Melissa Klembara is currently acting as a Senior Technical Advisor in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Manufacturing Office, where she is currently managing roughly $200 million in RD&D investments in the areas of energy-water nexus and the circular economy of plastics. Specifically, Melissa is leading DOE’s National Alliance for Water Innovations (NAWI), a $110 million desalination R&D consortium. NAWI is led by Lawrence Berkley National Laboratory with NREL, ORNL and NETL along with over 230 alliance members across the water community. Melissa is also co-leading a jointly funded R&D effort in AMO with the Bioenergy Technology Office (BETO) on the circular economy of plastics, including the Bio-Optimized Technologies to keep Thermoplastics out of Landfills and the Environment (BOTTLE) consortium led by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Previously, Melissa managed the $170 million public-private Manufacturing USA Institute on process intensification called RAPID, led by the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE). Prior to joining AMO, Melissa served as a Chief of Staff for both the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Energy Efficiency and the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Renewable Power. She also spent several years as a Technology Manager in the Bioenergy Technology Office working on all aspects of their RD&D portfolio. Before joining the federal government, Melissa worked at International Paper Company as a process engineer and corporate auditor. She holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineer from the University of Maryland as well as two master’s degrees from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland.