Sustainability & environment

Daniel Kammen named senior adviser to USAID

10/21/21 — Kammen, who holds joint appointments in energy and resources, public policy and nuclear engineering, will serve as senior adviser for energy, climate and innovation for the U.S. Agency for International Development.

San Francisco skyline seen through brown haze

New study shows how air pollution varies block by block

09/07/21 — Researchers used Google Street View cars to show that levels of air pollution vary not only by region, such as between urban and rural areas, but also by city street

Five new hires in the Climate Equity and Environmental Justice cluster

New faculty cluster to focus on climate change, environmental justice

09/02/21 — CNR: Five assistant professors, including civil and environmental engineering's Maya Carrasquillo, will bring their disparate perspectives to research on battling the “climate gap”

Stock photo of light shining through a window revealing smoke

How much wildfire smoke is infiltrating our homes?

09/01/21 — Environmental engineers used crowdsourced data to measure indoor air quality during California’s wildfires.

Frame capture from video about making plastics self-destruct

How to make plastic truly biodegradable

08/31/21 — Professor Ting Xu and her students have come up with a solution for the global problem of single-use plastics: embed enzymes so that the unwanted plastic can self-destruct with a little heat and water

Firefighter in helmet amid wildfire flames.

Fighting wildfires with computing and data science

07/13/21 — Berkeley's Fire Research Group uses algorithms, machine learning, and simulation to improve fire prevention efforts.

Video frame showing children on seesaw amid differing levels of air pollution

New studies of deadly air pollutant document environmental inequality

04/28/21 Washington Post — “The deck is stacked against people of color,” says civil and environmental engineering assistant professor Joshua Apte

Out of the bag

04/26/21 — A chemical process that converts polyethylene plastic into a strong adhesive could create economic incentives for recycling plastic bags.

Solar panels and wind power turbine in the Tehachapi Mountains

Earth Day message for California: Move faster on climate change

04/22/21 Los Angeles Times — Scientists led by Berkeley energy professor Dan Kammen urge aggressive action to confront the climate crisis

Graduate student Ivan Jayapurna with a sample film of PCL (polycaprolactone), a new, biodegradable polyester plastic.

New process makes ‘biodegradable’ plastics truly compostable

04/21/21 — Ting Xu's lab has embedded polymer-eating enzymes in plastic to allow programmed degradation after the plastic's useful life is over

maps showing declining radiation dose rates in the Fukushima evacuation zone over time

10 years after Fukushima, Berkeley monitoring still in use

03/11/21 Berkeley Lab — Response to earthquake, nuclear plant disaster led Kai Vetter and colleagues to new programs and technologies

Bundles of plastic bags awaiting recycling

Upcycling: Turning plastic bags into adhesives

12/17/20 — New catalytic process can stick polyethylene to metal or other materials, potentially boosting the economics of recycling

Clean Air Car Race turns 50

11/05/20 — In 1970, two teams of engineering students participated in a cross-country car race to test technologies that reduced automobile emissions.

Ricardo San Martin and Holly Forbes in the UC Botanical Garden

How SCET director is protecting trees needed for a COVID vaccine

10/23/20 — A compound in Chilean soapbark trees is a key ingredient in a COVID-19 vaccine; Ricardo San Martin wants to ensure that the bark is sustainably harvested.

Super sand

04/14/20 — Engineers have developed a mineral-coated sand that can soak up toxic metals from water, cleaning up stormwater as it replenishes aquifers.

Environmental engineering students win $25K grant from the EPA

02/20/20 — The team, supervised by Professor Ashok Gadgil, will use the money to develop ways to remove arsenic from drinking water in California.

Sustainable sand gives pollution a one-two punch

12/05/19 — Berkeley engineers have developed a mineral-coated sand that can soak up toxic metals like lead and cadmium from water.

Berkeley researchers help secure water future

09/27/19 — The National Alliance for Water Innovation , which includes researchers from Berkeley Engineering, has been awarded a five-year, $100 million Energy-Water Desalination Hub by the U.S. Department of Energy to address water security issues in the United States.

Making the invisible visible

07/22/19 Berkeley Lab — Berkeley researchers have developed a new type of sensor network that is affordable and capable of tracking soot (black carbon). With more than 100 custom-built sensors installed across West Oakland for 100 days, the team created the largest black carbon monitoring network deployed in a single city.

Caleb Wright and Charles Yang at the U.N. Environmental Assembly in Kenya

Berkeley engineers propose solutions for reaching U.N. development goals

05/28/19 — Three UC Berkeley undergrads attended the U.N. Environmental Assembly in Kenya and saw their proposals included in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.