Energy, Environment & Sustainability

Cornell is a global leader in sustainability and climate change research, teaching and engagement. Our campuses are living laboratories for developing, testing and implementing solutions that address these most challenging issues.


Cornell experts aim for carbon neutrality via Earth Source Heat

Cornell engineering faculty and facility experts met with more than 100 members of the Ithaca community May 17 at an open forum to give an update on the Ithaca campus’s path toward carbon neutrality and its goal to heat campus in a climate-friendly way.

Grandfather and granddaughter to graduate together

Herb Doig started work on his master's degree in the 1950s and is now on the cusp of completing that journey at the age of 83, alongside his granddaughter Kiley McPeek.

Trash to treasure: Cornell’s pyrolysis kiln opens May 24

Cornell's new pyrolysis kiln opens May 24, when Johannes Lehmann, professor of soil science, will hold an open house 2-4 p.m., at the Leland Laboratory building.

CURB galvanizes Puerto Rican students’ lab experience

Visiting students from hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico honed their science skills by shadowing and working in laboratories across campus this semester.

Self-assembling 3D battery would charge in seconds

Uli Wiesner and collaborators have developed a block copolymer self-assembled 3D energy storage architecture that could help change the way batteries are constructed.

Atkinson Center brainstorms solutions for carbon removal

An Atkinson Center workshop May 4 looked for ways to use Cornell research to draw carbon out of the air and oceans and sequester it. 

Cornellians pitch in to update federal flood guide

The U.S. Geological Survey’s “Guidelines for Determining Flood Flow Frequency” has been updated, thanks to a large group of Cornellians.

Two Cornell-related teams chosen as ‘Reimagine the Canals’ finalists

Two Cornell teams are finalists in the Reimagine the Canals competition, a $2.5 million New York state contest that aspires to return the 200-year-old Erie Canal into an economic catalyst and tourism hotspot.

Forum on geothermal energy project set for May 17

A public forum Thursday, May 17, will provide an update on an enhanced geothermal energy system to heat the Ithaca campus sustainably without the use of fossil fuels.