SEARCH Project

YCELP Director Dan Esty addresses the SEARCH Group this past March


The SEARCH (Solutions for Energy, AiR, Climate, and Health) Center aligns cutting-edge scientific information and tools to support the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s strategic goals of protecting and improving air quality and addressing climate change. SEARCH is an EPA Air, Climate, and Energy (ACE) Center based at Yale University and is led by Dr. Michelle Bell and co-led by Dr. Benjamin Hobbs of Johns Hopkins University. It hosts four research projects and involves more than two-dozen researchers across a number of institutions including North Carolina State University, Stanford University, Northeastern University, University of Chicago, University of Michigan, and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Project 1 encompasses economic modeling of national air-quality under different energy policy scenarios. Project 2 measures and examines real-world exposure to air pollution. Project 3 draws upon Projects 1 & 2 to model relationships between air quality, policy, and health under various climate change scenarios using air quality and climate change modeling. Project 4 estimates the health impacts of various air quality scenarios from the other SEARCH projects and identifies populations most vulnerable to air pollution.

To support SEARCH’s goal of performing rigorous scientific research to aid more effective decision making, SEARCH includes a Policy and Decision Making support unit led by Professor Dan Esty of Yale University and the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy. This support unit seeks to bridge the divide which often separates science and policy through an iterative process bringing the science and policy domains together in a regular and robust fashion.  The support unit will work with federal, state, and local policymakers before, during, and after analysis to ensure that SEARCH focuses on the most relevant research questions and clearly communicates scientific findings. The support unit will help SEARCH generate and disseminate research that is most beneficial for real-world decisions in the air pollution, energy, and climate change policy realms and ultimately maximize the center’s contributions to public health and the environment.