Presented on Wednesday, October 30, 2024, by

The University of Hawaii ERC EARTH Team

The University of Hawaii at Manoa is part of a team of six universities (UHM, Notre Dame, Lehigh University, University of South Dakota, and University of Maryland, and ERC lead University of Kansas) awarded $26 million to establish EARTH (Environmentally Applied Refrigerant Technology Hub), one of four new NSF Gen-4 Engineering Research Centers (ERC) announced in August 2024. EARTH will create a transformative, sustainable refrigerant lifecycle to reduce global warming from refrigerants while increasing the energy efficiency of heating, ventilation, and cooling.

The replacement of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and the subsequent recovery of the ozone layer following the Montreal Protocol is hailed as the most significant environmental success story in recent history. The phase-out of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) and the adoption of more energy-efficient cooling technologies in accordance with the Kigali Amendment, F-gas regulations, and the AIM Act will represent the next big environmental success story for the global community.

The UH team’s contributions to ERC EARTH are diverse and interdisciplinary: from climate modeling (Prof. Karamperidou) to experimental and computational atmospheric chemistry (Prof. R. Kaiser, and Prof. R. Sun) and environmental history (Prof. K. Matteson) to key leadership roles in EARTH’s Diversity and Culture of Inclusion effort (J. Pagala Barnett) and the Student Leadership Council (Chemistry PhD student A. Vincent).

In this information session, kicked off by EARTH Director Mark Shiflett, the UH EARTH team will provide an overview of the project and introduce some of the research elements involved, along with information on open positions and student projects, and partnerships across the ERC EARTH institutions. For more information, please visit the EARTH webpage at https://erc-earth.ku.edu/