Industry is a leading climate polluter: Our road map shows what’s needed to cut industrial emissions in fast-growing countries.
Academic rigor, journalistic flair
Colorado School of Mines
Colorado School of Mines is a public research university devoted to engineering and applied science. It has the highest admissions standards of any public university in Colorado and among the highest of any public university in the U.S.
Mines has distinguished itself by developing a curriculum and research program geared towards responsible stewardship of the earth and its resources. In addition to strong education and research programs in traditional fields of science and engineering, Mines is one of a very few institutions in the world having broad expertise in resource exploration, extraction, production and utilization. As such, Mines occupies a unique position among the world’s institutions of higher education.
Since its founding in 1874, the translation of the school’s mission into educational programs has been influenced by the needs of society. Those needs are now focused more clearly than ever before. The world faces a crisis in balancing resource availability with environmental protection and Mines and its programs are central to the solution.
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A warmer atmosphere can hold more water – and that makes floods harder to predict. To help, we improved one common tool used to predict floods.
Liquid water below the ice determines how fast an ice stream flows. As the ice sheet gets thinner, more of that salty groundwater could rise.
Russia isn’t a major producer of uranium, but it handles a large share of the steps that turn it into nuclear fuel. That makes it a major player in this globalized industry.
Clean energy innovation, giving up coal, cutting methane and getting China and India on board for net-zero can deliver progress at COP26.
Major international donors, including the US and UK, are pledging to stop funding fossil fuel projects overseas, but they aren’t making the equivalent cuts at home.
Energy and climate policies aren’t always headed in the same direction, but if they work together they can tackle two of the biggest challenges of our time.
Two energy and climate policy experts take a closer look at the Leaders Summit on Climate, the US pledge and today’s industrial reality.
Right now, the nation is almost entirely dependent on other countries for minerals that are used in everything from wind turbines to strike fighters and satellites.
The US is formally back in the Paris climate agreement as of today. As one of the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitters, it has a lot of work to do, with food security, health and safety at stake.
Bold visions for slowing global warming have emerged from all over the world. What’s not clear is how countries will meet them.
Choosing former Secretary of State John Kerry as climate envoy is the first step. To regain trust, the U.S. will also have to take concrete actions to cut its own greenhouse gas emissions.
The pandemic recession has reduced US energy demand, roiling budgets in states that are major fossil fuel producers. But politics and culture can impede efforts to look beyond oil, gas and coal.
Both drought and violence drove many Syrians out of their homes; even if the war ends, the continuing difficulty of farming will make it hard for them to return.
The ‘used water’ that flows from our showers, dishwashers and toilets isn’t a waste to engineers – it contains valuable materials. The challenge is recovering them and turning them into products.
Much disaster reporting simply chronicles events, but good journalism digs deeper and examines causes. Stories about Colorado wildfires have raised questions about risk, especially on fire anniversaries.
Newly released data show how the hundreds of abandoned mines in the western US discharge the same volume as the Gold King Mine spill every two days.
The dramatic wastewater spill in the Animas River is past its critical phase, but given the long history of untreated mine waste, there will surely be more like it.
Hydrologists, climate scientists and policymakers are beginning to grapple with a difficult question: who will be affected most by longer and more frequent droughts?
Authors
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Assistant Professor, Division of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences, Colorado School of Mines
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PhD Candidate in Space Resources, Colorado School of Mines
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Postdoctoral fellow, Colorado School of Mines
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Fellow, Payne Institute for Public Policy, Colorado School of Mines
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Non-resident Fellow, Payne Institute of Public Policy, Colorado School of Mines
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Director for Technology and Innovation at the International Renewable Energy Agency and Payne Institute Fellow, Colorado School of Mines
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Professor of International Studies, Colorado School of Mines
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Payne Institute Program Manager, Colorado School of Mines
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PhD Student in Hydrology, Colorado School of Mines
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Assistant Professor of Geophysics and Hydrologic Science and Engineering, Colorado School of Mines
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Professor of Public Policy and Director, Payne Institute, Colorado School of Mines
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Emeritus Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Colorado School of Mines
