HUCE 2010-2011 Faculty Seed Grant Award Recipients

Sea Level Rise in the Greater Boston Area: Strategies for Adaptation
Boston’s complex geography leaves the city and surrounding communities vulnerable to sea level rise. By bringing in the perspectives of climate science, law and public policy, urban planning, and design, the faculty group will evaluate potential strategies for adapting to the expected sea level rise in the Greater Boston area over the course of this century.

Lead faculty: David Barron (HLS); Gerald Frug (HLS); Jerold Kayden (GSD, HKS); Daniel P. Schrag (Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, SEAS); Charles Waldheim (GSD)

Biological Approaches to the Recovery of Scarce Energy Materials
The development and expansion of large scale "green" technologies to meet the growing societal energy demands, while minimizing CO2 generation, relies on the availability of scare metals. This interdisciplinary research team will explore the possibility of using microbes for the extraction and recovery of scare metals, making the production of green materials more cost-effective.

Lead faculty: David R. Clarke (SEAS); Peter R. Girguis (Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology); Evelyn L. Hu (SEAS); Colleen Hansel (SEAS); Richard Losick (Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology)

What is the Real Cost of Disasters?
This project brings together faculty from the fields of global health, climate science, and economics to develop new methodologies to calculate the cost of disasters—including economic, political, and public health consequences—with the goal of contributing to discussions of climate change adaptation strategies.

Lead faculty: Jennifer Leaning (HSPH, HMS); Michael VanRooyen (HSPH, HMS); in conjunction with the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative and the FXB Center for Health and Human Rights

Global History of Energy
An initiative of the Joint Center for History and Economics, this research project focuses on the history of energy use and transformation and its interaction with economic, social, and environmental processes in a global context. Its outcome will be a major new research and educational program which sets the history of energy in a broad context of economic, environmental, and social change.

Lead faculty: Alison Frank (Department of History); Richard Hornbeck (Department of Economics); Ian Miller (Department of History)

Characterization and Assessment of Domestic Climate Policies
As the international climate change policy process continues to move slowly, domestic policies become even more important for meaningful progress. This project will work to advance public policy addressing global climate change through an assessment of domestic (national and possibly sub-national) climate-change policies in both industrialized and developing countries.

Lead faculty: Robert N Stavins (HKS); William Hogan (HKS); Forest Reinhardt (HBS)