Elliot Cohen
Bio
Elliot Cohen is a first year NSF-IGERT fellow at the University of Colorado Denver (UCD) Center for Sustainable Urban Infrastructure. Elliot is pursuing his Masters of Science and Ph.D in Civil and Environmental Engineering. His research investigates the relationship between urbanization, sustainable energy conversion/utilization and resource efficiency as means of promoting human, environmental and economic vitality. Before coming to UCD, Elliot earned a Bachelors of Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Maryland College Park (UMCP), and studied at the School of Photovoltaic and Renewable Energy Engineering at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia.
Beyond the classroom, Elliot has worked extensively with the international non-profit organization Engineers without Borders (EWB), partnering with under-resourced communities in developing countries to provide sustainable solutions to basic infrastructure needs such as clean water, wastewater sanitation, health clinics and electricity from renewable sources. In the course of four years, Elliot served as the EWB-UMCP Chapter President, Vice President, and Project Leader in Brazil and in Peru. Throughout this period, Elliot helped the UMCP chapter grow from a handful of dedicated engineering students working on their first projects in Thailand and Ecuador, to the University’s showcase student organization, gaining local and national recognition, and completing 11 projects in five countries, impacting the lives of over 6000 community members worldwide.
Elliot’s joint interests in energy engineering, energy policy and international affairs led him in the summer of 2008 to work at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Policy and International Affairs, Office of Economic Analysis. At DOE Elliot earned recognition for his work in assessing the impact of energy price manipulation in commodity and futures trading markets, as well as quantitative and qualitative investigation of cellulosic biomass resources for use in biofuels and electricity generation in support of climate and energy security policy. Elliot hopes to continue working on timely energy policy issues as part of his IGERT Fellowship.