U-M experts can discuss President Obama’s energy agenda

March 14, 2013
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ANN ARBOR—President Obama is expected to talk about his second-term energy agenda Friday during his speech at Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, Ill. The University of Michigan has experts who can offer insight on issues related to sustainability, climate change, alternative energy and more.

Barry Rabe is a professor at the Ford School of Public Policy and a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. He was the first social scientist to receive a Climate Protection Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2006 and is a member of the National Research Council committee on Risk Assessment and Risk Governance for Shale Gas Development. Rabe is available for interviews on Obama administration climate initiatives and programs the EPA has launched in recent years. He can be reached at (734) 765-1677 or brabe@umich.edu.

Andrew Hoffman, director of the Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise, can field questions about the social debate over climate change and why some people reject the scientific consensus. Hoffman is the Holcim Professor of Sustainable Enterprise, a position with joint appointments at the Ross School of Business and School of Natural Resources and Environment. He can be reached at (734) 763-9455, (617) 285-0920 or ajhoff@umich.edu.

Mark Barteau, the DTE Energy Professor of Advanced Energy Research and director of the U-M Energy Institute, could discuss a wide range of energy issues including the intersection of electric power generation and transportation. “We have almost two separate energy infrastructures that don’t intersect very much and those are electric power generation and transportation,” Barteau said. “The greatest challenge is to create more crossover between those two.” Barteau is a chemical engineer whose research focuses on catalysis, a process at the heart of fuel production. He can be reached at (734) 763-7401 or barteau@umich.edu.

Don Siegel, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, can discuss the importance of energy storage and batteries in enabling sustainable technologies. Siegel can be reached at (734) 764-4808 or djsiege@umich.edu.

Andre Boehman, a professor of mechanical engineering, can discuss energy policy as it pertains to transportation, alternative fuels and energy efficiency. He is an expert on fuels and combustion. Boehman can be reached at (734) 764-6995 or boehman@umich.edu.

 

 

M planet blue: the sustainable differenceU-M Sustainability fosters a more sustainable world through collaborations across campus and beyond aimed at educating students, generating new knowledge, and minimizing our environmental footprint. Learn more at sustainability.umich.edu.