Energy Ethics in Science and Engineering Education: EESE Collaborative Research

This project takes a problem-oriented approach to ethics education, focused on the international issue of energy in the 21st century. Current policy discussions in the U.S. stress the need for energy system change, even transformation, if national and global goals for justice and sustainability are to be met. This project will examine energy ethics issues for the responsible conduct of science and engineering and in the intersections of science, engineering, technology, and society, emphasizing potential scenarios for the U.S., while acknowledging the critical roles other nations and international institutions play in the future of energy. It will develop new research and educational activities involving graduate students in interdisciplinary research programs.

Recent reports about America’s Energy Future from The National Academies focus mainly on technological options for improving America’s energy supply. In its first year, this project will synthesize and augment research findings and educational materials about ethical aspects of options for improving energy supply, distribution, and use in the U.S. It will develop a more inclusive model that examines technological and sociological plausibility as well as ethical desirability of energy options. It will develop materials and approaches that examine issues of research ethics in domains of energy research and development, so as to promote attention to these issues in graduate and post-doctoral education in these fields. In the second year, it will develop, implement, and evaluate energy ethics research and education components in graduate programs at ASU. The third year will revise and continue the research and education components, and extend these activities nationally via a workshop and a National Institute on Energy, Ethics, and Society (NIEES). The project will engage fifteen graduate students from energy research programs around the nation in the week-long National Institute, preparing them for leadership in the fields of energy ethics and energy ethics education. Also in the final year, the project workshop at the NAE will raise the visibility among energy science and policy audiences of the need for expanding ethics education in energy fields. It will disseminate project results to relevant educators and practitioners, publicize the National Institute, and initiate a larger strategy for ensuring that project findings are transmitted and incorporated into science and engineering education through diverse pathways. Workshop participants will share ideas and discuss findings and best practices; the workshop will be pod-cast and archived in the widely used Online Ethics Center (OEC) at the NAE. 

NAE and ASU are committed to continuing energy ethics activities after the award. The training activities in energy and energy research ethics at ASU will continue. The Consortium for Science Policy & Outcomes (CSPO) at ASU reaches a broad set of actors in the science policy realm who consider energy issues. The project investigators and their programs have numerous outlets for project results, and a strong history of outreach and dissemination via electronic channels and numerous professional societies and publications. The NAE Center for Engineering, Ethics, and Society (CEES) will continue to develop and sponsor programs in energy ethics. The OEC has been recently upgraded and efforts to incorporate materials for and increase outreach to groups underrepresented in science and engineering are underway. All these efforts will be fostered by the project and continue thereafter, helping to develop a national conversation about energy ethics.