Research Themes

The Institute on the Environment organizes its problem-solving research around broad themes, each focused on a major environmental issue facing humankind, and each capable of encompassing a diverse array of research projects. It is expected that these themes will evolve over time as existing problems are addressed and new ones emerge, and input into this process from all stakeholders is welcome.

Each theme is examined from the twin perspectives of sustainability and restoration. The sustainability perspective addresses how human and ecological systems can be made sufficiently resilient and adaptive to weather future constraints and demands on their resources. The restoration perspective has both a retrospective and a prospective aspect: it looks back at damaged and degraded systems, and forward toward measures to re-create healthy ecological systems and human communities.

With broad input from faculty and stakeholders, the Institute’s Founding Fellows have selected the following initial set of research themes:

Climate change adaptation and mitigation

The consensus view in the scientific community is that anthropogenic sources of greenhouse gases are contributing to rapid and dramatic changes in the global climate. The Institute’s climate change research theme focuses on understanding and responding to the effects of this changing climate on ecological and human systems. Tools from the engineering fields, the natural and social sciences, and the policy disciplines will be used to develop interdisciplinary research centered on the most effective and efficient means to mitigate and adapt to a changing climate in both industrialized and developing countries, and in urban and rural settings.

Renewable energy and the environment

Working with the Initiative for Renewable Energy and the Environment (IREE), the Institute facilitates the development, analysis, evaluation, and propagation of clean, efficient, sustainable, and environmentally benign renewable energy technologies. This research includes traditional economic and engineering studies as well as socio-political, ecological, and policy analyses concerning the development and use of various technologies.

Landscapes and watersheds

This theme focuses on measures to sustain and restore the “critical zone” of landscapes and watersheds, from the bedrock through the lower atmospheric boundary layer - the part of the planet in which we and most other life forms reside. The Institute promotes engineering, science, social science, and policy research aiming toward sustaining intact systems, remediating damaged systems, and re-creating the conditions that support functional and sustainable landscapes, lakes, and rivers.

Human and ecosystem health

The World Health Organization’s Global Burden of Disease project indicates that environmental factors are implicated in a significant fraction of global death and disease. The Institute’s human and ecosystem health research theme focuses on understanding and reducing or eliminating the adverse health impacts of pollution and other environmental stressors on humans and ecosystems, and addressing them in a more integrated fashion.