Fellowship program helps researchers develop pragmatic climate solutions

This spring, the inaugural cohort of Yale Planetary Solutions fellows wrapped up their first year in the two-year program, a partnership between the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and Yale Planetary Solutions.  The multidisciplinary fellowship supports graduate student research while equipping fellows with leadership, systems thinking, and real‑world decision-making skills. 

“The YPS fellowship program, with its emphasis on interdisciplinary collaboration and public communication, is an incredible opportunity for graduate students,” said Lynn Cooley, dean of the Graduate School. “It’s an exciting new community where scholars can exchange ideas across disciplines and discover new ways to approach their research.” 

For YPS fellow Lucas Bertucci, a third-year PhD student in Chemical Engineering, the fellowship has offered an invaluable opportunity to think more broadly about his research on recycling end-of-life solar panels, which create a huge amount of hazardous waste, making them difficult to recycle. 

“The best part [of the fellowship] is being able to see different approaches to the same thing,” said Bertucci.   

“We're all generally working on this idea of planetary solutions and sustainability and what that looks like. As a chemical engineer, I’m approaching it as a purely technical problem. There’s a member of the cohort who works with puppetry and how to use that to tell stories about climate change. That’s important because you have to be able to translate your work into something people understand,” he said.   

Bertucci’s interest in the topic began during his undergraduate years at the University of Kentucky, where his research focused on metallurgical recycling of neglected wastes including solar panels, computers, cell phones, batteries, and other electronic wastes. At Yale, his PhD research is focused on transforming solar panel waste into photocatalysts that can separate and recover critical materials from electronic waste. His goal is to develop recycling solutions that are both economically viable and environmentally impactful.   

As part of the fellowship, Bertucci attended Climate Week in New York City this fall, where he had the chance to interact with Yale alumni and others in related fields.  

“It helps you grow the ways you approach a problem,” he said. “Everyone says ‘you have to think outside the box,’ but as an engineer you really have to think inside the box because we have constraints.  Sometimes you have to pivot, to look at the box differently, see what we can actually fit in the box within our constraints. Seeing how different people were approaching different problems and how they apply their sustainability glasses to it informs how can I apply similar principles to my own research,” he said.  

Also at Climate Week in September was Ella Milliken, a second-year PhD student in Earth and Planetary Sciences and a YPS fellow. She researches the applications of carbon dioxide removal techniques that can be integrated into working agricultural communities. Similar to Bertucci, her work focuses on developing solutions that offer both economic benefits and environmental wins.  

Last year, she conducted a research trial which deployed basalt rock to 70 acres of farmland in Virginia. The soil amendment—which geochemically removes CO2 as it dissolves while raising soil pH—correlated with a nearly 40% increase in one farmer’s corn yield during the trial year. The cost of the material and labor for the deployment was paid for by corporate contracts. Since many large companies purchase carbon removal credits, those payments can help cover materials and labor costs, creating a funding model that could benefit rural economies. 

“It may not be significant for a really big grower, but for a small farm, that might be the make-or-break that allows them to keep their farm,” she explained.  

Milliken is particularly interested in creating synergies that repurpose waste from one industry and redirect it to another. For example, she has also tested the application of biochar (heat-treated organic matter made from wood chips or lumber that would normally go to a burn pile), which stores carbon, improves water and nutrient retention in soil, and is often subsidized. Biochar can be further improved by mixing in nitrogen-rich manure from hog operations.  

She credits the YPS fellowship with fostering interdisciplinary connections, improving her ability to communicate technical research to non-academic audiences, and providing insight into how climate decisions are made by policymakers and corporate entities.  

“We need to build a new generation of leaders and scientists that have deep technical skills, but also understand the social and economic implications of their research. The most successful solutions will be those that are scientifically sound, but also make sense in larger society so that people want to implement them,” she explained.  

She hopes more early-career researchers like her will take advantage of the fellowship program.  

“The YPS fellowship program can really expand your horizons beyond your little sphere. It gives you the opportunity to learn from others that you would normally never have a conversation with,” Milliken said.  

“If you dive into those experiences, you can come away as a much more multifaceted scientist or multifaceted researcher. That’s pretty rare, in my opinion.”  

“Addressing today’s planetary challenges demands new ideas and new ways of working,” said Julie Zimmerman, vice provost for planetary solutions at Yale.  

“By bringing early career scholars with deep disciplinary knowledge together across departments and schools, we are creating a community that is poised to learn from one another and bring new perspectives into their work. Our goal is to ensure they are prepared to be impactful leaders in an increasingly complex, interconnected world.  It’s incredibly exciting to see their individual work expand and deepen with new awareness while they also design and pursue collaborative projects.  

“This kind of interdisciplinary engagement will drive sustainable, systemic, and innovative solutions for people and the planet,” she said.