News

Debate on nuclear energy (description by Alejandro Fiocco) At the beginning of March, ESD students gathered once again for the much anticipated second event in our series of debates. This time, the discussion was around a rather hotter topic (in every sense of the word). Considering the goals set in the Paris agreement, the debate asked if Nuc…

The class of 2016/2017 have started a new bloghttps://thinkingsustainably.wixsite.com/esd40Every month a different class member will write a new post based on their personal interests and opinions – but will be based on a specific sustainability theme. The posts will have an average read time of 8 minutes. We hope you enjoy reading the blog! If you…

Debate on dirty industries (description by Jof Ruxton)On Wednesday 7th February, students participated in a lively debate on the topic: "Dirty industries, do we really need them or can we do without them?”. The afternoon was started off with a thought-provoking talk from Caroline Still who shared her experience in South Africa in the mining industr…

Congratulations to Katherine Bruce ESD 16-17 on winning the Space for Sustainability award 2017.Katherine submitted a paper titled "Using Satellites to Unlock Europe’s Untapped Resource.  Accelerating the transition to the bioeconomy. " with Gabriele De Canio (PhD Student in Applied Mathematics, Unviersity of Cambridge.)For more information and a l…

Dick Fenner has create a blog on the need for multi functional design of sustainable urban drainage which is posted on the Urban Flood Resilence website. You can view what he has to say by clicking on the following link http://blogs.nottingham.ac.uk/blue-greencities/2018/01/16/multi-functional-design/

"Investigating the association of healthcare-seeking behavior with the freshness of indoor spaces in low-income tenement housing in Mumbai."Current student Ramit Debnath has recently had a paper published in the journal Habitat International titled "Investigating the association of healthcare-seeking behavior with the freshness of indoor spaces in…

Congratulations Tahawar Hussain, ESD MPhil 15-16Congratulations to Tahawar who has recently been appointed as Member (Energy), Planning Commission of the Government of Pakistan. He is the youngest person ever to hold this prestigious position since the inception of the Planning Commission in 1952. The Planning Commission is the premier think tank a…

How do we design sustainable water resources, hydropower and dams infrastructure projects knowing that climate change and other variables are changing?Former MPhil student Pravin Karki (2006-07) has been recently promoted to Global Lead for Hydropower & Dams at the World Bank. Pravin recently returned to Cambridge to lead a seminar for the current…

New Department YouTube video about the ESD MPhil.The Department asked three ESD MPhil students to summarise their dissertation topics and reveal what they thought of the course itself and how it has been of benefit to them.Thank you to Garrett, Comfort and Theo for agreeing to be interviewed.See https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=WPHP_…

We have 36 students this year from 18 different countries.On the first weekend students attended the fieldtrip to Southern England to look at complexity in the landscape and "messy problems."

ESD MPhil hand in 25th August 2017Many congratulations to all the ESD MPhil students for successfully handing in their dissertations on Friday 25th August 2017.We've never had hand in by punt before!Photo credits: Ray Siems and Will Van Der Byl

ESD MPhil hand in 25th August 2017Many congratulations to all the ESD MPhil students for sucessfully handing in their dissertations on Friday 25th August 2017.We've never had hand in by punt before!Photo credits: Ray Siems and Will Van Der Byl

Realising Operational Energy Performance in Non-Domestic Buildings: Lessons Learnt from Initiatives Applied in CambridgeSee link for full text of new publication by Ray Pritchard (ESD MPhil 14)  and Scott Kelly (ESD MPhil 08) based on Ray's ESD MPhil dissertation supervised by Dr Scott Kelly.Abstract:The gap between the intended and actual energy p…

A new report has been published by the Whole Systems Energy Modelling consortium (WholeSEM) examining key issues and priorities relating to the UK water-energy nexus under climate change. The report was co-authored by Professor Dick Fenner with Dr Dennis Konadu, Professor Keith Richards and Professor Julian Allwood and is based on a series of invi…

Many thanks to all the current students who took part in the annual dissertation conference - 17-19th July 2017. The dissertation topics ranged from the circular economy and industrial symbiosis, transport, urban infrastructure, resource management, water, energy, renewable energy and international development. The best presentation prize was won…