are upending scientists’ ability to accurately assess the health of a coral reef community, according to new work from a team of marine science experts led ...
      • Read more about Algae growing on dead coral could paint a falsely rosy portrait of reef health
      Dec
      15
      2020

      Infrastructure key to balancing climate and economic goals in developing countries

      By Carnegie HQ
      Washington, DC— Developing nations have an opportunity to avoid long-term dependence on fossil fuel-burning infrastructure as they move toward economic stability, even if they are slow to cut carbon ...
      • Read more about Infrastructure key to balancing climate and economic goals in developing countries
      Sep
      29
      2020

      Are China’s pollution remediation efforts making the planet warmer?

      By Carnegie HQ
      Washington, DC— A 10-year effort by China to improve air quality and reduce pollution-related health risks has caused warming in areas across the northern hemisphere, according to new work published ...
      • Read more about Are China’s pollution remediation efforts making the planet warmer?
      Aug
      20
      2020

      Do we need to look beyond batteries for seasonal energy storage?

      By Leslie Willoughby
      Co-located solar farm and energy storage facility (Primus Power)
      STANFORD, CA - Some U.S. states and other regions of the world have set policy goals for all electricity generation to come from zero-carbon or renewable resources by 2050. Because wind and solar ...
      Energy
      • Read more about Do we need to look beyond batteries for seasonal energy storage?
      More News
      Our Research

      Caldeira Lab Publications

      Carnegie Energy Innovation

      CALDEIRA LAB LEGACY SITE

      Lab PI

      Ken Caldeira

      Ken Caldeira, Senior Staff Scientist

      Senior Staff Scientist Emeritus

      Global Ecology
      Carnegie Institution for Science
      • kcaldeira@carnegiescience.edu
      • 650-704-7212
      • Office:  
      • 260 Panama Street
        Stanford, CA 94305, US

      Profile

      Bio

      Ken Caldeira is a climate scientist at the Carnegie Institution for Science, where his job is “to make important scientific discoveries.” He also serves as a Professor (by courtesy) in the Stanford University Department of Earth System Science. Among Caldeira’s key contributions to science are his relatively early recognition of the threats posed by ocean acidification, his pioneering investigations into the environmental consequences of intentional intervention in the climate system (“geoengineering”), and the first peer-reviewed study to estimate near-zero-emission energy needs consistent with a 2°C climate stabilization target. He has also played a central role in helping to elucidate what our understanding of long-term geochemical cycles implies for the fate of today’s carbon dioxide emissions. More recently, he has been focusing on trying to understand what sorts of energy systems could facilitate a transition to a near-zero emission economy that will allow both human and natural systems to flourish.

      Biographies for Ken Caldeira

      Affiliation
      Carnegie Affiliation: 
      DGE Collaborators
      DGE Affiliation: 
      DGE Faculty
      Labs: 
      Caldeira Lab
      CV
      Download: 
      PDF icon CaldeiraCurrentCV20200330.pdf
      Websites

      Projects

      • Carnegie Energy Innovation

      People
      • Enrico Antonini, Postdoctoral associate

        Enrico Antonini (Postdoctoral Fellow)

        Enrico is a Postdoctoral Research Scientist for the Carnegie Institution for Science, Department of Global Ecology at Stanford University. His research aims to understand the physics of wind power extraction for regional-scale wind farms. Enrico is investigating the efficiency of large wind farms and which physical parameters control their power extraction.

        Before joining the Carnegie Institution for Science, Enrico conducted research in wind energy, computational fluid dynamics and optimization algorithms with the goal of advancing the knowledge of wind turbine aerodynamics and creating new design frameworks for the wind turbine industry.


      • Michael Dioha (Postdoctoral Fellow)

        Michael Dioha is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Carnegie Institution for Science Department of Global Ecology, located at the Stanford University campus. His main research areas include energy system analysis & modelling and socioeconomic development for a sustainable energy transition. Michael develops integrated energy system models to examine the techno-economic implications of alternative energy strategies, and how they might be shaped for a coherent and sustainable energy future.

