The University Record, March 11, 1998
Lovins
By Diane Swanbrow
News and Information Services
Amory B. Lovins, co-founder of the Rocky Mountain Institute and director of its high-profile Hypercar Center, will speak on “How Far Can Technology Take Us: A Look at the Automobile,” at 3:30 p.m. Thursday (March 12) in Auditorium B, Angell Hall. The free, public talk will be followed by a reception.
At 7 p.m., in the same location, Dean Daniel Mazmanian of the School of Natural Resources and Environment (SNRE) will facilitate a panel discussion on environmental technology. Participants include U-M associate professor Jonathan Levine, an expert on urban transportation systems; John Decicco, a senior associate of the Washington, D.C.-based American Council of Energy-Efficient Economy; Chris White, Director of the Ann Arbor Transportation Authority; and Barbara Richardson, a research scientist at the U-M Transportation Research Institute.
“We’re delighted to host Amory Lovins to kick off this discussion,” says Steven R. Brechin, associate professor of environmental sociology and organizer of the forum. “He has been working intensely with industry and government leaders here and around the world to develop an ultralight hybrid electric vehicle and, more generally, on the role technology will play in greening our future.”
One of the nation’s foremost experts on energy, Lovins is a 1993 MacArthur Foundation Fellow and the author of 24 books, most recently Factor Four: Doubling Wealth, Halving Resource Use. He was named by the Wall Street Journal as one of 28 people in the world most likely to change the course of business in the 1990s.
The forum is sponsored by the Environmental Theme Semester, with support from LS&A and SNRE.