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Thursday, October 2, 2025
William C. Powers Student Activity Center | Ballroom (WCP 2.410 & 2.412)
8:30 AM - 4:30 PM
This year's Mitchell Sustainability Symposium will continue its focus on the intersection of sustainability and student education on UT Austin’s campus and beyond. We’ll look into the state of sustainability at UT Austin through a series of panel discussions, lectures, and student presentations. Dr. Adam Met, will provide the lunchtime keynote address.
UT Austin’s Dell Medical School and UT MD Anderson Cancer Center are partnering to design and construct an academic medical center at the site of the old Erwin Center. The medical center will include over 3 million square feet in two distinct, but complementary towers with shared public and support spaces joining them together to create a cohesive patient and visitor experience that integrates into the existing fabric of the Austin campus.
Various sustainability goals were identified early in the project related to Energy, Water and Materials within a broader vision that “The Medical Complex Project sets a new bar for high performing, healing environments and exemplifies the future of healthcare as a 'living-lab' grounded in research, education and care, resilience to climatic stresses and responsive to public health challenges.”
Moderator: Allison Muth, Senior Project Director, Planning, Design and Construction
Travis Laird, Chief Operating Officer, Hospital Planning and Operations
Pouyan Layegh, AVP Engineering & Building Systems Management, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center
Gail Vittori, Co-Director of Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems, Energy Institute
Overview of university-wide initiatives focused on the stewardship of campus resources such as power plant innovation, advanced water treatment, transportation and mobility planning and landscape.
Introduction: Brent Stringfellow, Associate Vice President, Campus Operations
Moderator: Jim Walker, Director of Sustainability
Veronica Castro-Barrera, Lead Campus and Mobility Planner, Design and Construction
Claire LeGrow, Senior Safety Specialist, Environmental Health and Safety
Ryan Thompson, Executive Director of Utilities and Energy Management
Ahnsa Campbell, Biology
Synthetic Biology for Safer Waters: Detecting Harmful Algal Blooms in Lady Bird Lake
Kyra Jean Cipolla, Marine Science
UTMSI Green Team's Bird Friendly Campus Initiative
Will Eagle, Geology
Reconstructing Climate Variability in the Pedernales River Basin, Central Texas
Akanksha Mehta, Environmental Science
Don’t Trash It. Re-glass It: The Environmental and Financial Incentives
Kaylie Ortega, Architecture
Rethinking Architecture as a Living System through Emergy Analysis
Brian Pham, Statistics & Data Science
U-share-iT: The Hidden Inventory of Science
Aishwarya Sreenivasan, Statistics & Data Science; Economics
Integrating Student Leadership into Campus Climate Strategy
Seungah Suh, Civil Engineering
Diverting Construction and Demolition Waste: Automated Layout Designing for Reclaimed Building
Material Stock
Arya Upadhyay, Electrical Engineering
Biodegradable Nanorobots: Tackling Soil Microplastics for a Sustainable Future
UT Farm Stand (Quinn Hungerford, Nardos Wondwossen,and Olivia Gerhart)
From Farm to Table to Waste: UT Farm Stand’s Model for Campus Sustainability
Columbia University
Talk Title: How to Use the Power of Connection to Engage, Take Action, and Build a Better World
Dr. Adam Met is an adjunct professor at Columbia University, where he teaches students about climate policy and movement building. He holds a dual degree in business and philosophy from Columbia, as well as a PhD in international human rights law and sustainable development from the University of Birmingham. In addition to his professorial role, he is also the Executive Director of the climate non-profit Planet Reimagined and the bassist for the band AJR.
Keynote speaker sponsored by UT Energy Institute.
