Dr. Jeffrey Michel

Job Title: 
Energy Coordinator
Organization: 
Heuersdorf, Germany
Conversation: 
Germany's Transformation into a World Leader for Renewable Energy

Dr. Jeffrey Michel is an MIT-educated electrical engineer who worked for the Boeing Space Division before moving to Germany in 1970. He began traveling to East Germany and Czechoslovakia in the 1980's to investigate prospects for multinational cooperation in overcoming common environmental problems. As Energy Director of the European Energy and Environment Park in Leipzig from 1992 to 1995, he implemented the first CO2 model community project in the New German States. He has since served as energy coordinator of Heuersdorf, a historic village that is currently being destroyed by a brown coal (lignite) surface mine operated by two US corporations. In 2005, Jeffrey was named by WWF as one of six "Climate Heroes" worldwide for his development of strategic alternatives to coal power generation. His study "Status and Impacts of the German Lignite Industry" was published that same year by the Swedish NGO Secretariat on Acid Rain. Jeffrey works with the international power meter industry in promoting advanced metering technologies for CO2 emissions reduction and environmental quality monitoring.