Why Environmental Policy?
The Centre for Environmental Policy (CEP) provides a unique interface between science and technology and the economic and policy context in which it is developed and applied. Its focus is on environmental and development issues, including energy, pollution, conservation of natural resources, food and health security and poverty reduction. The Centre seeks to integrate the College's outstanding science and technology research with a leading team of social and policy scientists, creating exciting interdisciplinary research programmes.
The Centre for Environmental Policy is a vibrant department situated in the heart of the Mechanical Engineering building, and also at Silwood Park.
The Centre is a unique interface between science and technology, and economics and policy. Scientists, economists and social and policy experts work towards gathering the scientific evidence necessary to develop or implement new environmental policies, or, alternatively, support policies already in place.
As a result, the Centre actively collaborates with institutional bodies such as the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), Research Councils UK and the Environment Agency amongst others. Part of the Cenre’s work involves obtaining information from medics, engineers and scientists across College to understand where the needs for new policies stand. Similarly, amending and modifying policies currently in place requires strong scientific evidence which the Centre gathers from Imperial’s outstanding science and technology research. As the name suggests, the Centre’s expertise touches all areas of the environment from energy to pollution, conservation of resources, food and environmental security, and poverty reduction. The excellence of Imperial’s research, which is carried out in such an extensive range of subjects, makes it an especially suitable place for the Centre to carry out its mission.
The department also runs one of the most successful and innovative post-graduate MSc courses at Imperial, the MSc in Environmental Technology. It is currently the largest MSc on campus, with ca. 135 students enrolled every year. The nature of this course is highly interdisciplinary. Indeed, the course comprises modules as diverse as Ecology, Environmental Law, Risk Assessment, Environmental Economics, Environmental Pollution and Control, and Environmental Policy and Management. In the 2nd Term students choose an area of specialization such as Business and the Environment, Energy Policy, Water Management and many more, depending on their academic background and interests. A significant number of MSc students remain within the Department to pursue a PhD. The research projects are highly cross-disciplinary, and focus on current or potential upcoming environmental issues in the UK and world-wide. PhD projects are often jointly supervised by the Centre and one or more other departments.
