Empowered, Energy Heroes introduces you to modern-day heroes — scientists, inventors, entrepreneurs, and policymakers powering us toward a carbon-free energy future. For years we’ve been inundated with the frightening facts — the burning of fossil fuels is destroying our planet. And it has seemed like an audacious goal to eliminate the use of fossil fuels in our energy system. Thankfully, brilliant minds across industries have been diligently working toward achieving this shared goal for decades. Because of their innovation and will, we now have the tools to take control of our energy future. And that energy is more affordable, reliable, and clean.

It all starts with electricity.

We can create our electricity with renewable energy and then electrify the transportation, industry, and buildings sectors. We can also use that electricity to make carbon-free liquid or gas fuels like hydrogen.

The entire energy sector is going through a once in a century change. 

We will take you to cities and states that generate electricity using carbon-free renewables like solar, wind, and hydro. 

We are revolutionizing and reimagining our electrical delivery system. For more than a century, our utility grid has moved electricity from large power generators across high voltage power lines and delivered it to customers where that electricity is used. This is a centralized system. This works well to bring electricity to cities from distant windmills and large solar fields. But it has its problems. It is not as reliable and resilient as we need it to be. It is not standing up to extreme weather or threats of fire.

Today, homeowners and businesses are also generating their own energy with solar and wind. No longer just “consumers” of energy, they are also producers. This is necessitating a new distributed energy system where energy generators, energy storage, and energy users are all connected. We will introduce you to individuals who have created digital tools that connect distributed energy resources and help the grid operate more efficiently. Their technology is enabling customers to play a vital role in creating and maintaining a safe, efficient and reliable system.

America has long been a nation of innovators. The oil and gas industries and the modern electric grid were all born in the U.S. It was here that scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs invented the microchip, created the Internet, invented the smartphone, revolutionized biotechnology, and sent astronauts to the Moon.

When the U.S. has set audacious goals in the past, we have reached them in record time and with even greater results than planned. Remember Moonshot, President Kennedy’s goal of landing astronauts on the moon in 1961? Achieving the goal required dramatic technical advancement and an unprecedented level of investment. The goal was a catalyst for a unifying focal point of effort and the results were remarkable. The U.S. landed the first manned spacecraft on the moon on July 20, 1969.

Well, we can do the unimaginable again. We can set our sights on a global energy system that supports a healthy planet while giving us even cheaper and more reliable energy. Nations committed to this goal in the Paris Accord. This sent a clear message to governments, businesses, and industries that this is where we are going. Investing in fossil fuels is not investing in the future.

We have a proud history of research at our universities and national labs. We have created policy that supports commercializing federally-funded research. Recently Lab-to-Market initiatives such as ARPA-E and the SunShot Initiative have changed the energy landscape. The SunShot Initiative set out to reduce the total costs of solar energy by 75% to make it cost competitive with other forms of energy without subsidies by the end of the decade. The goal was $1 a watt by 2020. On September 12, 2017, The Energy Department announced that they met the goal three years early. Now it is cheaper to build new solar than to operate an existing coal plant.

This has had the most dramatic and life-changing effect on the 1.2 billion people on the planet who do not have electricity. The low price of solar and batteries has enabled people to obtain electricity without being tied to a utility grid. Home and business-based microgrids are bringing people out of the dark. Energy is directly correlated with quality of life. The work of our heroes is lifting up the poorest and most vulnerable.

Through never-before-told stories of innovators who took on an issue that seemed insurmountable, Empowered sparks the creativity and desire in all of us to positively change the world. We believe you will feel uplifted, inspired, and empowered by people who will someday be remembered as victors in the most poignant battle our world has ever faced.

Our story begins with Stone Edge Farm in Sonoma, California.

Beneath the idyllic vineyard, old oak trees and ancient rock lies a testing ground for new technologies sprung from our world’s greatest minds.

Researchers and entrepreneurs in the renewable energy sector use the Stone Edge Farm microgrid as a living laboratory for their projects. The microgrid’s founder, Mac McQuown, has given the gift of free use and open IP to these innovators and from it has come incredible progress.

The influence of the Stone Edge Farm microgrid reaches across the United States and overseas. Universities, utility companies, and startups are among the beneficiaries of the microgrid’s research and have led our series to an endless list of success stories that we can’t wait to share.