As Climate Week NYC continues, global tech trade association ITI and member company Accenture convened leading climate experts from the Biden Administration and the tech industry for “Sustainable Technology: AI's Role in the Energy Transition.”

The event featured a fireside conversation between Carla Frisch, Principal Deputy Director of the Office of Policy at the U.S. Department of Energy, and ITI’s Executive Vice President of Public Sector Policy Gordon Bitko. The fireside chat was followed by panel discussions on upstream and downstream technologies with sustainability experts from Accenture, AMD, Cisco, Samsung, Siemens, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and ITI.

Throughout the day, the group explored the role of AI and next-generation technologies in driving sustainability and the opportunities and challenges these innovations present when it comes to addressing the energy transition and climate change.

The first panel discussion was moderated by James Prussing from leading climate change government relations firm Boundary Stone Partners. It provided insight from industry leaders on how the tech sector can coordinate across stakeholders on the responsible use of AI. The second panel was moderated by Axios’ Senior Business Reporter Hope King, where they discussed downstream and innovative tech in this context.

“ITI was proud to convene industry experts and administration leaders for this important discussion on AI and the energy transition,” said Gordon Bitko, ITI Executive Vice President of Public Sector Policy. “The public and private sectors can realize our shared clean energy and sustainability goals while advancing innovation if we work together to modernize the grid, promote resource efficiency, expand access to alternative power sources, and manage the carbon lifecycle.”

Earlier this week, ITI released a new policy guide urging lawmakers to leverage AI’s immense benefits while reducing its environmental impact by building a reliable, resilient, and modern infrastructure that supports technology’s growth.