Innovation Heroes

Crowdsourcing Renewable Energy Innovations with NREL

April 29, 2020 HeroX Season 1 Episode 6
Innovation Heroes
Crowdsourcing Renewable Energy Innovations with NREL
Show Notes

Oftentimes, you see organizations that want to innovate, but they’re stuck within this framework that they’ve been using for years and they miss the simplest suggestions for innovation. That’s why there is a need to merge the industries and allow people with different perspectives to jump in with creative ideas and bring to the table new ways of looking at any given problem.

The American-Made Challenges is a broad portfolio of prizes that is trying to create innovative ideas related to solar, water, geothermal and the whole gamut of renewables, thus giving small businesses a chance to get money more quickly than ever before.  

Today, I am joined by Debbie Brodt-Giles from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), and Liz Treadwell – Head of Customer Engagement at HeroX – and together we’re going to help you learn first-hand how NREL and HeroX partnered on the American-Made Challenges. We’ll also get into the specifics and dig into some of the key learnings, so tune in to our conversation to hear everything there is to know about these challenges.

Listen to this episode to find out more about the American-Made Challenges, who can apply to these competitions, why these prize-driven projects bring great results and support innovation, what are the upcoming challenges that we can look forward to, and many more.

In this episode, you will learn:

  • How the Solar Prize competition works. (04:29)
  • The most challenging aspects of running a challenge. (11:46)
  • A few examples of the creativity and the innovation Debbie has seen from non-traditional industries participants. (15:44)
  • Some of the benefits Debbie has seen as a result of this prize model. (30:05)
  • Why you should apply for these types of competition. (32:16)
  • Who initiates these challenges and why. (42:07)


Connect with Debbie:

Useful HeroX resources:

🔉 About the Innovation Heroes podcast

The Innovation Heroes series covers all things open innovation, crowdsourcing, and remote work. It’s time to open up the airways, share strategies, engage partners, and leverage the power of crowd intelligence to expedite solutions to the pressing problems facing every level of organization, individuals, and the world. The key word here is OPEN.

We're bringing our partners in innovation, organizations who have run their own crowdsourcing projects, innovator powerhouses, and remote work legends into the spotlight. There is a global network ready to contribute time, energy and intelligence to just about any challenge that comes their way. All we need to do is provide the opportunity. Thank you for being a part of the solution. Discover the Power of the Crowd.

Adam
is your Podcast Host at HeroX, connecting with innovation leaders from around the world to gain insights on how they approach innovation, the technologies they're most excited about, and how these innovations impact their industries. HeroX is a platform and open marketplace for crowdsourcing innovation that allows anyone, anywhere, to solve everyday business and world challenges using the power of the crowd.

Connect with Adam: LinkedIn, adam.olsen@herox.com...