JEFFREY H. MICHELBoard of Directors
Mr. Michel is a US-born engineer and researcher who lives and works in Central Europe. During the Cold War, he undertook numerous trips to the former German Democratic Republic and Czechoslovakia to analyze the environmental conditions of Marxist planned economies. Since German reunification in 1990, he has been involved in research and projects directed toward the ecological modernization of eastern Germany. With coal and lignite the main sources of electrical power in Central Europe, Jeffrey has conducted extensive investigations of the effects of carbon emissions and of technological alternatives to employing fossil fuels.
Background
Mr. Michel began his career as a test program design engineer for the Boeing Company as part of the Apollo Project. He subsequently became Chief Audio Developer at Gerätewerk Lahr, a German company manufacturing Thorens hi-fi turntables and EMT broadcast equipment. He later established his own business in Germany for technical documentation and measurement instrumentation that was contracted by Thorens, EMT, Papst Motors, Auvis Asona, Epicure, Ferrofluid, Sonus Research, and Julabo. He simultaneously conducted scholarly research on the economic, environmental, and social conditions prevailing in Eastern Europe.
Model Communities
Jeffrey directed the first CO2 model community project in the German State of Saxony in 1993 – 94 as Energy Director of the European Energy and Environment Park of the Region of Leipzig. His group was subsequently awarded a grant by the German Environment Foundation to establish the prerequisites for a low-energy residential settlement with 38 individual homes designed by architects from throughout Europe.
As one of the earliest proponents of solar energy in the New German States, Jeffrey created analytical computer programs for specifying thermal insulation and renewable energies in modernizing existing housing settlements. Recognizing the need for reducing energy consumption to enhance the utilization of any energy resource, he developed concepts in 1995 - 98 for real-time metering infrastructures in various usage situations, including:
- A 15 unit apartment building with solar water heating in the CO2 model community of Lützschena-Stahmeln.
- The nearby 38 unit low-energy housing settlement.
- A former socialist apartment subdivision with over 40,000 units in the Leipzig suburb of Grünau.
- The community of Heuersdorf, a village threatened by lignite mining destruction that was seen as the result of inefficient energy usage.
Education
Jeffrey graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1964 with a BSc. in Humanities and Engineering. He received a Master of Science Degree in Electrical Engineering from Tulane University in 1969.
Memberships
Association of Energy Services Professionals (AESP), Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), Heuersdorf Society, Eurosolar, Thoreau Society.
Awards
In recognition of his work in mitigating CO2-intensive lignite usage, Jeffrey was named one of six Climate Heroes by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) in 2005.
Technical Papers
Jeffrey’s articles on energy policy, renewable energies, and climate change have been widely distributed in Germany, Sweden, Eastern Europe, and the United States. His treatments of advanced power metering as an element of progressive climate protection policy have been featured at a number of professional trade shows and published by Metering International, EnergyPulse, and Conserve Magazine.
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