Cleaning Up Heavy Industry

Creating a near-term roadmap for industrial decarbonization

The U.S. industrial sector is responsible for nearly a quarter of the nation’s climate pollution, but has been largely left out of federal climate investment packages. We are developing a near term technical and policy roadmap to electrifying low to medium temperature heat across the US. We’re also building an open database on industrial electrification technologies, and analyzing the use of geothermal to decarbonize heating processes. We are focusing on three industrial subsectors: major chemicals (ammonia, methylene, ethylene, and propylene), food and beverage, and pulp and paper. Policymakers need to know the specific industries, plant-level processes, electrification technologies, and locations that should be targeted. Our work will bridge this gap and give officials and industry players an empirically-grounded blueprint to accelerate industrial decarbonization. 

This project is supported by the Climate Imperative Foundation, the U.S. Energy Foundation, and Project Innerspace.

To learn more about this project, reach out to: Carrie Fernandes, carriefernandes@ucsb.edu