Jack O'Grady

Hey, I’m Jack.
I’m passionate about solving climate change with renewable energy technology.

I started posting projects on my website after my experience building a battery management system in college, which would not have been possible without other technical blogs like this. I think technical project sites are an important aspect of the open-source code community — sharing knowledge, implementations, and theory.

I spent the last three years using data to design, control, and optimize batteries at Rivian.

I started the ESS Data Science team, working as a Sr. Battery Data Scientist. My most recent focus was leading a project to optimize DC fast charging with reinforcement learning. In addition to AI-based optimization, I spent years utilizing fleet data to improve both the battery hardware and firmware.

Before that, I was a Battery Engineer on the BMS Algorithms group at Rivian, and before that I was studying Physics at USC. Outside of work, I’m usually skiing, surfing, or hacking on side projects.

With a thriving EV industry, we now need to accelerate the electrification of the grid.

When I began at Rivian in 2019, it was not clear that the automotive industry would rapidly move to electrification. We launched the R1T, R1S, and EDV to show how that these heavy-duty vehicles could be electrified, and we accomplished that mission: nearly every OEM is electrifying their trucks, SUVs, and vans.

In the grid, though, renewables only account for about 30% of global power generation, of which ~60% comes from hydropower (source: IEA). While so much progress has been made with renewables, there’s still so much left to do.

I believe AI will be paramount to rapidly scaling renewable energy in the grid.

AI lets us adapt to new energy technology faster, extract more value from existing deployments, and scale our optimization capabilities for future deployments in ways we haven’t been able to with traditional methods. Right now, I’m focused on exploring opportunities to combine my passion for RL-based optimization methods and my experience with energy systems to maximize my impact towards the electrification of the grid.

I’m deeply optimistic about the future of renewable energy systems with AI — stay tuned to see how this plays out, and drop me a note if you think about this space as well.