UC's impact — public investment at work 
Fighting global warming
Producing alternative energy and fuels. Identifying the effects of climate change. Increasing energy efficiency. See how UC is leading efforts to solve one of our planet's biggest problems.
Viewing the Science Today video requires the free Flash player. Get Flash.
Alternative energy
UC is leading an unprecedented research effort to develop new sources of energy. In the past year alone, UC has been named co-host of two major alternative-energy research centers, the BP-backed Energy Biosciences Institute and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Joint BioEnergy Institute.
“I became convinced that the climate change projections were increasingly ominous; we had to do something about it. I looked around and I realized that Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, in partnership with the University of California, Berkeley, had the intellectual capacity to be a world center for the type of energy research that would lead to solutions.”
-- Steve Chu, director of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Nobel Prize winner
Climate change
UC researchers have been at the forefront of studying global climate change, from an opening salvo co-authored in 1957 by Roger Revelle of Scripps Institution of Oceanography, to today. Researchers from Scripps, UC Berkeley, UC Irvine, UC Santa Barbara and Berkeley and Livermore national labs contributed to the work of the U.N. climate change panel that shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with Al Gore.
Energy efficiency
UC researchers are helping find more energy-efficient solutions. In 2006, UC Davis launched the Energy Efficiency Center, which is dedicated to speeding the transfer of new energy-saving products and services into the homes and lives of Californians.
Campus links:
Find out more about what UC is doing to fight global warming.
- UC San Diego multimedia presentation on biofuels
- UCLA researchers develop method for production of more efficient biofuels
- UC Merced/Livermore team modeling alternative-fuel engines
- UC Riverside advances waste-to-fuels research
- UC Santa Barbara hosts Solid State Lighting and Display Center
- UC Santa Cruz: New nanostructured thin film shows promise for efficient solar energy conversion
- UC campus sustainability information
Latest budget news
- UC Regents approve plans to trim enrollment, freeze senior management pay as part of response to state budget challenge
- Summary of governor's 2009-10 budget proposal for UC (pdf)
- UC President Mark G. Yudof statement on governor's 2009-10 state budget proposal
- UC President Mark G. Yudof: Our future: human capital
- Making the case for UC
- UC Office of the President cuts budget more than $60 million
- Governor's mid-year cuts include new reduction for UC
- UC Regents approve final budget for 2008-09
Did you know?
- UC is contributing more than $14 billion in California economic activity and more than $4 billion in state and local tax revenues annually.
- UC is expected to have a hand in creating more than 2 million California jobs this decade.
- For every $1 in research funding provided by the state, UC secures $6 more in federal and private research funding.
- More than 1,100 California biotech, high-tech and other R&D-intensive companies put UC research to work.
Resources
- UC's impact: key points (pdf)
- 2009-10 budget process for UC (pdf)
- Discussion of 2009-10 budget issues (pdf)
- Funding higher education: An investment in California's economy (pdf)
- Campaign for College Opportunity issues report on impact of higher education cuts to California
- UC, CSU, CCC leaders: Invest in public higher education (pdf)
- UC Academic Senate’s report on impact of proposed budget cuts (pdf)
- Student fee fact sheet (pdf)
- 2009-10 governor's proposed state budget
- Archived budget information
Related links:
