The ten-year Carbon Mitigation Initiative (CMI) at Princeton University is concluding its third year. Over the first three years we have rooted CMI in four areas of the campus, achieving substantial commitment from faculty, staff, and students. From an initial group of fewer than 20 researchers, CMI has increased its ranks to include 60 investigators. We have built new labs and office space, expanded into new research areas, and developed new relationships with other institutions.
If all the world’s coal, oil, gas, and other fossil fuels reserves were burned and the carbon they contain were released to the atmosphere, then atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) levels would reach levels five to ten times higher than today’s. Such high levels of this greenhouse gas would lead to dramatic and damaging climate change. This prospect has prompted many people in the scientific, governmental, corporate, and non-profit communities to call for early action to reduce future CO2 emissions.
The Carbon Mitigation Initiative is a 10-year, 20 million dollar program jointly funded by bp and Ford that seeks solutions to the CO2 problem.
Research over the first three years of the grant has resulted in the expansion of some new research programs and the contraction of others. In the next three years, our groups will contribute to our “stabilization wedge” assessment, while continuing to conduct investigator-driven research in their various fields.