        Before joining the Carnegie Institution for Science, Michael was a Research Analyst at the TERI School of Advanced Studies, New Delhi, where he did research on net-zero emission pathways for India. Beyond academic research, Michael also advocates for innovative approaches that promote just socioeconomic development especially, in Africa. Michael holds an interdisciplinary PhD in Energy & Environment and a BSc in Mechanical Engineering. Outside of work, Michael enjoys playing soccer, running and art.


      • Lei Duan, Predoctoral Associate

        Lei Duan (Postdoctoral Fellow)

        Lei Duan's research topic is about modeling the climate response to external forcing, especially the global scale geoengineering schemes during his PhD. At Carnegie, he will continue working on climate simulations and also helping with the energy modeling work in Ken Caldeira's group. He had a wonderful experience when he was here previously, and feels happy to come back and work with everyone in Carnegie. 


      • David Farnham, Postdoctoral Fellow

        David Farnham (Postdoctoral Fellow)

        David Farnham is an environmental engineer and hydroclimatologist interested in how climate affects our engineered water and energy systems. David’s work can broadly be described as the development of statistical models to estimate and/or predict climate risks at time scales ranging from daily to seasonal to multi-decadal.

        With regard to water systems, David has authored papers on topics ranging from the prediction of urban water contamination, to the estimation of future regional riverine flooding hazard, to the climate drivers of seasonal precipitation variability in water scarce regions such as the Southwestern, United States.

        Within energy systems, David has been focusing on weather/climate dependent renewable energy technologies; namely solar, wind, and hydro power. For example, David has recently been investigating the implications of yearly to decadal fluctuations in potential wind and solar energy supply for energy system planning.


      • Bill Hayes

        Bill Hayes (Scientific Programmer)

        Bill creates programs to analyze data from climate models for Ken Caldeira and others in his lab.
        After receiving his BSEE and MSEE from the University of Cincinnati in his home town he did his first professional work developing hardware and software for a Pediatric Cardiology research lab at Duke University. After working for many small companies in California he became a Systems Engineer at Siemens Oncology in Concord before joining Carnegie
        He currently resides in Las Vegas tutoring Python online in his spare time.


      • Manoela Romano de Orte (Postdoctoral Fellow)

        Manoela Romanó de Orte is a Postdoctoral Research Scientist in in the Caldeira Lab at the Carnegie Institution for Science's Department of Global Ecology. She is a marine scientist, studying the fate and the effects of pollutants in the coastal environment. Her research considers traditional pollutants, such as heavy metals, alongside emerging contaminant threats. These emerging threats include plastics and the global effects of humans dumping carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere, which warms and acidifies the ocean. Manoela's latest work focuses on the response of coral reef ecosystems to climate change and to plastic pollution.

         


      • Tyler Ruggles (Research Associate)

        I am a scientist studying low carbon energy transitions. How do we create a low carbon energy system? What could that system look like? What technological breakthroughs are necessary? These are some of the questions which motivate my research.

        My current work focuses on studying the interannual variability of renewable energy resources and potential consequences for a highly-renewable grid. I also model the conversion of electric power to liquid fuels or hydrogen to study the benefits these technologies can bring to the grid including increased flexibility.

        Before starting on energy systems research, I completed a PhD in particle physics while based at CERN working for the University of Wisconsin-Madison.


      • Leslie Willoughby (Science Writer)

        Leslie's first love was a horned toad that lived in her backyard in Albuquerque. It disappeared over winter, emerged in spring, and showed her that nature changes over time. Throughout childhood, she yearned to share that lizard's world with others.

        In college she studied environmental interpretation. Afterward, at the newly created Ohio EPA, she funded programs that regulated scrubbers in coal-fired power plants and improved sewage treatment facilities. Later, as a science teacher, she set the lab tables with a new narrative each morning. Monday’s tale might compare skeletons; Tuesday’s could mimic a lunar eclipse.

        When climate change became the biggest nature story, Leslie signed on as a reporter in the Eastern Sierra. While forest fires rage and drought starves California's snowpack and water supply, Leslie heeds the call for epic writing muscle. She works out every day.


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