Dead & Company concert funds $800,000 for new climate solutions

One year after Dead & Company’s show at Barton Hall, proceeds from the fundraiser are providing momentum for faculty-led climate research efforts with impact, and now the Climate Solutions Fund is announcing its first grant recipients.

“The Climate Solutions Fund and Fast Grants are launching new research, and the 2030 Project is helping to catalyze investments in cutting-edge climate work across the university,” said Ben Furnas ’06, executive director of the 2030 Project, highlighting the new, nation’s first animal respiratory chambers to study solutions to reduce methane in livestock; the creation of the ILR School’s Climate Jobs Institute; Funding of more than $600,000 for a startup that will accelerate the commercialization of innovative carbon management technology; and a new $2 million Department of Energy award to study pricing and procurement in electricity markets, supported for the first time by a Project Fast 2030 Grant.

Five interdisciplinary projects at seven universities will undertake large-scale, impact-oriented climate research leveraging the inaugural Climate Solutions Fund awards, totaling $800,000 and administered by the Cornell Atkinson Center for Sustainability. They address strategies from reducing infectious diseases while adapting to climate change and improving agricultural productivity in Africa to using machine learning and computer vision to reduce food waste, mitigating the impact of disasters in New York State, and more.

“These projects funded by our Climate Solutions Fund are some of the many major climate-related investments across Cornell that we are all celebrating as part of the 2030 Project’s ambition to find concrete solutions to the climate crisis,” Furnas said. “These projects build on investments we have made through our Fast Grants program and help deepen Cornell’s commitment to scalable solutions to the challenges of climate change.”

The Climate Solutions Fund supports research in the 2030 Project’s forward-looking priorities: food and agriculture; energy systems; Materials; and societies. Each grant ranges from $100,000 to $240,000. The opening projects are:

Bioremediation of methane emissions from abandoned oil and gas wells

Matthew Reid, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at Cornell Engineering, wants to combat methane emissions more cost-effectively by covering wells with biologically based filters. Such biofilters convert methane into carbon dioxide. Although CO2 is also a powerful greenhouse gas, methane has significantly more damaging effects in the short term; Converting methane to CO2 reduces global warming impacts by more than 95% over 100 years, Reid said.

There are an estimated 3.5 million abandoned oil and gas wells in the United States, and diffuse methane emissions from these wells are estimated to be equivalent to releasing 7.1 million tons of carbon dioxide per year. The traditional method of capping wells is to encase them in cement, but this process is expensive: about $40,000 per well.

Reid and his colleagues will build and test their biofilters in the laboratory and then evaluate their real-world performance at abandoned oil and gas wells in Allegany State Park in western New York state. This project also builds on previous research supported by a 2030 Fast Grant.

Scaling a solution to Africa’s climate change, health, agriculture, water and energy challenges

Schistosomiasis, a disease caused by leeches that live in freshwater snails, affects over 200 million people worldwide, with more than 85% of cases occurring in Africa. Snails live in aquatic vegetation and humans become infected when they enter infested bodies of water to collect water for drinking, farming or other purposes. Climate change is exacerbating the problem by altering rainfall patterns and increasing pest and disease pressure.

Cornell researchers and their colleagues found that removing invasive aquatic vegetation significantly reduces schistosomiasis in children and increases access to open water without affecting water quality or freshwater biodiversity. Additionally, the removed vegetation can be converted into compost and livestock feed – creating business opportunities for local entrepreneurs and providing local, sustainable sources of agricultural inputs.

Chris Barrett, Stephen B. and Janice G. Ashley Professor of Applied Economics and Management in the SC Johnson College of Business, and Ying Sun, associate professor in the School of Integrative Plant Science, Soil and Crop Sciences Section in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences ( CALS) seek to scale and sustain their innovations with a network of partners in Senegal.

Using artificial intelligence to reduce food waste in commercial kitchens

Elena Belavina, associate professor of service operations at Cornell’s Peter and Stephanie Nolan School of Hotel Administration, will study the use of AI tools to reduce food waste in commercial foodservice operations, a goal that benefits food security, environmental resources and the bottom line would .

Worldwide, a third of all food produced for human consumption ends up in waste. In the hospitality and food service industries alone, the cost of wasted food is over $100 billion per year.

Together with colleagues from Cornell Tech and industry partner Winnow, Belavina will first study the effectiveness of a computer vision-based system that accurately measures and classifies food waste. Early results suggest this system can reduce food waste by up to 30% three months after implementation. They will then develop and test AI assistants to help kitchen managers with front-line tasks that can reduce food waste, such as: Such as managing inventory, providing instructions on how and when to prepare food, and identifying errors in food production decisions.

Operationalizing Resilience Centers in New York State: Pathway to Community-Led Multi-Hazard Resilience for Climate Justice

Cornell researchers will work with existing organizations in a variety of communities across New York and with state agencies to establish resiliency hubs – community-based facilities developed and designed collaboratively with community partners to meet residents’ needs in short-term emergencies such as heat waves or power outages and for long-term needs such as community organization or food security.

Led by Rebecca Morgenstern Brenner, senior lecturer in the Brooks School of Public Policy, and Alistair Hayden, assistant professor of practice in the College of Veterinary Medicine’s Department of Public and Ecosystem Health, researchers will pilot resilience centers, develop collaborative knowledge and build a network successful and reproducible model for other communities interested in creating their own resilience centers. Cornell staff in the Colleges of Engineering and of Architecture, Art and Planning and CALS, as well as the Water Resources Institute, will also provide consultation.

Cornell Advanced Platform for testing, exploitation and research in carbon capture and conversion technologies (CAPTURE Lab)

Nine faculty members will build an experimental carbon capture and utilization or sequestration facility and industrial decarbonization at Cornell’s combined heat and power plant.

The project is led by Tobias Hanrath, the Marjorie L. Hart ’50 Professor of Engineering in the Smith School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Phillip Milner, assistant professor of chemistry and chemical biology in the College of Arts and Sciences, and Greeshma Gadikota. Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Cornell Engineering.

The project team plans to set up a mobile laboratory next to the plant that will analyze gas emissions and provide real-time information about their composition. They will then study and test materials for carbon capture, sequestration and conversion, industrial decarbonization and pollution control using the power plant’s flue gas emissions. This type of flue gas is difficult to access for researchers in both industry and academia. The project will support interdisciplinary research on both basic research and lab-to-market feasibility.

The project builds on previous research on carbon management techniques and industrial decarbonization supported by 2030 Project Fast Grants.

Krisy Gashler is a freelance writer for the Cornell Atkinson Center for Sustainability.