In 2020, the Incubator Fund began supporting an interdisciplinary research team seeking to identify sustainable procurement and sourcing strategies for PPE for the campus and beyond. The challenge the team faces is common: In times of crisis, cost and speed of procurement take precedence over the environmental and human health impacts of essential items like PPE. With their forthcoming strategy suggestions, the team hopes to change that.
Campus Sustainability Incubator Fund
About the Incubator Fund
The Campus Sustainability Incubator Fund seeks to enable MIT community members to use the MIT campus as a test bed for research in sustainable operations, management and design. The seed funds enable teams of students, faculty, and researchers to explore the physical facility and social context in which they are working, living and learning at MIT. The fund was made possible through a generous gift from Malcom M. Strandberg. Join us in solving for a low carbon future, high performance building design, resilient ecosystems, zero waste and other relevant challenges. Currently (2023), we are unable to support new work through the Sustainability Incubator Fund as work to rebuild the funding to support future projects. Check this page for updates or email us at sustainablemit@mit.edu with any questions.
Those interested in donating to the Sustainability Incubator Fund can do so here.
Incubator Award Winners
2018
The 2018 Incubator Fund began supporting two new projects led by Professor Jessika Trancik, in the Institute for Data, Systems and Society, and Professor Douglas Hart, in the department of Mechanical Engineering. The Trancik team seeks to study on-site renewable energy storage systems and the Hart team will be engaging in a two-semester class to prototype carbon-neutral cooling systems.
2017
In 2017 the fund awarded four multi-departmental projects, all of which use the MIT campus as a test bed for research in sustainable operations, management, and design. The four project teams are lead by Kripa Varanasi of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Randy Kirchain and Jeremy Gregory of the Concrete Sustainability Hub, Lisa Anderson of the Department of Chemical Engineering, and Danielle Dahan of the Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research.
About the donor
Malcom B. Strandberg
Engineer and Software Developer
The Campus Sustainability Incubator Fund was made possible through a generous gift from Malcom M. Strandberg. Malcom served as Research and Development Chief Architect at Aspect Software for 32 years, with a career in technology spanning nearly four decades. Passionate about sustainable living, he has created a “Tech Village” model for small-scale, high-density green communities.
Inspired by his late father, long-time MIT Physics professor Malcom W.P. “Woody” Strandberg, PhD ’48, Malcom has directed other parts of his gift to MIT’s D-Lab, to the MIT Office of Engineering Outreach’s STEM program, and to sustainability projects at the Priscilla King Gray Public Service Center.
In a recent interview in the MIT Technology review, Malcom said he is excited to be plugged into MIT’s work to promote the health of the planet and is confident that the Institute will be a global leader in innovative approaches to sustainability. “If MIT shows it can make progress in these areas, then hopefully other places will try to do it as well,” he said.
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Scales of Impact
The challenges of sustainability are both local and global. Creating transformative solutions requires deep collaboration among community leaders and members on campus, city and global scales.
It starts with you on campus.
We start with you to find solutions at the campus level to serve both the institution's needs as well as to incubate new and big ideas.
