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.


Library-lending partnership gets a reboot

Borrow Direct takes a giant leap forward with open-source software.

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Doctoral student co-authors global plastics declaration

Cornell doctoral candidate Bethany Jorgensen co-authored the 2022 Lanzarote Declaration – a synthesized wish list of action in anticipation of a U.N. treaty on global plastic pollution in 2024.

Cornell leads $3M project to grow organic dry bean industry

Cornell AgriTech is leading a multidisciplinary research project to increase the sustainability of the organic dry bean industry in the Northeast and upper Midwest by overcoming production challenges while developing improved management practices that build soil health and resilience to climate change. 

Electric car sales drive toward cleaner air, less mortality

The continued sales growth of electric passenger vehicles will be having a greener, cleaner influence on air pollution in most metro U.S. regions, all the while reducing human death by mid-century.

Sustainability students bring dead solar panels back to life

Using polyurethane, resin, epoxy – and gallons of wit – the Solar Panel Reboot student team, part of the Cornell University Sustainability Design, provides an afterlife to old, broken photovoltaic boards.

Drew Harvell named US Science Envoy by State Department

Drew Harvell, professor emerita of ecology and evolutionary biology who studies sustainable marine biodiversity, is one of seven U.S. researchers named 2023 U.S. Science Envoys by the Department of State.

Students design robot to collect microplastics from beaches

The robot’s layered filtration system will gather tiny bits of plastic the size of a sesame seed and smaller, which contaminate ecosystems and damage human and animal health.

Warming climate prompts harmful oxygen loss in lakes

Unrelenting climate change is leading to extended, late-summer weeks of water stratification, which prompts varying degrees of oxygen deprivation in lakes, says new Cornell research.

MPA students find optimism at climate conference

Courtney Schneider (r) took a selfie with U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm, one of many memorable moments at the United Nations Conference on Climate Change. Three students in the Cornell Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy participated in the conference, known as COP27.

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