The 2010 Gordon Research Conference (GRC) on Industrial Ecology will examine environmental challenges and remedies at various scales through the lens of design. Industrial ecology is an emerging field that examines local, regional and global uses and flows of materials and energy in products, processes, industrial sectors and economies. The field has primarily focused in the past decade on environmental assessment. Industrial ecology, however, includes an interest in design both as a route to environmental improvement and as a vehicle for realizing the opportunities arising from technological innovation. The conference will therefore examine solutions in the various domains that are central to industrial ecology, exploring the relationship between the field’s well developed capabilities for environmental assessment and the opportunities and constraints arising from a design orientation, including how emergent phenomena and complexity theory relate to a design perspective. The intent is to examine design at multiple scales and in various realms -- from products to networks to large-scale systems to policies.
The GRCs were established in the 1920s by an American chemist concerned about the lack of opportunity for the presentation and discussion of cutting edge science. From that modest start, they have grown to encompass approximately 200 conferences per year and have become the premier venue for the presentation of frontier research in science and technology. More information on the history and structure of the Gordon Conferences can be found here.
All sessions are in plenary.
Participants must apply to attend and be accepted by the conference chair.
All presentations and discussions are “off-the-record” to encourage open discussion of cutting edge work -- no photography or tape recording of sessions or publication of conference proceedings.
Conference sessions occur in the morning and evening; afternoons are deliberately left unscheduled to provide opportunities for discussion and interaction.
The conference is 4½ days in order to provide adequate time for presentation and discussions.
* For those that applied to attend the 2008 meeting, but could not participate because of capacity limits at the conference site, please note that a larger venue will be used in 2010.
The program for the 2010 Industrial Ecology conference will be posted here as it coalesces. For the first time, there will also be an Industrial Ecology Gordon-Kenan Research Seminar for graduate students and post-docs that will precede the main conference (July 10-11, 2010) at the same location.