EDGE

Dan Vermeer

Research insights: Climate psychology, environmental risk, careers, and more

Recent research articles

In 2014, EDGE faculty and staff were highlighted in the media for their research insights on a wide range of energy and environmental topics. Here are a few of the highlights of the year: Conservatives don’t hate climate science. They hate the left’s climate solutions (Washington Post). Research by Fuqua School of Business’s Aaron Kay […]

Turning environmental risk into opportunity

Dialogue Review

“Environmental risks can be the most complex challenges for companies — but can also be the most rewarding to address,” says EDGE executive director  Dan Vermeer in a new article in Dialogue Review. Before joining Fuqua School of Business as an associate professor of the practice and executive director of EDGE, Dan was director of […]

China’s smog cloud may have a silver lining

Air pollution in Hebei province

by Dan Vermeer, Executive Director, EDGE Environmental concerns are ubiquitous in China. Every day, the newspapers include stories about the converging crises related to air pollution, food contamination, water shortages, and solid waste. There is also a growing frustration that China’s “growth at all costs” development path has been very costly, sacrificing both the environment […]

Crossing the climate line

Dan Vermeer

This op-ed first appeared in the Raleigh News & Observer on May 21, 2013. by Daniel Vermeer, Executive Director, EDGE Earlier this month, a remote monitoring system in Hawaii recorded the first time in human history that the daily average for carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere hit over 400 parts per million. Crossing the […]

Why companies should value water

stream

by Dan Vermeer, Executive Director of EDGE If water is so valuable, then why is it so cheap? Economists have long been fascinated by the water paradox – clean, abundant water keeps us healthy, provides our food, sustains our ecosystems, and keeps our businesses operating.  Yet we have routinely undervalued water, and have been willing […]

Food vs. fuel: State of the debate

Carol Healy

by Carol Healy, MEM/MBA Class of 2014 and Dan Vermeer, Executive Director of EDGE Food security is back in the news.  According to estimates, this summer’s drought is the second most costly natural disaster in US history, after Hurricane Katrina – including serious impacts on our country’s agricultural system.  Agriculture feeds us, but increasingly it […]

The new convergence: Smart grid, efficiency, and renewables

Josh Seidenfeld

by Josh Seidenfeld, MEM/MBA Class of 2015 and Dan Vermeer, Executive Director of EDGE For all the strident debates about energy in American politics (e.g. fracking, drilling on public lands, government incentives, etc.), no one disagrees that innovation will be critical in creating a better energy future.  And North Carolina and Duke are well-positioned to […]

On extreme energy, risk, and culture

Dan Vermeer

by Dan Vermeer, Executive Director of EDGE One of the more frustrating aspects of working the sustainability field is that every problem is mind-bogglingly complex, and can be framed at multiple levels.  Take, for example, the heated debates and accusations about the causes and consequences of the Macondo well explosion in the Gulf of Mexico. […]

Connecting the dots on agriculture, water, and energy

by Dan Vermeer, executive director, EDGE In Thomas Homer-Dixon’s book The Ingenuity Gap, he describes a growing chasm between the world’s knotty problems and its lagging ability to develop robust and integrated solutions.  An “ingenuity gap” emerges when a society’s ability to solve problems is outpaced by the scale, complexity, speed of change, and unpredictability […]

Dan Vermeer speaks on the opportunities inherent in energy efficiency

EDGE executive director Dan Vermeer spoke about energy efficiency as a business opportunity at last week’s ABB Automation & Power World 2011. You can read the recap at: “The real impact of energy efficiency on the bottom line” – ABB website, Apr. 20, 2011 “Finally, Energy Efficiency’s Day in the Sun: Discussing Existing and Future […]