MIT Professor Uses AI to Tackle Climate Change Challenges

Priya Donti's upbringing instilled in her a desire to address global inequities, which later fueled her passion for applying artificial intelligence to climate change.

Her focus sharpened after learning that climate change would intensify existing inequalities around the world.

Initially drawn to chemistry for solar panel innovation, Donti discovered the potential of AI in integrating renewable energy into power grids.

This revelation led her to pursue a PhD combining computer science and public policy to develop algorithms for managing renewable-heavy power grids at scale.

While pursuing her PhD, Donti co-founded Climate Change AI, a nonprofit aimed at connecting experts and resources in the climate and sustainability fields.

The goal is to foster collaboration between scientists, academics, practitioners, and policymakers for impactful climate solutions.

At MIT, Donti is dedicated to using computer science to address critical societal challenges, with a particular focus on environmental sustainability.

Her work leverages deep learning to improve the forecasting, optimization, and control of electric power systems that rely on renewable energy sources.

Donti is developing solutions to optimize power grid costs while accounting for the physical constraints of the grid, outperforming existing technologies in both speed and cost-effectiveness.

She is also creating synthetic data to train machine learning systems for power system optimization, addressing the challenge of data privacy and security.

Donti's contributions have earned her accolades, including the U.S. Department of Energy Computational Science Graduate Fellowship and recognition as an innovator under 35 by MIT Technology Review.

Next spring, she will co-teach a class on AI for Climate Action, collaborating with experts in biodiversity, ecosystems, and Earth science to further advance the field.