Born August 6th, 1969 in Charleston, South Carolina. Raised on Edisto Island in the South Carolina low-country where I had plenty of time to play in the woods and the ocean, and to catch and eat seafood. Received a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Clemson University in 1994. Worked first as a project engineer and then as environmental, health, and safety manager in the flat glass manufacturing industry in North Carolina until August 1999. Returned to school at the University of South Carolina to pursue a PhD in mechanical engineering. I returned to school through contact with Dr. Wally Peters who heads the Laboratory for Sustainable Solutions and for whom I currently work. The Laboratory for Sustainable Solutions is an interdisciplinary laboratory that studies sustainability issues using the concepts of industrial ecology. My current research interests follow below:

During the last 400 years, human knowledge and the concurrent use of power have developed exponentially. The fruits of this labor can be summed up as modern life and modern conveniences in the developed world. However, these conveniences have come at a cost. Human systems have grown so large that they are at risk of overwhelming the biological systems in which they are embedded. As scientific knowledge and understanding has increased, the realization that the earth is a complex system full of interactions and interrelationships among the biota, land, atmosphere, and oceans has developed along with the realization that human activities are intimately tied into these systems. Even though they play an ever-increasing role in earth systems, human activities are currently not coordinated with or integrated into earth systems in a coherent manner. This research intends to create a knowledge base in complex systems science and use that knowledge to explore the interactions between industrial activities (including the built environment and manufacturing activities) and earth systems in order to devise decision-making and design methodologies that help create solutions which bring industrial activity into coherence with earth systems.

http://www.engr.sc.edu/grad/russellj