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About ERG
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ERG is more formally designated as the Graduate Group in Energy and Resources. Although the term "group" has an informal ring, this augmented Graduate Group at UCB is in fact an interdisciplinary graduate program. ERG has the same abilities as an ordinary department to admit students and offer courses as well as to confer advanced degrees. Graduate Groups differ structurally from ordinary departments mainly in the composition of the faculty: most of the faculty members associated with Graduate Groups hold their main appointments in disciplinary or professional departments and participate in the activities of the Group only part-time. A few of the larger Groups, however, have "core" faculty appointments of their own in addition to "affiliated" departmental faculty members. ERG was the first Graduate Group at UCB to have core appointments.
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PHOTO/R.NORGAARD
Windmills in Solano County, Rio Vista.
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ERG Mission Statement
The well being of human society is threatened by environmental degradation, inequity within and between nations, and long-term resource scarcity. This is occuring on an unprecedented scale as an unintended consequence of material consumption, technological innovation, and a growing population.
The Energy and Resources Group's mission is to develop and transmit the critical knowledge needed to make possible a future in which human material needs and the requisites of a healthy environment are mutually and sustainably satisfied. Toward this end, research and teaching at ERG is systemic, strategic, and salient. Viewing society and the environment systemically and from an interdisciplinary perspective, we seek to comprehend the complex linkages between human actions and environmental responses, and to develop conceptual frameworks that respect actual system boundaries. A strategic focus to ERG's research is manifest in our emphasis on strengthening and augmenting analytical tools, questioning the assumptions underlying them, and scrutinizing the goals to which they are applied. ERG fosters research that is relevant to public policy and equips students with the capacity to act upon knowledge.
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Who We Are: A Brief History of ERG
For thirty years, the Energy and Resources Group (ERG) at the University of California, Berkeley has provided its outstanding graduate students and exceptional faculty the scholarly conditions in which to:
> study the environmental sciences,
> analyze the social causes of our energy and environmental problems,
> undertake field research in a variety of ecosystems,
> engage in cross cultural learning, and
> devise technical and policy alternatives to unsustainable energy and resource use patterns.
The Berkeley Campus offers exceptional opportunities to learn from outstanding scholars in many disciplines. ERG facilitates the placement of specialized knowledge into the larger integrated perspective. Students and faculty incorporating one another's insights, work on alternative energy technologies, ecological economics, terrestrial ecology, environmental justice, resource conflicts, and society and technology. ERG and the term "activist-scholar" are closely associated: Faculty and students alike are motivated by current and foreseeable problems and are encouraged to take what they learn into the full range of educational, political, and policy processes. In this highly interactive academic environment, feasible paths to social justice, appropriate technologies and ecological integrity begin to emerge.
ERG traces its origins to the Committee on Energy and Resources, which was established in November l972 under the chairmanship of electrical engineering professor C. K. Birdsall as an Advisory Committee to the then Vice-Chancellor Mark N. Christensen. The Committee laid the groundwork for an interdisciplinary program of teaching and research in energy and resources and secured for this purpose the first regular faculty position in Berkeley's history to reside entirely in an interdisciplinary unit. John P. Holdren (emeritus) was appointed to fill that position, as Assistant Professor in the Energy and Resources Program, in summer l973. The program attained degree-granting status as a Graduate Group in late l974, and admitted its first graduate students in l975. Mark Christensen was appointed to the core faculty in l976, John Harte in l982, Gene I. Rochlin in 1984, Richard Norgaard in l987, Catherine Koshland in l995, Daniel Kammen,1998, Isha Ray, 2001, Alex Farrell in 2003, and most recently Ashok Gadgil and Margaret Torn in 2006. The affiliated faculty meanwhile has grown from its initial membership of fifteen to more than one hundred and fifty. As of Fall 2006, more than 350 degrees have been awarded. The student population stands at about seventy.
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Facilities
Housed in 310 Barrows Hall on the south side of the Berkeley campus, ERG facilities include office space for core faculty members, visitors, students, and staff, a reading/seminar room, and a student lounge. The ERG computing system consists of PC and Macintosh microcomputers, several printers and scanners, linked with each other through a server and with the Berkeley-campus mainframes. Augmenting the modest collection of journals and reference books in the ERG reading room are the enormous information resources available within a short distance in UCB's Main Library, Engineering Library, and Earth Sciences Library, Business/Social Sciences Library, Governmental Studies Library and undergraduate library.
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Administrative Structure
ERG is administered by the Chair and Vice Chair, by other core and affiliated faculty and students who serve on the main administrative committees (Executive, Admissions and Financial Aid, Curriculum and Examinations, Publications, Computing, and Affirmative Action), and by the office staff: Management Services Officer Donna Bridges, Administrative Analyst Lee Borrowman, Student Affairs Officer Bette Evanas, Administrative Assistant, Sandra Dovali and Administrative Specialist, Jane Youn. In the campus administrative structure, ERG reports to the Vice Provost for Academic Affairs and Faculty Welfare.
Staff
For staff assistance please call: (510) 642-1640
Management Services Officer, Donna Bridges
Student Affairs Officer, Bette Evans
Administrative Analyst, Lee Borrowman
Administrative Specialist, Jane Youn
Administrative Assistant, Sandra Dovali
Student Assistant
Tech Support
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