Cece Luciano, Thermal Batteries, California
Cece Luciano, who has been in the industry for 4 years, is a TPV Module Development & Test Engineer at Antora Energy.
Why is clean energy important to you? The frustrating reality about climate change is that it often disproportionately affects those that did the least to cause it. We’re already seeing this reality with changes in weather events, sea level, global temperatures, air quality, and more: those from disadvantaged communities and countries tend to see the brunt of these effects. Embracing clean energy allows me to be part of the solution to this problem.
What's a memorable clean energy project you’ve worked on? I am most proud of my work on implementing Antora’s heat-to-power thermophotovoltaic (TPV) technology into our first commercial-scale system. Helping to bring TPV technology from the lab into a real-world system was a very rewarding experience, paving the way for TPV to help eliminate gigatons of industrial emissions.
What did you do prior to working in clean energy? Why did you transition to the clean energy industry? I had been pursuing a career in the medical field for the majority of my time in college. I transitioned my focus to clean energy—studying chemical engineering and renewable energy technologies in graduate school—because I felt working to combat climate change would provide the best opportunity to make a positive impact with my career while also working on challenging and rewarding engineering problems.
What do you wish more people knew about the clean energy industry? It’s not solely a matter of new technology needing to be developed; in fact, in many cases, the technological solutions are already available. The industry needs people from all backgrounds with many different skill sets to ensure that clean energy solutions, once they’re developed, can actually be adopted and implemented smoothly.
