Past Programs & Projects at HARC

About HARC Program Areas & Projects Past

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Links to past programs, projects, and reports are listed below. Note that some links will not work or are out of date.

Air Quality Research (AQR): PI: Jay Olaguer
HARC works on behalf of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the Texas Environmental Research Consortium to manage air quality research for east Texas, especially in the Houston and Dallas areas. HARC employs nationally and internationally recognized air quality experts to perform research which is used by policymakers to develop effective legislation for reducing pollution.
Center for Fuel Cell Research & Applications: PI: Daniel Bullock
HARC works with an industry consortium to test and evaluate hydrogen fuel cells.
Coastal Management Performance Measure System: PI: Lisa Gonzalez
HARC is working with the Texas General Land Office Coastal Management Program to implement the National Coastal Management Performance Measurement System in Texas. This system consists of a framework of measures developed to quantify management outcomes related to the Coastal Zone Management Act and the Coastal Management Program.
Conserving Lands in Rural Areas: PI: Pris Weeks
The Big Thicket and Chesapeake Bay Eastern Shore are valued rural landscapes, threatened by urbanization and changing markets for their resource-based economies – timber and oil in the Big Thicket and farming and fisheries on the Eastern Shore. Both regions are home to rural communities dependent on natural resources to make their living.
Dallas Urban Heat Island Study: PI: David Hitchcock
HARC was selected by U.S. EPA to develop strategies to reduce the urban heat island effects in Dallas, Texas. The role of vegetation, roofing and paved surfaces in raising urban temperatures will be examined as part of this study.
Developing a Texas Groundwater Monitoring Strategy: PI: Stephanie Glenn
HARC has completed a 2006-07 project with the Texas Groundwater Protection Committee (TGPC) to develop a proposed Texas Groundwater Monitoring Strategy. Monitoring groundwater quality is necessary before estimating how much is available for use. The project assessed the challenges of combining data at different agencies into a data management system. It identified large gaps in the monitoring of certain contaminants of concern to water managers. It recommended systematic m
Economics of Sustainability: The Economics of Sustainability is a holistic approach to economics that seeks to balance economic, social and environmental elements. Only through explicit recognition of both the ecological limits to economic growth and the varied preferences and priorities of society can development become truly sustainable. The Economics of Sustainability works to develop valuable insights based on this holistic framework.
Galveston Bay Freshwater Inflows Group: PI: Pris Weeks
The Galveston Bay Freshwater Inflows Group includes staff from relevant natural resource agencies, representatives from environmental groups, fisheries and agricultural interests, and water district managers. The group has been meeting since 1996 to devise strategies to maintain adequate freshwater inflows to Galveston Bay
HARCwood®: PI: John Colvin
The Houston Advanced Research Center has patented and licensed the HARCwood® process, which uses low-value cellulosic feedstock to create high-value building materials.
Houston-Galveston Invastigators: A wide variety of exotic species threaten the health of Gulf Coast habitats, yet few people know that these pests and pathogens are already present or poised to invade. The Texas Invasives Citizen Science program empowers citizens to take control of invasive species in their natural surroundings through education, information gathering, and management actions. The Houston-Galveston Invastigators is a group of trained citizen scientists that act as a satellite group to cover the Houston-Galveston
Houston's Regional Forest: PI: David Hitchcock
The Houston Regional Forest Initiative involves HARC with the Texas Forest Service and area stakeholders in activities that are fostering increased forestation in the Houston region. Activities include educational efforts targeted for regional decision makers, assistance to communities in the region on related forest initiatives, and support and leadership on efforts to incorporate urban forestry and heat island mitigation provisions in the State Implementation Plan (SIP).
Houston Urban Heat Island Effect: PI: David Hitchcock
Cool Houston! is a program designed to address the urban heat island effect through use of cool technologies - reflective and green roofing, paving with light colored or porous materials, and a greatly expanded forest canopy.
Houston Wilderness Atlas of Biodiversity: PI: Stephanie Glenn
The Houston Wilderness Atlas of Biodiversity will be a book that aims to highlight the diversity, cultural importance, and global environmental value of the natural environment found within the 24-county Houston Wilderness project area.
National Biological Information Infrastructure: PI: Stephanie Glenn
HARC is a regional node of the US Geological Survey's NBII program and acquires, analyzes, and provides Web-based access to biodiversity data and environmental resource information.
Recycle Ike: City of Houston's Wood Debris Recycling Contest
Paso del Norte Task Force: Water conservation and planning in the Texas-Mexico desert border region.

Archived Programs

The Center for Fuel Cell Research and Applications
The Center is a multi-sponsor research consortium working to advance hydrogen and fuel cell technologies from lab to market.

Texas NanoEnergy Collaborative
The NEC was created to accelerate commercialization of clean energy technologies through use of innovative nano-materials.

Cultivate Green
HARC's Cultivate Green program was seed funded by the Texas State Energy Conservation Office to create demand-side knowledge of green building and energy efficient practices.

Environmental Public Health Indicators
HARC works with the City of Houston Health Department to develop regional environmental health indicators.

