This award is funded under NSF's Science, Engineering, and Education for Sustainability (SEES) activities, which aim to address the challenges of creating a sustainable world. This Research Coordination Network (RCN) sustainable energy project brings together a multidisciplinary team including U.S. academics from Arizona State University, Northeastern University, University of Michigan and Rochester Institute of Technology , together with academics from Cardiff University (U.K) and Mountains of the Moon and Makerere Universities (Uganda) as well as researchers at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the US Army Corps of Engineers.

Based on concepts of strong and weak ties, the network will build ties among stakeholders for sustainable energy systems with subgroups focused on 1) innovations in energy technologies, 2) sustainability implications of manufacture, use and end-of-life at scale, and 3) energy and human development. Ties between and within groups will be developed through industrial, government and developing country residencies through which graduate students acquire tacit knowledge necessary to bridge various stages of the innovation system.

This project develops knowledge and the human capital necessary for sustainable energy systems as well as mechanisms for interdisciplinary training necessary in a variety of technical domains.