Monday, March 21, 2016

City to holds Annual Environmental Forum: ‘A Smart Energy Future: Will Edina Lead the Way?’

Edina, Minn., March 17, 2016 – The City of Edina’s Energy & Environment Commission will hold its fifth-annual Environmental Forum 7 p.m. Thursday, April 14 at Fick Auditorium at Edina High School. This year’s forum is entitled “A Smart Energy Future: Will Edina Lead the Way?” and will focus on renewable energy initiatives in Edina and the southwest metro.

The forum will begin with an action resource fair and refreshments from 6 to 7 p.m. Dr. Elizabeth Wilson, University of Minnesota Professor of Energy and Environmental Policy and Law, is the keynote speaker and will address the theme of “A Smart Energy Future” by examining the future of renewable energy and climate change in Minnesota. Following Wilson’s presentation, Architect Rick Carter, LHB, Inc., and Director Lissa Pawlisch, University of Minnesota Clean Energy Resource Teams, will speak. The forum is interactive and will include time for attendees to ask questions and participate in the discussion.

Wilson studies how energy systems are changing in the face of new technologies and new societal pressures. She studies how institutions support and thwart energy system transitions and focuses on the interplays between technology innovation, policy creation and institutional decision-making. Wilson was recently awarded a 2015 Andrew Carnegie Fellowship and was selected as a 2014-5 CIC Academic Leadership Fellow. She spent the 2009-2010 academic year as a visiting professor at Tsinghua University in Beijing, supported by a McKnight Land-Grant Professorship. Prior to joining the University of Minnesota, she worked with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and before that Wilson worked in Belgium, Burundi and Tanzania. She holds a doctorate in Engineering and Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon University.

Carter co-founded LHB, Inc.’s Green Team in 1992, a multi-discipline team that spearheads research of sustainable design techniques. Pawlisch has staffed five of the greater Minnesota CERTs regions and worked to stimulate clean energy project development.

This is an Edina Dialogue event, in partnership with the Edina Community Foundation, encouraging intergenerational dialogue to further the conversation on how Edina can lead the way to a smart energy future. The event is free and open to the public and will include refreshments prior to the program during the action resource fair. The action resource fair and forum will be held in the Commons Area and Fick Auditorium, respectively, at Edina High School, 6754 Valley View Road. Please enter using door No. 3. All attendees are eligible to enter in a drawing for three Home Energy Squad Visits from the Center for Energy and Environment.

For more information, contact Environmental Engineer Ross Bintner, staff liaison to the Energy & Environment Commission, at 952-903-5713 or RBintner@EdinaMN.gov.

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The City of Edina
4801 W. 50th St., Edina, MN 55424
mail@EdinaMN.gov 952-927-8861

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