Sustainability is a strategic initiative in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences. Below are the most current stories showcasing our college's sustainability efforts.
Subscribe to the Sustainability News listsesrv
New subscribers can join by sending mail to: L-EMS-SUSTAINABILITY-COUNCIL-NEWS-subscribe-request@lists.psu.edu
Researchers awarded grant to advance geothermal energy science
06/02/2021
06/02/2021
Penn State scientists are working to predict possible breaks in massve underground reservoirs that store geothermal energy and how to mitigate the potential fallout.
Scientists develop transparent electrode that boosts solar cell efficiency
05/28/2021
05/28/2021
Developing new ultrathin metal electrodes has allowed researchers to create semitransparent perovskite solar cells that are highly efficient and can be coupled with traditional silicon cells to greatly boost the performance of both devices, said an international team of scientists.
'Getting to Negative: Strategies, Ethics and Co-benefits' webinar on May 19
05/13/2021
05/13/2021
Increasingly aggressive strategies are needed to reduce current and future carbon emissions and proactively remove carbon-based heat-trapping gasses that have been emitted to date. A panel of experts will discuss this topic during the webinar "Getting to negative: strategies, ethics and co-benefits."
College of EMS offsets carbon emissions one tree at a time
05/11/2021
05/11/2021
With a sled full of wooden stakes, green tree shelters and saplings in tow, Tim White made his way across acres of mud and grass and at times ankle-deep water to a three-person team planting saplings along a trench.
Penn State, University of Freiburg partner to form Virtual Classroom Project
05/03/2021
05/03/2021
In 2020, Penn State and the University of Freiburg launched a pilot program to create collaborative, integrated virtual classroom courses by providing development and implementation money to faculty teams.
Energy Days to be held virtually on May 19 and 20
04/26/2021
04/26/2021
Energy Days, an annual conference that brings together professionals working in all areas of energy, will be held on May 19 and 20. This year's event will be virtual, and it is free and open to the public.
Sustainability awards recognize student leadership, commitment
04/21/2021
04/21/2021
This month, Penn State's Sustainability Institute (SI) and the Student Sustainability Advisory Council (SSAC) honored six Penn State students for their leadership and commitment to sustainability throughout their time at Penn State.
When calculating the social cost of methane, equity matters
04/21/2021
04/21/2021
The social cost of methane -- a greenhouse gas that is 30 times as potent as carbon dioxide in its ability to trap heat -- varies by as much as an order of magnitude between industrialized and developing regions of the world, according to researchers from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), UC Berkeley and Penn State.
EarthTalks: Head of nuclear engineering looks to stars for clean energy
04/11/2021
04/11/2021
Jean Paul Allain, professor of nuclear engineering and head of the Ken and Mary Alice Lindquist Department of Nuclear Engineering at Penn State, will discuss the recent progress made in nuclear fusion, emerging technologies and the remaining challenges to realizing energy generation from a star here on Earth at a talk at 4 p.m. Monday, April 12.
Webinar: 'Planning for the Unplanned: Designing Resilience in Energy Systems'
04/06/2021
04/06/2021
A panel of energy experts from Penn State and industry will discuss how energy systems are currently designed to be resilient to extreme weather events, and how they may need to be designed in the future. The panel discussion, which is free and open to the public, will be broadcast at 2 p.m. EDT on Monday, April 12 via Zoom.