Professor Emerita Mary Durfee (SS) published a commentary “Existential Security: Lessons from the Pandemic and Arctic,” on the website for the Arctic Institute in Washington, D.C.
Adam Wellstead co-authored a piece with Paul Cairney titled Who can you trust during the coronavirus crisis? based off their paper, The Role of Trust in Policymaking.
Trust is essential during a crisis. It is necessary for cooperation. Cooperation helps people coordinate action, to reduce the need for imposition. It helps reduce uncertainty in a complex world. It facilitates social order and cohesiveness. In a crisis, almost-instant choices about who to trust or distrust make a difference between life and death.
Shan Zhou (SS) and Professor Emeritus Barry Solomon (SS) recently published “Do renewable portfolio standards in the United States stunt renewable electricity development beyond mandatory targets?” in the journal Energy Policy. This article explores the question of whether the renewable portfolio standard (RPS) serves as a floor or a cap on renewable electricity capacity deployment in the U.S.
A panel dataset from 1998 to 2017 is constructed for 28 states that have adopted a mandatory RPS in this timeframe. Using hybrid random effects negative binomial regression models, the authors find that when constrained by renewable electricity potential capacity, more stringent RPSs are significantly associated with a lower level of non-RPS related renewable electricity capacity additions. This negative effect of the RPS on beyond RPS compliance renewable electricity development is weakened by the abundance of renewable energy resources.
Richelle Winkler (SS) recently published “Exporting Consumption: Lifestyle Migration and Energy Use” in the journal Global Environmental Change. This paper is the result of her collaboration with Costa Rican colleagues during her sabbatical year. The article is available here.
Mark Rhodes (SS) published an article in the geography journal Asia Pacific Viewpoint detailing the use of music by the Khmer Rouge during the 1975-79 Cambodian Genocide. The title of the paper is Music work: Traditional Cambodian music and state-building under the Khmer Rouge.
Angie Carter (Social Sciences) was awarded the Rural Sociological Society Early Career Award of $1,680 for “Growing Food, Feeding Communities of Practice: Preliminary Analysis of Community Food Provider Networks in the Western U.P.”
The West Point Foundry in Cold Spring, NY, the site of an intensive industrial heritage and archaeology (IHA) project by Michigan Tech faculty and grad students from 2002-2009, was designated an American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Historical Mechanical Engineering Landmark on Oct. 5.
One of the largest integrated iron foundries and machine shops in the first half of the 19th century, the West Point Foundry is also one of the most intact industrial archaeological sites of its type in America.
The Tech IHA investigations helped lead to the designation. Arron Kotlensky (M.S. IHA 2007) wrote the nomination on behalf of Scenic Hudson, the property owners, and he and Steven Walton (SS) were at the designation ceremony to lead tours for the president of ASME, local historical society board members, the press and the interested public.
The story received coverage in the Cold Spring media, Foundry Management and Technology and by the ASME.
Walton and Kotlensky also designed the brochure for the event.
Richelle Winkler was recently invited by the Director of the United States Bureau of the Census to serve as an appointee to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Census Scientific Advisory Committee (CSAC) on a three-year term. The CSAC consists of about 21 members from academia, public and private enterprise, and nonprofit organizations. It provides strategic perspective and advice to the Director of the Census Bureau on the full range of Census Bureau programs and activities.
Roman Sidortsov is 1 of 19 residents recently appointed to the UP Energy Task Force by Governor Gretchen Whitmer. In early June, Governor Whitmer signed Executive Order 2019-14 creating the UP Energy Task Force. According to the Governor’s office, “the task force will assess the UP’s overall energy needs and how they are currently being met; identify and evaluate potential changes in energy supply and distribution; and formulate alternative solutions to meet the UP’s energy needs – including alternatives to the current distribution of propane through Line 5, which poses an unacceptable threat to The Great Lakes”. The task force will submit a final report to the Governor in two stages with the first part being due March 31, 2020 and the remainder due March 31, 2021.
Faculty and students from MTU’s Historical Environments Spatial Analytics Lab, the Department of Social Sciences, and GLRC traveled to the annual meeting of the American Association of Geographers in Washington D.C. Don Lafreniere (SS/GLRC Faculty) presented a paper entitled “Public Participatory Historical GIS to Build a Spatial Data Infrastructure of Historical Landscapes and Environments”. Dan Trepal (IHA PhD Candidate) presented a paper entitled :Using Historical Spatial Data Infrastructures as a Tool for Hazard Assessment in Urban Industrial Archaeology”. Sun Nguyen (EEP MS Student) presented a paper entitled “Citizen Engagement in Minnesota Environmental Decision Making”. Sophia Ford (EEP MS Student) presented a paper entitled “Mineral Property Law as Exclusion: Obfuscating Mineral Ownership”. Rose Hildebrandt (Psychology Undergraduate and SURF) presented a paper entitled “Empowering Youth to Be a Voice in Neighborhood Change Through Geospatial Technologies”. Tim Stone (Sustainability Sciences Undergraduate and Portage Health URIP) presented a paper entitled “Exploring the Social and Built Determinants of Health of Children in Early Twentieth Century Calumet, MI”.