Galveston Bay Invasive Species Risk Assessment
The Galveston Bay Invasive Species Risk Assessment identified 296 current and potential invasive species of the Lower Galveston Bay Watershed. Of those, 84 invasive species were ranked by local and regional experts based on a set of ecological risk and management criteria. The risk assessment resulted in a list of prioritized invasive species which can be used by resource managers to target invasive species research and management resources toward high risk invaders.

Green Building Advising
We work with building owners, architects, engineers to assist them in greening their work, writing specifications, conducting ecocharrettes, assessing LEED® possibilities, and processing LEED documentation.

Hot & Humid
HARC's built environment team works on behalf of the Department of Energy and the State Energy Conservation Office to promote the use of green buildings in hot and humid climates.

Houston Environmental Foresight
Houston Environmental Foresight was conceived in 1993 at the Houston Advanced Research Center (HARC) as a community-based project to identify, examine and rank major environmental issues that face the 8-county Houston region. Critical concerns were analyzed and prioritized in Phase 1 by experts and regional stakeholders. Foresight Phase 2, completed in 2000, developed achievable recommendations that could be used by decision makers in the region.

Local Green Materials
The goal of this program is to provide the citizens of the Houston metropolitan area green materials information. We provide the information in the most user friendly way for residential materials needs and in a manner known as the CSI format for the commercial/institutional materials needs which is the industry standard.

Southwest Biofuel Initiative
The SWBI is supported by government, industry, university, and research organizations to promote environmentally-friendly fuels. The initiative furthers the development of new feedstocks, accelerates commercialization of biobased fuels, and documents air emissions reductions.

Water in the Lower Rio Grande/Río Bravo Basin
Several years back HARC received an EPA-NSF STAR award to conduct a sustainability assessment of the Lower Rio Grande watershed. The report of the binational research team quantifies water supply shortages under drought and climate change conditions, defines development option for the agricultural sector, and documents decline in regional biodiversity. A PDF file of the final report is available for download.

Environmentally Friendly Drilling Systems
A program to integrate advanced technologies into a drilling rig system that significantly reduces the environmental impact of petroleum drilling and production.

Hybrid Trucks
Hybrid drivetrains are particularly attractive for vehicle applications that entail a significant amount of stop-and-go driving, such as refuse haulers, urban delivery trucks or school buses. Information about the Texas Hybrid Truck Coalition can also be found here.

Diverse Perspectives on Land Conservation
Over the last 30 years, urban sprawl, population increases, and economic development have resulted in land fragmentation and significant social changes in rural communities.

Land Trust: Science & Society
As urban populations grow conservation practitioners face issues of fragmentation of agricultural and forested lands, water management and sustainable development of rural communities. Land Trusts have responded to these challenges by devising an array of incentive based tools to sustain both ecological services and rural heritage for the benefit of future generations.

Past Reports

Galveston Bay Indicators Project
The Galveston Bay Indicators Project identified quantitative measures that met selected criteria and summarized significant portions of the data relevant to the health of Galveston Bay. The Galveston Bay indicator framework consists of 16 assessment questions and 28 indicators describing physical characteristics, biological resources, and human uses of Galveston Bay.

Corporate Incentives & Environmental Decision Making
In 1998, the Houston Advanced Research Center (HARC) commenced a project to examine the drivers - both internal and external - that lead some corporations to pursue transformational business practices that contribute to sustainability. As a result of these practices, a corporation may undergo fundamental redefinitions concerning its mission, approach to operations, or even the nature of its industry or sector.

Guide to Electric Power in Texas (Third Edition)
In 1997, HARC and the University of Houston published the first edition of "A Guide to Electric Power in Texas," a report providing background and key issues for understanding the deregulation of electricity. The 3rd jointly published edition was released in 2003. The First Edition ( 677 KB) and Second Edition ( 855 KB) are also available.

Houston Cool and Green!
The Houston Cool and Green workshop (May 1999) was one of several such events that were part of the Southern Great Plains regional assessment of the U.S. Global Change Research Program, mandated by Congress in 1990 ( P.L. 101-606). These workshops linked research by scientists to the needs of stakeholders in each region. They provided planners, managers, organizations, and the public with information to cope with climate change, shaped to fit the unique priorities within each region.

Houston Corridor Guide to Sustainable Development
This Guide, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, was produced as a collaborative effort with the City of Houston. It was designed to capture sustainable development as applied in key Houston central city corridors.

Policy Options: Responding to Climate Change in Texas
In 1993 as part of HARC's early involvement in climate change issues, HARC and the Texas Water Commission sponsored a series of EPA-funded research projects on climate change and Texas. This report by HARC's Center for Global Studies analyzes impacts and policy options for climate change effects on water resources and energy.

Relocation and Resettlement in Ceará (Final Report)
From 1993 - 2000 HARC participated in a World Bank project aimed at improving water management in the arid Northeast of Brazil. Our team assisted the state of Ceará in improving policies for resettling people who lost their homes and fields to a new water reservoir. The First Interm ( 149 KB) and Second Interm ( 74 KB)

Sustainable Corporations
Economic processes are at the heart of the environmental crisis. Industrialisation has created a culture of mass consumption of mass production that persists even in the face of current environmental damage and the potential of serious ecological threat.

Press Releases
HARC's Press Releases 1994 - 2009

Announcement Archive
HARC's Announcements 2006 - 2009

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