Michael Braungart (born 1958) is a German chemist who advocates that humans can make a positive instead of a negative environmental impact by redesigning industrial production and therefore that dissipation is not waste. A former
Greenpeace activist who once lived in a tree as protest, he is now considered to be a visionary environmental thinker.
Founder of
EPEA International Umweltforschung GmbH in Hamburg, Germany, and co-founder of
MBDC McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry in
Charlottesville
Charlottesville, colloquially known as C'ville, is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is the county seat of Albemarle County, which surrounds the city, though the two are separate legal entities. It is named after Queen Ch ...
, Virginia, Dr. Braungart is currently a professor for Eco-Design at
Leuphana University of Lüneburg
Leuphana University Lüneburg is a public university in Lüneburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Leuphana was founded in 1946 as a college of education (''Pädagogische Hochschule''). Leuphana established a unique university model within the German acad ...
.
He currently holds the
Cradle-to-Cradle chair at the
Erasmus University Rotterdam
Erasmus University Rotterdam (abbreviated as ''EUR'', nl, Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam ) is a public research university located in Rotterdam, Netherlands. The university is named after Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, a 15th-century humani ...
, the Netherlands.
Career
After completing studies in Process Engineering in
Darmstadt, Germany, Dr. Braungart went on to investigate the chemical processes of industrial production techniques with the Chemistry Department at
Konstanz
Konstanz (, , locally: ; also written as Constance in English) is a university city with approximately 83,000 inhabitants located at the western end of Lake Constance in the south of Germany. The city houses the University of Konstanz and was th ...
, Germany. He subsequently led the formation of the Chemistry Section of Greenpeace International. By the time he completed his PhD in chemistry at the
University of Hannover
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz University Hannover (german: Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Universität), also known as the University of Hannover, is a public research university located in Hanover, Germany. Founded on 2 May 1831 as Higher Vocational Sc ...
in 1985, he had assumed leadership of Greenpeace Chemistry.
In 1987, Dr. Braungart founded the EPEA Umweltforschung in Hamburg. At the heart of EPEA is
Cradle to Cradle Design, to create products oriented toward a life-cycle economy.
In addition to his achievements with EPEA, Dr. Braungart also serves as Scientific Manager of the Hamburg Environmental Institute, the non-profit research center which produces the "
Top 50 Study". This study ranks the quality of environmentally sound production of companies within the chemical industry. He has initiated scholarly and scientific inquiry into the adverse environmental and physiological impacts of industrially produced consumer goods.
Dr. Braungart also works together with American architect and designer
William A. McDonough in their product design and development firm, McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry. In partnership with McDonough, Braungart released the book
Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things in 2002.
Books
* . Served as development guidelines for the World's Fair in Hannover, 2000.
*
*''The Upcycle'', with William McDonough, North Point Press, 2013,
See also
*
William McDonough
William Andrews McDonough is an American architect, designer, and author. McDonough is founding principal of William McDonough + Partners, co-founder of McDonough MBDC, and co-author of '' Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things'' ...
*
The Environmental Institute
The Environmental Institute (O Instituto Ambiental (OIA)) is a non-profit organization devoted exclusively to building and managing Integrated Biosystems that purify sewage water in urban areas and for small farms and agro-industries in South Ameri ...
References
External links
''The Next Industrial Revolution'' a Documentary film about William McDonough and Michael Braungart
an interview with Michael Braungart, in ''
Science & Theology News
''Science & Theology News'' was a monthly international newspaper of the Templeton Foundation that focused on science and religion and dialogue between them, specifically the point of view that both are worthwhile and compatible endeavors.
Har ...
'' by Chhavi Sachdev
Braungart.comRoyal Institute of British Architecture: William McDonough & Michael Braungart: Cradle to Cradle
(video)
Cradle to Cradle Design: A Deeper Shade of Green Watch for products that meet this stringent new eco-certification standard
Amanda Kimble Mother Earth News
''Mother Earth News'' is a bi-monthly American magazine that has a circulation of 500,520 . It is published in Topeka, Kansas.
Since its founding, ''Mother Earth News'' has promoted renewable energy, recycling, family farms, good agricultural ...
Feb./March 2011
"A Friendly Tsunami"
interview with Michael Braungart in Digital Development Debates, July 2015.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Braungart, Michael
1958 births
Living people
Non-fiction environmental writers
People from Schwäbisch Gmünd
20th-century German chemists
German environmentalists
University of Hanover alumni
Erasmus University Rotterdam faculty