School of Natural Resources and Environment

Sustainable Systems

Men and women of steel

SNRE's "Industrial Ecology" class recently toured the USS Steel Great Lakes Works on the Detroit River. The plant manufactures rolled and coated sheet steel. Students observed rolling mills, annealing furnaces and zinc-coating processes that galvanize the steel to prevent rust.

Pouring on the publicity

A 2011 master’s project has led to a local brewery installing nearly $250,000 in energy efficiencies, including a 144-panel roof solar array to provide energy to the brewing process. The efforts of the students, and the ongoing work of one in particular, were highlighted in a recent news report from WJBK-TV Fox 2.

Erb report examines public understanding of climate risks, choices

What can the social sciences contribute to the public debate about climate change? To answer that question, the Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise and the Union of Concerned Scientists gathered 90 leading scholars, business leaders, policy makers, advocates, religious leaders and journalists to explore how better to communicate climate science to a skeptical public and mobilize progress. The summary report of that workshop distills the collective wisdom of that landmark two-day event.

SNRE master's project organizes 'Green Communities' workshop

Municipalities and nonprofit organizations from southeast Michigan will be sharing the latest environmental infrastructure know-how this week at a Michigan Green Communities workshop organized by an SNRE master's project team. The workshop will provide an update to the Michigan Green Communities Challenge, a reporting mechanism for communities to track sustainability activity and share information with one another. The Economic Energy Analysis tool make its debut at the workshop.

image: From left: Ajay Varadharajan, Lawrence Han and Javier Rivera

SNRE students look to put the brakes on 'range anxiety' among electric vehicle owners

Three aspiring student entrepreneurs have set their sights on overcoming a major obstacle to electric vehicle (EV) adoption: "range anxiety." Range anxiety refers to the concerns of potential EV buyers about the limited range of these new automobiles and the accessibility of re-charging stations to keep them on the road. University of Michigan students Javier Rivera, Lawrence Han and Ajay Varadharajan believe they can eliminate these concerns by creating an EV network that matches the demand for electric vehicle power with supply.

Hoffman talks climate change on WEMU's 'Focus on the Environment'

SNRE Professor Andy Hoffman talks about reframing the climate change debate during an interview on WEMU-FM (89.1). The interview was aired during the public radio station's "November First Friday Focus on the Environment" show. The hosts are WEMU's David Fair and Lisa Wozniak, executive director of the Michigan League of Conservation Voters.

Wege Foundation makes $1.5 million pledge in support of sustainability at University of Michigan

The Wege Foundation, based in Grand Rapids, Mich., has pledged to fund a new graduate student fellowship and a professorship in the School of Natural Resources and Environment (SNRE) as part of its ongoing support of the school and the University of Michigan. Both gifts acknowledge the decades-long relationship between Peter M. Wege, the foundation's founder, and Jonathan W. Bulkley, who retired in June as a University of Michigan professor after 43 years of service. The announcements were made as part of a special academic panel discussion, organized to reflect upon the career and celebrate Professor Bulkley's research, teaching and mentoring accomplishments.

U-M launches collaboration to help Great Lakes cities adapt to a changing climate

Faced with increasing risks of intense storms, heat stress, clean water availability and economic hardship, municipal leaders are seeking high-quality, location-specific analyses to help plan for climate change impacts. That is the focus of a new $1.2 million University of Michigan research project called the Great Lakes Adaptation Assessment for Cities.

U-M students help build sustainable community in rural Africa

A merry-go-round that generates electricity to light a rural African schoolhouse is among the sustainability projects tackled this summer by a team of University of Michigan graduate students working with villagers in Liberia. With colleagues from Clemson University and the University of Liberia, the U-M student group also designed and installed a toilet system that creates biogas to fuel the school's kitchen stove and a solar-powered produce dehydrator that allows the villagers to keep dried mangoes, tomatoes and eggplant for up to a year without refrigeration. "The developing countries are a key to global sustainability," said Jose Alfaro, a doctoral student at the School of Natural Resources and Environment and co-founder of the U-M student group, Sustainability Without Borders.

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