Energy Values Lab

The Department of Community Sustainability (CSUS) at Michigan State University is an interdisciplinary department addressing contemporary issues of sustainability in agriculture, recreation, natural resources, and the environment. Recently the department expanded that focus to include energy!  Specifically, the department hired an assistant professor of sustainable energy systems.  This person–hint, it’s me!–is tasked with researching sustainable fuels and power-generation systems, investigating and encouraging sustainable energy transitions, and developing sustainable communities and community energy solutions.

If you are interested in studying energy sustainability, perhaps you should join me in CSUS!!  –you really should!–  Consistent with its mission to assist in the development of sustainable communities, CSUS offers three undergraduate majors linked by a common core in community sustainability. These three majors – Environmental Studies and Sustainability (ESS); Sustainable Parks, Recreation and Tourism (SPRT); and Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources Education (AFNRE) – share a set of courses centered on community sustainability.

The CSUS graduate program offers two graduate majors: Community Sustainability (MS and PhD) and Sustainable Tourism and Protected Areas Management (MS and PhD). In both undergraduate and graduate programs, CSUS embraces international as well as domestic applications, engagement, and opportunities.

Please feel free to email me at bessett6@msu.edu or call my office at 517-353-0803 and ask questions about both my own research and or the research of my colleagues in CSUS.  You might also follow me on twitter @dlbessette to get a flavor of the kind of questions and concerns we’re asking here in CSUS.