-Does the proposed technology resolve a sustainability challenge?

The final project will be an individual short report reviewing a specific technology that you either think a) needs to be developed or b) needs to be more widely applied to resolve specific sustainability issues. As part of your analysis, you need to clearly describe the concept (include figures, etc, as useful), explain why it resolves a sustainability challenge, evaluate the various impacts of its adoption on the triple bottom line (e.g., does it trade environmental impacts for social impacts in an unacceptable manner?), and examine other alternatives. The limits are 1-you can’t violate the first/second laws of thermodynamics (basically, you can’t make energy/matter out of nothing), and 2-the technology can’t rely on materials/processes that don’t exist yet (e.g., you can’t claim a 60% efficient photovoltaic cell)(unless you describe carefully how you are going to build that in an economically viable manner)(in which case I need you in my lab, not in this class…) The brief assignment I have for you this week is to consider the topic you would like to address and explain it in about a paragraph (just that, doesn’t even need references or anything yet, but needs to be a reasonable idea). As before, use the assignment template or a reasonable imitation and submit on Canvas as a PDF file. The paper will be graded on: Mechanics: -Did you use the paper template and did you remain within the limit of 550 words? Content: Paper Title Your paper introduction goes here – use it to introduce the core concept you are writing your paper around. Notice it did not have a subheading, but this is nonetheless a very important part of your paper, especially because your thesis statement goes at the end of this first section. In case you don’t know what a thesis statement is and how it makes a paper work, please look it up at a resource like this reference, as it is fundamental to the mechanics of a well written paper. Proposed Technical Advancement Present your idea for a technical advancement that could be developed in more detail here. If useful, add in a figure/diagram/schematic that conveys your idea in better detail such as the diagram in Figure 1 below. Notice that every single figure, table, diagram, equation, scheme, etc. should be mentioned in the text of the document (otherwise, why is it there?...) Figure 1. Example of a diagram of a proposed system intended to implement a specific process. Supporting Information This section gives you the opportunity to present information from the peer reviewed technical literature, and to critically examine those references. You should present the specific information you are taking from your references and on which you are basing your arguments and discuss any perceived shortfalls in the papers (for example biases in the studies, experiments with no inconclusive results, or statistical analyses of what looks like noise) and the effects those shortfalls may have on the conclusions of your specific analysis. In particular evaluate the source and quality of supporting material, since in the absence of good supporting information, the source is no better than an opinion piece. Evaluation This sub-section should be used to evaluate the broader consequences of implementation of your proposed new technology. For example, is the solution applicable only to address a local issue/opportunity, or is it applicable at the national/regional/global scale? Analysis of effects on natural/built environments and impacts on human populations are useful. Conclusion The explanation is analogous to a concluding sentence or paragraph. In this section it is necessary to state your argument, briefly summarize the findings that support your point of view, and concisely speculate on the broader effects; in other words, this may be seen as a re-iteration/reinforcement of the interpretation and inference sections. Bias Evaluation The “Bias Evaluation” section requires an analysis of other authors’ biases. This is intended to be your own self-conscious critique of your own argument(s). What factors might influence why you believe this viewpoint. Is there a way that you could remedy this, thereby making your paper more objective?