Annual Report for the Academic Year 2025–2026
E-ffiliates
Princeton E-ffiliates Partnership cultivates robust partnerships with industry to accelerate the development and implementation of innovative energy and environmental solutions. As a corporate membership program, it positions organizations to engage with academic experts, Princeton students, and partners from diverse sectors.
INDUSTRY ENGAGEMENT
Worley and Princeton convene industry leaders to explore the future of data centers
In response to artificial intelligence driving an unprecedented wave of data center investment, E-ffiliates member Worley brought together industry senior leaders from across technology, energy, finance, academia, and infrastructure with the aim of tackling a critical question: How can we deliver data centers at pace without compromising community needs, sustainability, and long-term value?
Hosted by Worley in collaboration with the Andlinger Center and another E-ffiliates member, the workshop coalesced organizations across the data center ecosystem at Princeton University to identify practical ways to overcome delivery challenges and sustainability issues.
At the workshop, participants widely concurred that durable data center development will rely on responsible resource stewardship, early community engagement, resilient workforces and supply chains, transparent governance, and aligned financing and risk. Though profitability is important, participants emphasized that long-term value depends on community acceptance, sustainability performance, reliable access to power and water, and the ability to adapt to evolving technologies.
Speakers further discussed low- or net-zero carbon infrastructure and onsite power generation as ways to future-proof developments. Others noted smarter management and repeatable design approaches, drawing on proven engineering, technology, and operating models as ways to streamline deployment while minimizing risk.
“It’s important that industries come together to find solutions – data centers are rapidly becoming critical infrastructure,” said Fabricio Sousa, president at Worley Consulting and Technology Solutions. “As the pace and scale of development accelerates, decisions made today around power, water, permitting, community impacts, and sustainability will shape not only the performance of these assets, but also their impact on the energy systems, communities, and economies that depend on them.”
Captions: (Cover) Princeton University and E-ffiliates members held the day-long workshop in the newly-built Commons area. (Photo by Kevin Birch)
New Members
ARA PARTNERS
Ara Partners is a global private equity and infrastructure firm focused on industrial decarbonization and the transition to a lower‑carbon economy. The firm invests in companies that deliver practical, scalable solutions to reduce emissions and lower the intensity of resource and energy consumption in heavy industry. As an E‑ffiliates member, Ara Partners will contribute its perspective on mobilizing private capital and structuring projects to accelerate the deployment of critical industrial process technologies. The firm is particularly focused on transforming core industrial systems—applying technical expertise, creativity, and rigorous engineering to redesign processes in the highest-emitting sectors of the industrial economy. By partnering with the Andlinger Center, Ara aims to deepen its view on the future of industrial decarbonization and use those insights to guide its investment strategy and portfolio development.
SIEMENS ENERGY
Siemens Energy is a corporation that delivers energy technology solutions with a focus on transforming the grid and energy infrastructure. The company, wholly independent following its spin off from Siemens AG in 2020, is currently located in 90 countries and operates across the energy landscape to provide the solutions, products, hardware, digital applications and more that companies need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions while increasing their reliable and affordable energy supply. As an E-ffiliates member, Siemens Energy is interested in exploring strategies for covering the rapidly expanding energy needs of data centers. The company has started working with faculty to model different scenarios in which the energy that powers data centers could be sourced in part from local clean energy sources contracted out with power purchasing agreements.
E-ffiliates Tech Talks
E-ffiliates convenes industry, academic, and government experts to discuss emerging energy technologies and ideas. The meetings highlight the energy challenges on which the Andlinger Center and its corporate partners are at the vanguard of global progress.
Recent talk topics have included:
- Low-Cost, Electrolytic Hydrogen: From Industrial Uses to Grid Stabilization: April 2026
- Financing Clean Tech in Hard-to-abate Sectors: January 2026
